This week started on reassembling the headstock, the hammer klutz had been at that too. I put the spindle in the Harrison 140 & got all sorts of readings, turned out the old dial clock was dodgy & kept sticking. Then i realised that holding the spindle in the three jaw chuck one end would introduce inacuracy from the start as well.
I was worried that if the spindle was too far gone everything i had done thus far would have gone down the drain.
In the end i called a mate who is a retired toolmaker & he agreed to pop over & have a look.
In the meantime i turned an aluminium plug for a tight push fit into the rear end of the spindle & center drilled it. Took the three jaw chuck off cleaned the spindle taper out & fitted the spindle bush & a new centre. Tailstock end had to go on a revolving centre but its an accurate one.
Nick popped over this morning & we had a go. At the chuck register it was reading 0 runout on the forward face & less than 1/2 a thou on the diameter, forward main bearing less than 1/2 a thou runout, Other end was 1 thou max runout, The outboard end where the changewheels go was 1 1/2 thou runout.
We then flipped it end for end & the results were identical. As Nick said, not bad for a 70 year old machine thats been got at!
All in all a weight off my mind.
So i spent most of this afternoon scraping in the bronze main front bearing & the thrust face of the rear bearing. Hands covered in blue.
It is eating hours but getting there.
I was worried that if the spindle was too far gone everything i had done thus far would have gone down the drain.
In the end i called a mate who is a retired toolmaker & he agreed to pop over & have a look.
In the meantime i turned an aluminium plug for a tight push fit into the rear end of the spindle & center drilled it. Took the three jaw chuck off cleaned the spindle taper out & fitted the spindle bush & a new centre. Tailstock end had to go on a revolving centre but its an accurate one.
Nick popped over this morning & we had a go. At the chuck register it was reading 0 runout on the forward face & less than 1/2 a thou on the diameter, forward main bearing less than 1/2 a thou runout, Other end was 1 thou max runout, The outboard end where the changewheels go was 1 1/2 thou runout.
We then flipped it end for end & the results were identical. As Nick said, not bad for a 70 year old machine thats been got at!
All in all a weight off my mind.
So i spent most of this afternoon scraping in the bronze main front bearing & the thrust face of the rear bearing. Hands covered in blue.
It is eating hours but getting there.
