Possibly a crooked madrel....

[gothycdesigns]

I have a Central Machinery lather, of course from Harbor Freight tools. It was a cheap price $84.99 for a 14"x40". It came to my attention that it did not have a Morse taper of either #1 or #2, but infact is a thread on spur, faceplate, and sanding disk.

So for a long time I could not find a mandrel/arbor for turning pens. My father in-law has a metal lather and made me one that will thread on like it needs to be. But since only turning 5th pen now since Thanksgiving, I seem to be leaving more wood to one side. Has any one ran into this problem and how or what is the best way to get even thickness. The amount is about 1/16th or less, but enoug to se the wobble. If I could find a mandrel/arbor set up that is true I'd go with it. My drive shaft is 3/4"x8-9tpi. Again I've called a couple of place that I could find, like PSI and one other company ican't remember, even spoke to Rockler and Woodcraft.

Later,
Gothyc Designs

 

[Rifleman1776]

Sounds like you have an $84.95 boat anchor.

 

[JimGo]

PSI sells one for the 1x8" lathe headstocks. You may be able to find a coupler to allow it to fit on your lathe. But, IMHO (and hopefully some of the machineists will chime in) the more adapters and stuff you use, the more chance there will be for wobble. There are three things you can do to help combat the problem using the same set-up you currently have.

First, you could try only turning 1/2 of the pen at a time. This works great, because it reduces the length of the mandrel used, which means that even if there is some eccentricity, it will be reduced simply because of the reduced length. In fact, if you check your pens, you'll probably notice that the ends closest to the headstock are pretty true, and that it gradually increases as you work out toward the tailstock.

Second, you an check the alignment between the headstock and the tailstock. If they're off, it won't matter how straight your mandrel is, it will still wobble. That's a problem I have, and I need to figure out how to fix it.

Third, you can turn the pen down to basically the correct size, then rotate the blank by 1/4 turn, touch up the turning, rotate the blank another 1/4 turn, touch up again, and then do this one more time. That will get rid of almost all of the eccentricity in the blank. It has been suggested here that, when rotating, try to keep the bushings in approximately the same position as they were before rotating (i.e. only rotate the BLANK, not the bushings), as some of the problem may be some "slop" or eccentricity in the bushing, too.

Hope this helps! Oh, and be sure to read my sig block carefully.

 

[JimGo]

Originally posted by Rifleman
<br />Sounds like you have an $84.95 boat anchor.

Frank, what happened to the other four cents?

 

[Fred in NC]

Ray, the thread is 3/4-10. It is the common thread size for nuts, bolts, and more importantly, for the couplers you can buy at any hardware store. That was my first lathe. I still have it and use it once in a while, but not for pens.

I don't know how your adapter seats on the spindle, but if it does not go all the way back, it will probably wobble.

When I first started turning pens and had only the HF lathe, I made an adaptor from a rod coupler and a piece of 3/4" threaded rod. I used a chuck from a hand drill that no longer worked. You can buy a chuck with 3/8" internal thread in most hardware stores. This is how I made the adapter:

1. I cut a 1-1/4" piece of threaded rod. In the metal lathe, I drilled a 3/8" through hole. A machinist would call this hole a "slip fit" which means there is virtually no slop. Then in the same metal lathe, I faced each end true, to make the piece of rod 1-1/8" long.

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2. I bought a 1-1/2" long 3/8-24 bolt, that is a fine thread (NF). These bolts are measured without the head, so the whole bolt is a little longer. I threaded the bolt through the threaded rod, and screwed it into the chuck.

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3. Then I threaded the coupler onto the rod.

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This was done about 3 years ago, before I bought my Jet Mini. Maybe I was lucky, but it worked for me. Hope this helps ....

 

[TomServo]

Forget the four cents, where's your sig, Jim??

as to the original question, you could probably (maybe?) find a 3 jaw chuck and use it to hold a standard mandrel...

The problem could also be that the spindle face isn't flat (the flat where the edge of your adaptor sits against the spindle) or the adaptor face isn't 90 degrees to the hole for the mandrel...

 

[alamocdc]

I had one of those for my first lathe. Got rid of it b/c I couldn't find the attachments I wanted... scroll chucks, etc.

 

[Randy_]

Originally posted by alamocdc
<br />I had one of those for my first lathe. Got rid of it b/c I couldn't find the attachments I wanted... scroll chucks, etc.

Smart move, Billy!! Ray: You would probably be wise to turn the lathe into a dedicated buffing machine and buy another lathe that is more suited to making pens. You can get a Wilton from Amazon.com for less than $100.....maybe as little as 89 bucks if you have a Menards close by. That CM lathe is going to be nothing but a headache. [!][!]

 

[gothycdesigns]

Fred in NC, that was pretty much the same idea I was trying to attempt. See someone else has done something similar makes me think I was on the right track.

The CM lathe was cheap, I know, but it was all I could afford adn did not have $300-400 to spend on one. I barely got this by the wife. As I mentioned it was after I was interested in to start turning that I noticed the "No Taper" aspect of it. Thus resulting in making one.

JimGo, I was also thinking maybe the bushings had something to do with it. when they are on the mandrel, there is no slop, so they seem to ride true. So far the five pens/pencils I've done have turned out pretty great for beginning, but it is only wen looking at it closely then you see the thicker sides, or when twisting the pen to write or close it.

For the most part I am happy with the lathe, but really have my eye on a JET someday to upgrade.
I just got a new camera and am figuring it out, I know I keeps saying this, but I'll try to post pics of my pens/pencils soon and of the arbor/madrel I am working with.

Thanks again for all your replies. Its helpfull.

Later,
Ray K.
aka Gothyc Designs