Seeing that I just paid for my triple start 14mm tap and die set I thought I'd better get cracking on making a die holder for the 1.5" die in the set.
I already have the die holder from Little Machine Shop, but the largest die it accepts is 1".
George's post got me thinking that the 1" die holder could be used to hold a 1.5" adapter.
So I knocked up a couple yesterday (one for a penmaking friend)
Fred, yours and mine could be twins! Looking good! What would you charge for one of those? I've had lots of pm's about me making a few but my little lathe takes forever to knock one out so I'm bowing out of the adapter making business.
Actually I'm surprised that the toolmakers/sellers on the forum haven't stepped up to this oppurtunity yet!
Sorry George, just realised I should have posted that in your other thread, which I have now done, and I was going to delete this post.
So now there are 2 as I can't delete mine anymore!
To answer your question, not sure that I would want to make these for other people. It's not that they are hard to make, just time consuming.
There are quite a few steps in the machining of these, plus they have to be made out of 50mm aluminium, as well as the drilling and tapping for the grub screws has to be rather exact to match the dimples in the dies.
That is probably the reason that other people haven't stepped up to the plate. I think your machinist mate's estimate of a minimum of $40 in a batch of 12 was a pretty reasonable quote IMHO.
I made 2 yesterday, didn't time myself exactly, but I did about an hour and a half before lunch and about another 3 1/2 hours after lunch, add to that the cost of the aluminium and 3 6mm grub screws and he wouldn't get rich on that.
If you could make these on a CNC machine it would be a lot quicker and therefore cheaper.
Anyway, if people are desperate, I can make a few but would prefer to do them as a batch rather than individually, this would save some setting up time in changing from external to internal jaws on the chuck, setting up the mill and rotary table etc.