What size handwheel ?

I have just made a drawbar for my Colchester 11" Student 1800 lathe 15/8" dia threaded 11/4" x20 for 5c collets & step chucks.
What diameter handwheel should I attach to the end. Probably have to turn one from the solid as readymade handwheels & castors don't have big enough hubs to take the bar.
Thanks Don

I'd say "to fit your hand", assuming that isn't huge (I know some folks with hands literally like hams).

I made mine (for 3C) 2 piece. A hub, and then a piece of aluminum plate turned to make the wheel portion. Wasted less material that way.

You might consider plastic, also. It is lighter.

If you make it too heavy, it wants to unscrew on starts. If you had to reef on it, that's no problem, but if you had to just nip a more fragile or markable part, it can be a pain.

Don, the really correct traditional way to make up this handwheel is to make a thin plate of the desired diameter, secured to the hub either by welding/brazing or a pattern of screws, and then to make up a rounded rim for hand comfort, which is secured to the handwheel plate by a pattern of countersunk flat-head screws, with the screw heads blended into the contour of the rounded rim.

The traditional way to make the handwheel rim is to cut two circles of an especially hard, dense hardwood, or of tufnol, or a similar material, glue/screw them in place on the handwheel plate, and then turn them in situ to a suitably rounded contour of the material, of a size and shape you find comfortable.

The idea is to have an adequately strong handwheel, yet one which is comfortable to use, and of minimum weight. With care taken to ensure that the pattern of screws is uniformly distributed around the 'handle scales', the balance should be correct, or very nearly so, at any reasonable spindle speed.

I've made up a couple of handwheels this way...its a rather easy job, actually....

cheers

Carla

Seven inch diameter alluminium handwheel 3/4 thick
with three radial holes on the outer edge spaced 120 degrees apart.
also make a lever to fit into these holes.
so when you have finished tightening it by hand you can snug it up with the lever placed in one of the holes.
just made one of these.
the lever has a handle that screws into the exposed end of the draw bar when not in use.
My draw bar also uses car taper roller bearings .....this makes for minimum resistance as you tighten.
Also I have incorperated into it a sort of steady rest for the ends of long bars.
all the best..mark

Many thanks for the replies. I have decided laminate one from 1/4 " alluminium plate that I had by me.I will be incorporating a 40mm thrust race. Unfortunately my bandsaw broke down whilst cutting the 7" disks so will have to come back to it at some convenient later date. Could use a wooden rim as Carla suggests, but I think Aluminium would be more appropriate on a 1970's lathe.
best regards Don.

Here is an adjusable for runnout collet chuck and handwheel collet closer that I fabricated for specific work I do in my shop.
The handwheel is about 5 1/2" dia.
It will be noticed that I knurled the outer edge of the handwheel. I will advise not to do that, because it is a hazzard - if one were to get thier clothing caught up in it at 4000rpm !
http://www.metalworking.com/DropBox/_2003_retired_files/Don_shop2.jpg

My SB9 uses collets of the 1A and 3C styles. They are smaller than the 5Cs as they only go up to 1/2".

The drawbar the I got with it has a 3 1/4" diameter handwheel and I can tell you that it is a bit on the small size. It has a smooth outer surface and with oily hands I have had trouble tightening/loosening it. I added a thrust ball bearing to it and that helped a lot but it is still marginal. I plan to replace it with a bigger one, perhaps 5" or 6". A two piece design may help the unscrewing problem.

I suspect that the 5Cs will need at least a 6" or 8" handwheel for proper operation.

I have to agree with donie's comment about no nurling. Smooth is safer.

Paul A

On the handwheel closer pictured above, I used a single Timken bearing and race for thrust. It works very smooth.
I also constructed a simular handwheel closer to fit the #50 taper end of the tool & cutter grinder work head. I found a stray 5c lathe collet adapter and reground the OD for the B&S taper as seen on the work head.
MSC sells 5c collet adapters for use on the tool holding devices for CNC machines. These have straight ODs that can be reground to fit about anything one may want to adapt 5c collets to.