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25th March 2013, 12:35 PM #1SENIOR MEMBER
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My Chinese lathe finally gave trouble
Well after 10 years hard use my poor little long suffering 10 X 18 Asian lathe finally gave signs that all was not well in lathe land.
When winding the carriage across the ways I was getting a low growling noise as if the half nuts were not clearing the leadscrew fully.
So I took the carriage off this morning, for the first time ever. It all actually looked pretty good. The machining was on the good side of Asian quality and 4 broken shear pin remnants fell out when I turned it upside down, I had a little a chuckle to myself over that. Broken a few of those on this poor thing over the years.
Anyway the problem turned out to be pretty simple. The two 6 mm diameter cam pins which engage/disengage the half nuts (massive bronze things on this unit) were now 5 mm and there was no sign of any lubricant in that area of the woods.
Deary me, why can't the Chinese afford to just put two cents worth of grease in these things to begin with and avoid these problems?
Anyway, easy fix. I had some hard chromed 6 mm steel rod from a Canon inkjet printer carriage rail which is perfect for the job (how lucky is that) which once again demonstrates that there is no such thing as junk. Only selective recycling at it's best. The cam itself was only slightly worn.
So after lunch I will put it back together again and all should be well.
Slightly OT I've been working some more on my old Schaublin 102 lathe and made some wick oilers up for it yesterday, which may be of interest to anyone thinking about going down this path
Here's a short video on it.
How to make a lathe oil cup - wick type lathe oilers - YouTube
Cheers all
Rob
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26th March 2013, 12:27 PM #2SENIOR MEMBER
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Well fixed the problem. While I had it apart I also went over it thoroughly, surface ground the rear gibb on the carriage (it had a bow in it) and also did the same to the half nut gibb (just to polish it up a bit).
All nice now.
Despite the inconvenience I was really pleased to take the carriage off after 10 years use to see just how much crud was lodged in the supposed shoddy Asian machining where it contacts the ways - particularly as I do a lot of grinding, and all my milling on this lathe.
The carriage also doesn't have wipers of any sort.
In the video you can see what it looked like straight off the machine. Spotless. No crud whatsoever. I was pretty surprised.
All I've ever used on the ways is plain SAE 30 - 40 engine oil, the principle being, if it's good enough to stop wear in a car engine then a lathe will be no problem at all. Also being light it will wash away the crud rather than hold it there as heavy way lube will.
Seems to have worked very well, as everything looks A1 and wear is not an issue.
So I'm really pleased I gave it a service, and 10 more years should be no problem at all.
Cheers
Rob
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26th March 2013, 01:13 PM #3
Hi Rob,
Enjoyed watching that.. Impressive work, very nice..
I found the video ( wasn't that hard to find... ) What's inside a cheap Chinese lathe - a quick look under the carriage of a CQ9325 - YouTube
Regards
Ray
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26th March 2013, 03:03 PM #4SENIOR MEMBER
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Glad you found the video interesting Ray.
I see a few members are starting to use YouTube. It's really taking off as a social networking medium these days.
It makes for an "almost" hands on experience and you can put up any old interesting stuff (to some people ) imaginable and discuss/explain the subject as you go along. It's certainly a lot easier and less sterile than static web pages.
I just use my cheap little Canon A480 pocket camera in video mode.
Cheers
Rob