Steps to increase production on a lathe

Hello,

Im interested in learning how to speed up making parts on a lathe.

More looking for steps others have taken that reduce the time it takes to make a widget.

Ex. collect closer,quick change tool post,tailstock turret,gang tooling, automatic tool changer, hydraulic chuck,DRO ect.

Little more info which I hope will help out. Im a TIG welder at my day job but nights/ weekends I make whatever comes into my head to sell. Most of my ideas either don't sell or barely sell. A handful really take off keeping me mostly busy until someone else makes it cheaper and orders dry up.

I normally make one item and use it to make sure its what I wanted then change or modify it as needed to make it better. After that Ill make a dozen or so and see if it sells. Sells slowly Ill make another dozen but when they sell fast I farm out the parts to a local shop to free up my time.

Currently most of my widgets are 1.500-.500" diameter and .500-6.000" long ranging from aluminum to pre hardened 4130.

Was interested to hear if people either bought an attachment for a lathe(or a different lathe completely) that really helped speed things up or also the items that looked like they would help but really didn't.

I know this is a completely open ended question with more unknowns and variables than you can shake a stick at but thought I might get lucky here.

Current lathe I can not mention but along with the TIG welder and knee mill Im still making money with it just would like to be more efficient. Correction I make more money farming the parts out but I have to make them first.

Operations include: turning, facing, threading, drilling, grooving, parting, boring and lots of radius'.

Thanks for your time.

Awfull lot of words and yet, not a damn thing about what lathe you have.....

digger doug said:

Awfull lot of words and yet, not a damn thing about what lathe you have.....

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To his credit he did say it could not be mentioned here.

turnworks said:

Current lathe I can not mention but along with the TIG welder and knee mill Im still making money with it just would like to be more efficient.

Click to expand...

Rob F. said:

To his credit he did say it could not be mentioned here.

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Well, then maybe it shouldn't be discussed here either then eh ?

POS is a POS, and nothing will fix it.

Hence Milacron's banning of said machine-shaped-objects.

Suggest the OP try over at hobby-machinist.com

I thought it was nice for a change that a first poster knew enough to NOT mention the unmentionable. Opposite of most of them that dont read rules or lurk long enough to understand what is allowed.

The only thing wrong with the unmentionable lathe is the amount of money you'll spend to make it more efficient.

You need a good DRO system with tool offset capability for as many tools as you typically need. And a good multi-fix toolpost and a couple of dozen toolholders and a bunch of turning tools, bars, collet chucks, drill chucks semi-permanently mounted, offsets measured and ready to go.

Depending on the product, a real turret might be an answer, too. Again, not available for cheap on a cheap lathe.

Probably want several horsepower available, too.

Rob F. said:

I thought it was nice for a change that a first poster knew enough to NOT mention the unmentionable. Opposite of most of them that dont read rules or lurk long enough to understand what is allowed.

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So then it's 20 questions to get it out of the OP just exactly what they are
trying to do, come to find out it's not possible to polish that turd
to a mirror finish ?

Its hard for me to make a jump to a used/new full sized cnc lathe when I'm doing tiny runs of parts.

I would agree that is the simplest solution. If Im only shaving 5 mins off a part by going that route I can't see that being the best solution but Ive been wrong before.

Currently I draw up the part in CAD and it spits out the G code and run the part(ish). Still has a manual tailstock, chuck, and tooling. Rapids from one end to the other slow enough I can pick up my cup and take a drink then put it back down.

Lastly I get down right bored to tears at any sort of production runs more than a dozen pieces or so.

Doug you might be right, I might be in the wrong forum but wanted to give it a shot.

Soft jaws, mill vise and lathe chucks. Getting your part located in the right spot with minimal effort is a godsend. Depth stops in your collets fall in the same category as do stock stops on the saw.

Lay out your tools and parts in an orderly fashion, it'll help you get in a rhythm.

Buy good stock. Yes it costs more but it's easier and faster work cold drawn bars than extruded.

Make rudimentary gages. Got some related features to check? Make a block or plug that's a go/no-go gage it's much faster than measuring.

Divide the work into reasonable steps. Not ABC ABC ABC but aaa bbb ccc and maximize your setups.

Buy good tools, understand their feed/speed capabilities then use them.

Lastly take an occasional break.





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Thanks for the replies.

Cole I think you may be on to something. I have doing the ABC way too often now that I think about it actually its more ABCDEFGH. I guess I have issues wanting to start and finish something without stopping.

It has nothing to do with C.N.C.

It has to do with having a quality machine to that it is worth putting attachments
and such onto to "hot rod" it.

A POS lathe is just that...a POS, and a turret, etc. will just make the
weakness's even worse.

Your sizes would be served by a Hardinge, many parts and attachments still available, including lever collet closers, turrets, turret stops, etc.

And the ways, drivetrain, and bearings, all will be able to withstand the
higher feedrates and still maintain accuracy.

HuFlungDung said:

And a good multi-fix toolpost ...

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If you just care about speed, an Aloris or KDK is faster. The Enco/Multifix is nicer and more versatile but you can drop toolholders into a one-position device way quicker. Or maybe one of those old square compound-mounted turrets.

Depending on the parts, the Hardinge turret lathe - DV-59 ? might be suitable. But whatever he does, he's going to balance setup time against run time, for a dozen parts it's pretty hard to justify turret or nc lathe.

I had a Hardinge AHC for a while, those should be cheap as heck now if you can find one. Might be a possible way to avoid shopping it out, or buying nc and learning all the cadcam crap, or having to do the work manually.

If the parts are suitable, of course.

Or for bigger ones an OAC or OAB is not hard to set up ...

I wonder if a custom ground form tool and a way to hold it might be a good investment. Of course it is very limited for modifications.
Bill D.

Doug I believe you are making 2 assumptions. One that I can’t consistently make my parts to spec and two that I care about the lathe.

I’m not looking to hotrod a lathe granted after rereading the thread I can see how that might come across that way.

I agree with you that just tossing on attachments won’t increase my productivity. If adding those attachments will help then I will even if it’s not on this current lathe. Thanks for the recommendation though I will look into it. Also you are correct increasing feeds and speeds while still maintaining accuracy is a little tough at times on the current lathe.

As for the toolpost I really like the multifix toolpost but tossed it in favor of a Dorian quadra. Just easier for me to smack the lever and rotate it and smack it again on the M00s.

Thanks again all, much food for thought.

Don't worry about Doug. He's just one of many assholes on this board that thinks anyone with less than sixty years' experience is a neophyte, and any machine with less than 50HP at the spindle is a worthless toy. Screw 'im, I made something like $25,000 in profit using an import 9x20 when I was just starting out.

On your setup, as noted, the three things that will really speed work up is faster workholding, faster tool changes, and a proper bed turret.

Soft jaws turned to shape, or a good collet setup, preferably with depth stops, makes repetitive work a doddle. Drop it in, close it up, start the spindle.

For a regular toolpost, yeah, the standard Aloris dovetail pattern is hard to beat. Drop the block on, slap the lever locked, go cut. Secondary to that is have an easy to access rack for just the tools you need, so they're right there and handy.

But the biggest change I made was swapping to a proper capstan-wheel six-port bed turret. It's the next best thing to CNC. Takes a while to tool up, and get all the cutting dimensions right, but once it's set, just keep cranking the wheel and new parts just keep falling out of the machine.

Even though I'm switching over to CNC, I still dive back to it on occasion for things like deep-ish hole drilling (it's a lot faster than cranking a tailstock handwheel) and repetitive tapping, like for spacers.

There's other things that help- good indexible cutters, cross-slide stops, big easy-to-read dials, indexible carriage stops, flood coolant, and depending on your machine, a VFD with easy-to-adjust speed controls, but those first three things will make the most difference.

And don't pay any attention to all the Old Grumpy Bastards. Do what works for you, even if it's not the "industry accepted absolute best way" or something.

Doc.

Way to go doc.....you don't know me at all, and you never will.

And neither does the OP.

Are you trying to "Increase production" using a HF 7 x 12 ?

Because you won't tell, we can't help you.

And it's pointless to waste time helping if your POS lathe can't be helped.

"Form tools" ? For the OP's requirements, Hardinge makes a nice little
tool holder block (LVanice will know the number) that you can affix
multiple "stick tools" next to each other, to approximate a multiple form tool, but easier/faster to set up.

Multifix is more versatile, I seem to recall the OP wanting that.
Less tool count, more options for each one of those tools.

If you can't repeatably drop the tools in a multifix in the same spot
each time, you need help (or less caffeine).

"OAB" I have one, and the OP is doing one offs.

How about a simple 5-c hand turret lathe ?

I happen to own a dinky leetle Logan 9 x 54 and have modified
it just as above, for just such short run work. But you won't read me
discussing about it either.
I don't recommend
it, when there are many Hardinge's on the market today.

Or does the "Troll From Alaska" want to dis-agree some more eh ?

Honestly lathe wise, a turret as in proper indexing affair in place of the tail-stock is very very productive, its the best £300 i ever spent on a returns basis, add in die heads for threading, add in some form tools too and you can make serious money and most importantly profit on a per hour basis than with a cnc and a large payment plan. With form tools and die heads certain parts can even be made faster than on a CNC with single point turning, though you do end up tied to the machine. So many people buy swish CNC lathes and then drive them like grandmas, fighting single point threading at high length dia ratios is stupid, i routinely run parts with over 6" of thread on 1/4" and 5/16" rods with what really 1900's technology. You need to find some of the lathe operator guides from the 1960's - 70's, in them you will find lots of ideas on how to make seriously complicated turned parts manually fast and cheaply.

In my case its more than fair to say my best products don't come from just the use of any one machine, but a combination of pipe - tube bending, TIG welding, laser cut profiles and both turned and milled features + the occasional and simple pressing and to a degree ever increasingly more complex pressings. The more different technologies applied to a given product range the harder it is - the more of the competition it weeds out from your marketplace.

Things like my pipe bender, yes its home made, but it lets me make shapes i would have to spend tens of thousands on a commercial machine to match, you simply can't do the bends i do with a £400 ebay special or even a £8K Elora. You need a twin headed cnc with the ability to bend both left and right ans have enough clearance around it to do this stuff tight in and that is a seriously costly cnc option!

I also re-roll round ERW into custom profiles, its slow, its a pain in the ass, but when your competition can not even buy the tube section you have to use to match something it sure makes it simpler to compete once more.

If you want to succeed my best advice is get out of the turned object marketplace and get into the small assy marketplace, it just gets rid of the competition. Lots of people have lathes - will work cheaper than your prepared to or know how to make the item faster etc, Multi process parts and assemblies means fewer people to compete with and most importantly a higher market price for said items.

DocsMachine said:

Don't worry about Doug. He's just one of many assholes on this board that thinks anyone with less than sixty years' experience is a neophyte, and any machine with less than 50HP at the spindle is a worthless toy. Screw 'im, I made something like $25,000 in profit using an import 9x20 when I was just starting out.


Doc.

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Ooohhh resorting to name calling eh ?

Who's the "Grumpy old bastard" that doesn't post a single "Like"
to anyone else's postings eh ?

Rob F. said:

I thought it was nice for a change that a first poster knew enough to NOT mention the unmentionable. Opposite of most of them that dont read rules or lurk long enough to understand what is allowed.

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100% agree.

Most ESPECIALLY as he is seeking improvement AND NOT defending the indefensible.

That said? I see advantage to a more PRECISE lathe that can hit the prototype's spec sooner and with less effort, stress, or (risk of) wasted time and materials.

Did I forget to mention TIME? Well, just try laying-in an extra supply of it and cleverly storing it in the freezer-compartment for emergency use when deadlines approach. Silly stuff is forever subliming and vanishing.

I do NOT see much advantage in - for example, given these are not W&S nor Gisholt sizes - a well-equipped Hardinge "production" rig that could as easily turn out several thousand as just a few.

Reason is the effort is a part-time one, and he is already wise enough to farm-out the actual volume production, reap "some" reward, and free-up his precious BRAIN TIME to go and clever-up the NEXT "widget".

That system ain't broke, why "fix" it?

Much as I respect my "all manual" 10EE and HBX-360-BC, if I were even TWENTY years younger, I would want a "toolroom CNC" rig for the prototyping and pilot runs.

Reason being I would then HAVE CAD/CAM and proven toolpath code as an integral "byproduct", so could be compatible for seamless hand-off to a broader supply of the modern-day "volume" CNC-based contractors, faster.

That's a commercial decision to maximize the unique component, IOW.
His inventive mind.

AND NOT based off "it feels-good, and I enjoy the tasking of personally running the machinery, hands-on".

His choice, not mine, to make, but one should take that decision BEFORE going-off to "short list" suitable machinery.

The philosophy back of the tool-tip may as well be two separate universes. Pick one, review often, going forward.

S**t changes. It's why humans still have any interesting jobs at all.

2CW

I won't try to cover all previous comments, but I have a few things I have learned in over 60 years of lathe work. I own the lathes, so I do all the purchasing, setup, operation and repair. It took me a long time to get this old and I have learned more every day, just as I forget some things.

I have turrets for my Hardinge and Clausing lathes and have made a bunch of parts with them. Those parts were made in batches of at least 100. It costs money to buy turret tooling, and I have tooling that was bought just to make one part. It takes time to set up a turret and lever cross slide and I would never consider doing it for a dozen parts.

I have Hardinge radius attachments and struggle to find things I can make with them. I only recall using them twice in decades. There are simpler ways to make curved shapes. The simplest way is to use a T-rest and HSS or carbide hand-held wood turning chisels. This is the way all metal turning was done for centuries and it still works. Until recently, many metal lathes had T-rests available from the lathe maker because it was a known useful accessory. It is easy to make one curvy part this way. It requires more skill to make two or more that match. Sometimes a template is useful to check the shape as you are working. I always use this method when putting a rounded end or corner on a part in the lathe. It is a great way to shape a curvy crank handle and is quickly done. A handy tool for finishing that curvy crank handle is a hand-held belt sander (Milwaukee Bandfile or Dyna air-driven equivalent). Not so great for precise diameters, but gets you a nice ground finish.

The other way to cut curves is to make a form tool. It is easier to do for brass than for steel because brass does not want a back or side rake on the cutter. But 12L14 can be turned with such a tool. I have not tried making a form tool for aluminum, but I suspect it would need back rake. I usually use O-1 tool steel and mill or hand grind the shape, then heat treat it myself. That method is useful when there are too many parts to do them all by hand, or too complex to duplicate several by hand.

I use a Multifix tool post on my Clausing and am very happy with it. There is no problem mounting a holder on the 9 and 12 o'clock positions and I seldom use the other 38 positions. The main advantage of the Multifix for my work is the retracting threading holders, a feature not available on other styles of QCTP. I use Hardinge QCTP's on my Hardinge lathes and they are as good as you could ask. One of the Hardinge holders can hold three 3/8" bits in a gang.

Larry