One liners

[mklotz]

This style of electrical grounding clamps make good lathe dogs. All you need to do is add a short driver rod to fit against the chuck jaw.

One of those small adjustable Dremel chucks fitted to a length of tube with a spinner makes a neat little pin vise.

A small magnifying lens mounted to your prick punch will make marking out a bit easier. Use a bit of heavy copper wire as the mount to allow for fine tuning the focus.

A sawed-off toothbrush head held to the carriage with a magnet will keep the lead screw free of swarf.

A tea ball makes a great constrainer for cleaning small parts in solvent.

Fitting your fishtail gage with a tiny V-block will make holding it square to the workpiece much easier.

Liquid electrical "tape" applied to tweezer ends will make them tacky and prevent small parts going "sproing".

Soft, self-adhesive foam weather stripping applied at the edge of the workbench will make a forearm-friendly fence to prevent small parts rolling off.

[kbalch]

Thanks Marv! I've added your Lathe Dogs, Lead Screw Cleaner, Pin Vise, and Punch Magnifier to, respectively, our Lathe Accessories, Vises, and Measuring and Marking categories, as well as to your builder page: mklotz's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Lathe Dogs by mklotz

tags: lathe

Lead Screw Cleaner by mklotz

tags: cleaner, toothbrush, lead

Pin Vise by mklotz

tags: vise, chuck, Dremel

Punch Magnifier by mklotz

tags: punch, magnifier

[kbalch]

Thanks Marv! I've added your Small Parts Cleaner, Fishtail Gauge, Tweezer Modification, and Workbench Modification to, respectively, our Cleaning, Measuring and Marking, Workholding, and Workbenches categories, as well as to your builder page: mklotz's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Small Parts Cleaner by mklotz

tags: cleaner

Fishtail Gauge Alignment Method by mklotz

tags: gauge, alignment, V-block

Tweezer Modification by mklotz

tags: tweezer

Workbench Modification by mklotz

tags: workbench, modification

[dbat74]

great ideas here

[mwmkravchenko]

Pictures don't do the ideas enough justice. Thanks Marv!

[mklotz]

Pictures don't do the ideas enough justice. Thanks Marv!

If you would like me to expound on anything, just indicate which ideas and what further explanation you would like. I'll try to answer your questions.

[mwmkravchenko]

I think I understand them all well enough. The drive dog I had to think about a little. Are you holding a centre in the chuck and then clamping the ground clamp onto the object you wish to drive?

[mklotz]

I think I understand them all well enough. The drive dog I had to think about a little. Are you holding a centre in the chuck and then clamping the ground clamp onto the object you wish to drive?

Yes, exactly. With the work held between centers, there are a number of ways to drive the work. Most "dogs" consist of something that clamps to the work; drive force can come from a pin projecting from a face plate mounted behind the center. Sometimes the pin is integral to the dog and fits into a slot in the face plate.

When I need to work between centers I like to have the 3jaw mounted. A piece of steel clamped in the chuck is turned to a 60 degree point. This approach guarantees that the center is perfectly aligned with the rotation axis of the lathe spindle. If the stock I'm turning permits, the chuck end of the stock is drilled to accept a Loctited pin that is driven by the chuck jaws. With no projecting dog bits spinning about this approach is much safer than the conventional dog. Of course, if that technique isn't possible, I use the dog shown in the picture.

[drivermark]

Pictures don't do the ideas enough justice. Thanks Marv!

+1

Had to add at least 10 characters to post.

[Ed Weldon]

Yes, exactly. With the work held between centers, there are a number of ways to drive the work. Most "dogs" consist of something that clamps to the work; drive force can come from a pin projecting from a face plate mounted behind the center. Sometimes the pin is integral to the dog and fits into a slot in the face plate.

When I need to work between centers I like to have the 3jaw mounted. A piece of steel clamped in the chuck is turned to a 60 degree point. This approach guarantees that the center is perfectly aligned with the rotation axis of the lathe spindle. If the stock I'm turning permits, the chuck end of the stock is drilled to accept a Loctited pin that is driven by the chuck jaws. With no projecting dog bits spinning about this approach is much safer than the conventional dog. Of course, if that technique isn't possible, I use the dog shown in the picture.

Pretty cool, Marv. This suggests a number of different approaches to making a whole set of lathe dogs that solve the age old problem of 3 jaw chuck runout. A given set would be custom for just that chuck and it's custome worn scroll.. But it's really just an afternoon's work of relatively simple machining. You color code each set for one specific chuck. When the price of a new Bison chuck makes that approach out of the question this approach comes to the rescue. Ed Weldon