Laser alighnment tool

[seawolf]

I saw a post the other day that got me to thinking about how to align the tail stock on my Delta lathe for drilling. Someone said a laser but didn't go into details.
I have a key ring laser pointer and a lathe; I turned a taper on a piece of cherry then drilled it to match the diameter of the laser pen. I then cross cut the cherry to allow the home made chuck to tighten down firmly on the pen, hand pressure is all that is required. Then move the tail stock to the proper position and adjust as needed then lock it down, pop out the pen and chuck place in the wood and tighten the live center.
The cost is 10-15 dollars for the pen laser a scrap of any solid wood and 30 minutes of your time.
Mark

 

[hewunch]

sounds neat. pictures please?

 

[NewLondon88]

I have a key ring laser pointer and a lathe;

I had to fudge with my Jet headstock a bit to get a decent alignment, and
this is how I did it. It wasn't a keychain pointer, but same idea. By chucking
the pointer I was able to see the alignment much better so I could shim.
Then someone told me to make sure to do it both up close, and with the
tailstock as far back as it would go. That showed me just how mis-aligned
my bed extender was It worked well ..eliminated a lot of the vibration
and then I found out why people like using lathes :tongue:

 

[sdemars]

Great idea, but . . .

Great idea, but how do you know as to how accurately the actual laser component was placed into the hand held case. I would think it would work better if the laser unit was designed to be an alignment tool. The relationship between the outer shell and the laser may be off and would not matter in a handheld device.

Just my 2 cents . . .

Steve

 

[KD5NRH]

Great idea, but how do you know as to how accurately the actual laser component was placed into the hand held case. I would think it would work better if the laser unit was designed to be an alignment tool. The relationship between the outer shell and the laser may be off and would not matter in a handheld device.

Cut a v in a board, set the pointer in the v and rotate it. If the dot doesn't move, the laser is aligned in the housing.

That's how you check alignment on a laser collimator for telescopes, anyway.