Design Study
Hmm…
I have the design of my Taig CNC mill to CNC lathe conversion further along. I have the few scraps of the non-Taig material in hand and I placed an order for all new Taig components I will be using. I had an eight year old spindle and a 3,000 rpm Dayton motor but I decided to design with current parts and slower motor so there would be no surprises if I put together a kit. I also have a new idea for the tool mount that will be much easier and probably cheaper to implement.
The CNC lathe conversion is ultra easy and low cost if you own the CNC mill. I will dare call it a quick change process. It consists of mounting the Taig lathe bed on the Mill table, removing the mill spindle and motor assembly in one piece, and clamping on the lathe tool holder on the Z axis. I will be using a standard lathe 3/4 -16 spindle with a 1/5 hp mill 1750rpm motor to power the spindle with standard mill belt drive. I like the fact that the standard Taig tailstock can be used if required. There is plenty of working room above the lathe with the mill head removed.
Lathes should not be spinning at 10,000 rpm so the smaller mill motor will be a good choice rather than using the faster CNC mill motor, at least for the prototype. Of course testing is needed to prove this point, but it only makes good safety sense not to spin too fast.
Future development could be with a geared drive for slower rotation and an rpm reader to allow for thread cutting.
I decided to design and build this conversion mostly because it seems so easy to do. I don’t have… Continue reading
A Taig CNC Lathe
I have some basic materials on order for building my prototype Taig CNC lathe. I have the rough designs sketched out and I am satisfied it is completely doable. It is a HOB design I discussed in a previous post, “Taig CNC Lathe Ideas”. I have ordered a cast aluminum (MIC-6) plate so I can build a stable quick change one piece base for the lathe head and tail post which will mount quickly on the mill. I also ordered an aluminum stock piece for making a suitable mount for the tool holder(s) on the Z axis carriage.
I am not going into detail yet on my design as it is subject to change. Of course everything is subject to change. I’ll publish the prototype once I have it tested. I have sketched several designs for the motor mount. The first one is the standard Taig mill mount on a post. The motor is the biggest variable in my design notes.
I intend to use the basic Taig 6 step pulley on prototype #1 with space and mounting options for later variable speed motor experiments and ultimately a stepper driven spindle motor or other means for thread cutting.
Lastly, I have a very radical idea. Why does the spindle head have to be on the user’s left? It will require reversing thinking on X and Y moves but easily done at the MACH3 machine setup. It will look to the operator as if standing behind the typical lathe layout. The benefit on the Taig mill is it puts the spindle motor over the X axis stepper and the cutting tool, in position pointing down on the top of the part, is no longer held in the “backward” view. The spindle head is threaded on, so we usually don’t want… Continue reading
Taig CNC Lathe Ideas
Thanks to the contribution by George Moorehead of Gig Harbor, Washington, I see an excellent platform for creating a Taig CNC lathe. My vision is to use mostly Taig components. It is a similar basic idea that other creators have embraced (like Tormach Duality Lathe)* when creating a CNC lathe machine. I am not thinking of the entire lathe, just the head as George has done.
*Tormach seems to be phasing this Duality lathe-on-bed (LOB) product out with preference to their new Slant Bed lathe. At least it is no longer prominent in their product offers. But for the Taig, the lathe head design on the mill table seems like a very practical way to achieve CNC lathe operation.
I have often studied the Taig micro lathe trying to imagineer how to make it a CNC lathe. Many folks have accomplished the task. But George and even Tormach with their new slant bed design have raised a good thinking outside of the box point that a CNC lathe doesn’t have to look like a converted conventional lathe. The head-on-bed (HOB) is a superior approach for Taig components. Of course this has been done by many others, so no originality is claimed or credited to anyone. The Taig factory could be doing it.
My point is any home machinist can do this and thanks to George for getting the juices flowing and blowing away my image of a converted Taig micro lathe.
I have all the major spare parts needed. Even an old style Taig CNC mill head (Non ER) and an A/C mill motor. I just need to design a few mounting plates. I can see that this would also make a great 4th axis with the proper stepper motor.
I am only discussing ideas here. As a dealer,… Continue reading
Seeing The Light
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- Taig Micro-lathe improvements
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- Seeing with the light
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- The BIG glass
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- How it looks to the machinist.
I am showing off my personal Taig Micro-lathe and some of the minor improvements I have made. I haven’t done any super detailing but it seems everyone modifies their Taig Micro-lathe to the way they like it.
It is an older version and NOT exactly the same as the one being sold today. I wrote an article when I first obtained this lathe, so I won’t go into detailed coverage here. The biggest change is the carriage on the new lathes are extruded rather than cast, a much nicer looking detail improvement.
I like the motor on the left rather than behind the micro-lathe. I don’t want swarf thrown all over it and there is the carriage clamp screw on the back side of the carriage I have to get to. The compound tool holder (not shown) sometimes has to stick out the back for angle cuts. Also the motor switch is far more accessible in this position.
I also like how easy it is to make accurate motor belt adjustments. Other owners can do it their own way. The motor base is a homemade copy of one shown in Nick Carter’s web site. I used to buy from Nick (including this lathe) until I became a Taig dealer myself. He is a good guy!
The motor is a Dayton 6XJ07. It was supposed to be TEFC (Totally Enclosed Fan Cooled) but the shaft end cover is open in this motor. I have checked… Continue reading
CNC Wax Bell
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- Proof of concept
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- Stem turned on lathe
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- Inside
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- Bell on sprue
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- 201 grams of brass.
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- Web Wax
Yes! It can be done, as if there was any doubt.
I started with a 2″ diameter 3″ long wax cylinder. On the Taig micro lathe I turned half the length down to just over 1″ (not critical) so it could be held in the self centering 4 jaw chuck shown here. Once in this chuck it was never removed until finished.
I machined the inside on the Taig CNC mill as a 3D pocket. Then I switched to the 4 axis setup and ran the outside profile. When finished is shown in the first picture. Note the smooth finish that is possible.
Then I went back to the lathe (still in the original chuck) and turned down the stem and top of the bell. It would have been too weak if I had done this earlier. The big end will be cut off before spruing for the cast.
Not bad for a first try but still a lot of things to tweak.
The next bell I will spend more time on the CNC picture taking. I’ll do some video of the machining action. There was quite a pile of wax chips and turning ribbons. That green wax is a joy to machine. The bottom three pictures shown are more fitting I suppose for the lost wax casting over in “Ramblin’ Dan’s Workshop” than here in the machine shop blog but to get to this point there was a whole heck of a lot of CNC machining and some manual lathe work.