Michael is correct. I bought a new Romi M17 CNC engine lathe. I have 2 other lathes at work and thay are fitted with Aloris CXA holders. So the natural progression was to fit the same to the Romi. There were several problems with this choice. First off the Aloris was fitted with a hole that would accept a dowell pin and i ued this feature to locate and secure the post. First problem was that the single dowell was not rigid enough when you use the tool post for drilling and boring. The high offet thrust loads generated by the drilling made the tool block twist even though it was dowelled and that changed the drill alignment and offsets. The second problem i encountered was that the Aloris tool post (wedge type) did not seem to repeat well enough to allow the lateh to make repeatable parts. Every time you had to chamge to a different tool holder the part would come out a different size and i was forever messing with the tool offsets.
I have since fitted a "B" MultiFix tool block, thanks to Michael. The advantage for my application is several: first off the MultiFix has two dowells and a precision centr bolt hole. I made use of that center hole to make a steped stud to hold the post to the lathe. The stepped stud is counter bored into the riser block on the cross slide and also fits into the tool block hole tightly...sort of a ring dowell between the two. I further jig bored the dowell holes into the riser and fitted hardened dowells. The complete assembly is a tap fit and locates the tool holders true with the lathe "X" and "Z" axis.
Now i don't get the twist that the Aloris had and my drills stay in alignment.
Further the MultiFix has the added advantage for my application that the tool holders can be set at angles to the work for things like a quick chamfer or corner break, without losing the index to the machine .
I would say the Multifix setup is more rigid than the Aloris, and deffinately repeats better from tool holder to tool holder.
I have some complaints regarding the MultiFix however. The holders tend to be larger than the Aloris, and if you are working with small tool you will need an assortment of shim plates to get the tools to the correct height. The MultiFix holders also only have 3 holding clamp screws. Again if you are using short or small tools you might not have enough length in teh tools to get two clamps on it. Also the tool change time is higher with the MultiFix system. You must get the many teeth of the face spline to line up with tahae tool holder at the proper angle before you can drop the holder into the block. The Aloris due to its larger dovetail is a much larger target and easier to hit.
Most of the above will likely not make any difference to the user of an engine lathe, but i thought you might be interested in my reasons.
I still have the Aloris tool holders for the manual engine lathes in the shop, and i also ues one for my Monarch EE at home. It is still my favorite for manual work, but i am getting to like the MultiFix better every day.
One other note: genuine MultiFix tool holders are harder to find on the used market, and new ones are pretty expensieve...
The Chinese copies that Michael got seem pretty good. The fit and finish is high. I will tool my Romi with the genuine holders but mostly because i am looking for holders that are not supplied fron the Chinese...
Cheers Ross
