I have been turning wood for about 10 years. I am considering buying a small metalworking lathe to facilitate some new woodworking projects/jigs/tooling. Considering either a 7x16 mini-lathe with 500w brushless DC motor (https://littlemachineshop.com/produc...ory=1271799306) or an 8.5x20 metal lathe with 1000w brushless DC motor (https://littlemachineshop.com/produc...ory=1271799306). Both metal lathes are called HiTorque because of their brushless DC motors. Both come with headstock flange-type back plate of 4 inches diameter for chuck mounting. Both also come with MT3/MT2 for their headstock/tailstocks.
I already have a significant investment in accessories for my NOVA DVR/XP woodturning lathe that has MT2 in tailstock and MT2 in Headstock plus 1-1/4 x 8 TPI spindle threads in Headstock. I am looking at compatibility of some of my Headstock and tail stock woodworking accessories with the HiTorque lathe. The HiTorque specs show MT3 / MT2 for headstock / tailstock plus 4-inch chuck mount in Headstock. I already have a MT2 / J33 adapter and 1/2 inch Jacobs drill chuck (2-1/2 inch long MT2) so that should be compatible between my NOVA DVR/XP and the HiTorque lathe tailstocks.
However, the headstock accessory compatibility has me puzzled because my NOVA lathe uses 1-1/4 inch x 8 TPI spindle for mounting my woodworking drive accessories. So they won't be able to directly mount onto the metal lathe chuck back plate mount or the metal lathe MT3 taper mount.
I have a Beall Collet Chuck and set of ER-32 collets ... https://bealltool.com/products/turning/colletchuck.php The collet threads onto my NOVA 1-1/4 x 8 TPI spindle threads.
I have a number of NOVA scroll chucks with 1-1/4” x 8 TPI threaded inserts to mount directly onto my NOVA DVR/XP male 1-1/4 x 8 TPI threaded spindle. I am thinking that having an ability to mount them onto the metal lathe headstock back plate mount would be useful for some machining such as single point thread turning of wooden projects like lidded urns, homemade wooden "jam" chucks to screw onto my NOVA spindle, threaded aluminum face plates to screw onto my NOVA spindle, etc . By doing wood turning of all but threads on my NOVA then moving the NOVA chuck (with wood project still clamped in NOVA chuck) over to the HiTorque for single point thread machining, I could ensure good concentricity ... and even go back to my NOVA wood lathe with project still firmly clamped in the NOVA chuck for final tweaking. However, I have not found an adapter via Google search that would go from the metal lathe MT3 or 4-inch diameter headstock back plate mount directly to my NOVA chuck female threads ... 1-1/4 x 8 TPI. I wouldn’t do heavy metal cutting/machining with this metal lathe – NOVA chuck arrangement so I don’t feel that stresses would be excessive.
One option I'm considering is buying a 4 inch diameter chuck adapter with 1-1/2 x 8 TPI center hole threads ( https://littlemachineshop.com/produc...ry=-1110836144 ) and then turning a metal nipple with 1-1/2 x 8 TPI male threads on one end and 1-1/4 x 8 TPI male threads on the other end. Would need to drill ~0.8 inch ID thru-hole through the length of the nipple billet before cutting the screw threads to facilitate passing long turning stock into/through the headstock spindle bore ID. Screw the 1-1/2 x 8 TPI end into the chuck adapter and screw my woodturning accessories onto the 1-1/4 x 8 TPI other end. Would need a shoulder in middle of the nipple in order to properly register mounting for concentricity. Would be best to mount the chuck adapter onto metal lathe with nipple already threaded into chuck adapter then do the 1-1/4 x 8 TPI thread cutting on the installed nipple in order to get optimal concentricity.
Your thoughts / recommendations please on adapting my woodworking 1-1/4 x 8 TPI female-threaded headstock chuck and collet drivers to mount onto a metal lathe headstock back plate mount.
Regards,
Tom
Reply With Quote