Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

I bought an MT3 ER32 collet holder and set of ER32 collets from ctc tooling - http://www.ctctools.biz

Yep, aluminium warehouse not cheap postage especially for small bits but cheap for large bits of aluminium, ebay is good for small pieces but gets expensive if you want more than a small amount. For larger dia stuff I worked out for most things I could buy a 2m+ length from aluminium warehouse, make what I wanted and sell most of the remainder for a profit on ebay (assuming I got the same prices as everyone seems to be selling bits at)....

I presume you've seen http://www.chronos.ltd.uk/ ? They're pretty reasonable for stuff, I bought a replacement 3-jaw chuck from them (when I got sick of the burr on the original meaning it never clamped anything the same twice and damaged things).

Have you decided what size tooling you're going to use? I'm going with 12mm / 0.5" myself. Larger is cheaper second hand as the hobby users can't use it. You typically run into centre height issues with 1" stuff though but if you're grinding them yourself that's not a problem. You *do* have a bench grinder don't you? ;-)

Druid

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

I don't like MT collet chucks, threw one at myself at work at 1500rpm or something. When the rest is sorted I'll crack on and make a collet chuck and just by the collet nut and collets.

Chronos is OK, got some measuring kit from them that is alright, some other stuff can be a bit of a lottery.

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

I thought about doing that but was cheaper to buy the collet chuck than try and make one, although I have a nice chunk of cast iron now I could do one from. Plus you'll have to get your screw cutting sorted first! ;-)

Druid

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

I'm on with that, just need some bits.* Really don't want to have to reassemble it only to dissassemble it again so hoping I can get away with boring the gears, broaching a keyway and turning a couple of spacers up manually.

*Need 2 sets of 16DP 20t and 30t. Have a big 20 that I can cut in half, and one 30t from a harrison. So just short another 30 and a slug of steel to make the spacer out of and a little bit of brass to make the shifting peg out of.

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

Can make the spacer and shifting peg at work if you like.

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

Hmmm. Turns out I can't actually find gears for it because mine are likely 14.5* pressure angle not 20* as is the usual standard these days.

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

If you can halve that long 20T it'll give matching pairs, then get 2 new 30T ones which will mesh together OK, they don't need to mesh with anything else so presure angle doesn't matter.

They don't even need to be 16DP necessarily, as long as you can get 1.875" centres (e.g. 24DP and 45T if such things exist). Unfortunately 20DP (as on Myfords) won't work, 38T gives 1.9" centres, a bit tight!

Found this thread , it's a few years old but might be worth a call

Quote - "Do I get a prize for answering my own question ...

I phoned GMB Associates in Tamworth (they are one of the Boston gear
distributors) and they can do 20tooth, 16DP, 14.5PA, 3/4 inch bore in
steel for £11.89, 30T for £15.19 plus UK delivery VAT etc. They have
to be shipped from the US, but they are stock items out there.

Not bad - should get me going OK. They also do 20DP, 14.5PA - 20 to 120
teeth (and 8, 10 and 12 DP for serious lathes)".

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

Right I've got that big 20t to split and one 30t from a colchester bantam and a line on another the same, so hopefully tomorrow I can get that gear and machine it.

Cutting the keyway could be interesting, not done one before :)

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

In the bore or in a shaft ?

Re: Some properly old school heavy metal
 

In bore.

Basically I'm making a sandwich, 30T-spacer-20T (spacer right size for a selector pin to fit in). But the 20 and 30 need to have keyway to drive the shaft.

Lower gears are same 30-spacer-20 but plain bore to spin on shaft, just a collar to hold them in place laterally.