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Well it was bound to happen and I have had my first bad crash with the lathe. Was turning some aluminum with the auto feed and to be honest I am not sure what happend. All I know is the tooling started digging in the material and then crash into the chuck. Sparks, noise, and panic set in. Hit the emergency kill switch but the damage was done. Took about 10 mins to free everything up again and this is the result.

Luckily a few dollars will put me back in action. The down time will allow me to check all the settings and make sure I have a rigid set up again. Enjoy the pic of small amount of carnage

Jake

Jake,
thanx for reminding me that crap doesn't happen just to me

thanx also for sharing carnage pix with us.
Todd

does that lathe have a trip lever for the auto feed?

Trey, there is a lever that engages the auto feed on the saddle. I would love to say I just reached down and disengaged the feed, but when it the lathe started throwing sparks, and screaming, I freaked . The only thing I could do at that point was kill the machine by slapping the emergency cutoff.

Todd, I am glad my accident gives you some relief . You know what they say, you are not a machinist until you break your own machine by running the tooling into the chuck. I don't know one who has not crashed at least once in life.

New parts on order. Only $8 to boot

Jake

I dont think I would have been able to hit the shutoff. I probably would have ran out screaming!

Jake,your a RC guy put a spur gear on it and ya build stuff,good stuff. keeo on machinin!!!!! Johnny

i see the problem. that thing don't have a slipper on it. unless you are using it on dirt oval i would advise installing a slipper on it.

LowClassCC wrote:i see the problem. that thing don't have a slipper on it. unless you are using it on dirt oval i would advise installing a slipper on it.

LOL! That's what I was thinking!!

something similar to this happened in shop class last semester. guy didn't have the bit holder very tight so when he started to cut material it moved and dug right in.

i would have crapped myself.

rc10johnny wrote:Jake,your a RC guy put a spur gear on it and ya build stuff,good stuff. keeo on machinin!!!!! Johnny

Man, don't laugh. I have an Atlas 6" lathe that has a 32 pitch pinion in the gearbox for the saddle! The original part was toast and it just so happened that a pinion was perfect in every respect. Yup, I know, Flintstone Engineering at it's finest!

thats good to know on the atlas. I'm in the process of getting one up and running, but I'll have to keep that in mind should mine wear out or break.

what make of lathe is that you have? 9 bucks sounds pretty darn good for replacement gears......

like they say, you haven't earned your machinist badge until you've crashed a lathe, hahhah

Hey Jake,gonna put my special made parts on my new TQ build ,whats the lathe look like front view. Johnny

I was thinking that was pretty inexpensive to repair your lathe also. Possibly a Harbor Freight/Grizzly model? I know some of those have plastic gears in them. Also, for small lathes A2Z CNC makes a FANTASTIC quick change tool post assembly. There are proabably some out there that are less expensive and some way more expensive, but I've had one for many years and have transferred it from the Atlas to a Sherline and have never had a problem with it.

http://www.a2zcorp.us/store/Category.asp?Cguid={4EBEE5E0-FD40-4DF0-8364-FE85D043BEEF}&Category=QuickChangeToolPost%3AToolPost

Tom

Damn!
Worst i've done was auto feed into a part I was making with the auto feed gears set for threading so it went in fast. Hit the part hard, bent it and jammed the lathe up so it didn't make it to the chuck. Lucky it has a v belt drive so that just slipped til I turned it off.