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-70's/80's Craftsman? All but guaranteed it's cast iron. As the others have said, very likely you can find an off-the-shelf gear like that- there's absolutely nothing unusual about it. McMaster-Carr has a selection of gears, too. Not as extensive as Boston or Martin, but for something fairly...

-On this particular machine, there's also the fact that the tool slide is kind of biased towards having the tools below the work. There's more +X travel than there is -X. Not a huge thing, but there's also the simple fact that it eases programming, not having to remember that minus sign each...

-Upside down? That's normal boring bar, it's just that, in this machine, the tool/part interface is rotated 75 degrees towards the operator. (Hence the machine being known as a GT-75; Gang tooled, 75 degrees.) (That is, compared to normal manual engine lathe format.) All the OD tools are left...

You mean like painting a piece of material with Dykem, and then lasering your lines and dimensions into it? Actually, can't say I'd ever even heard of the idea 'til just now. :D Don't see why it couldn't be done, though I'd wonder about the accuracy of the scale. That is, if it marks off a...

And those, I just back from the anodizers earlier this week, and finally had a chance to sit down and finish them. In this case, they needed to be laser engraved to mark the two different sizes. I have a laser, the typical K-40, with some tweaks, but I hadn't used it in a couple of years. So I...

Looks like I missed one for you gents. Quick video of making a part for a Trracer paintball gun: This unit is a short extension, with a slightly constricted bore, so the older marker can use today's slightly smaller diameter paintballs. Doc.

One quick mod to yesterdays part stop; Since I was dealing with a long, thin part, I decided I'd make a second internal rod, this one with a concave coned end. That would help center the far end of the rod, hopefully letting it all run a little truer. So I rooted through the scrap bin, and...

Yeah, I've thought about it, in a vague "the concept's in my head somewhere" way. :) The issue is that it needs to be adjustable, anywhere from maybe an inch, out to 12" or so. And at this point, I haven't had either the time nor the mental clock cycles to spare to design and build it. Got a...

One common accessory for both turret lathes and some of the conventional lathes, is a work stop. It's a fixed feature mounted in the spindle, or attached to a collet, etc. that lets you put a part into the machine, and holds it in a repeatable position. That is, if you have, say, ten parts, and...

As a late-teenager, I built a custom car. I wanted to make all sorts of little bits and parts for it, like I saw in the magazines- such as "Lil' John" Buttera- but didn't have the machines. Shortly thereafter, I picked up a badly-worn mill-drill, and took a couple of classes at the local...

-Certainly, and I've seen that done. Ona Bridgeport or similar knee mill, however, the majority of the oil winds up running down the knee elevating screw. I didn't know that on my Grizzly (a bolt-for-bolt clone of a Bridgeport) and now the unsealed concrete under the base is pretty well soaked...

That's... pretty much what I got it for. :) Doc.

Quick little in-action video on the new lathe. Not a proper piece, just a test part to demonstrate some of the tools. Doc.

I got the new braking resistor in yesterday, and after a few other must-dos, took a moment to install it: The one I had, it turns out, was a 200-ohm, 80-watt. Not sure why I got that one, though as I've said, it was intended for the Nichols, which has a 1HP VFD (on a 3/4 HP motor) so it may...

-Lower resistance? I'm definitely something of an electrical dunce, but I suppose I can see how that would work. Most of the braking resistors I've seen are listed in ohms and wattage- the manual for this one recommends a 100-ohm, 300-watt unit. So maybe try something like a 75-ohm, or drop all...

It would seem I can still trip-out the VFD, if I go from forward to reverse too fast. And "too fast" isn't all that fast, really. That may be a problem when I go to do some tapping with a releasing head- which is one of the main tasks I got this smaller turret for. Anyone have any ideas about...

Something like that, or a thumbscrew or wingnut could work in one or two places, but there's a lot of places where it'd be more trouble than it's worth. The locks on the cotters I just made, would be too close together- the handles would get in each others' way. I also need a small wrench- like...

The very last little bit of functionality this thing needed, was the "split cotters", the clamping features to hold tools in the turret sockets. I started out trying to "fix" the originals, which had been mangled and distorted by countless ham-handed operators over the last sixty years, who had...

Rule Number One: Keep your hands away from the spinny bits! That's just as important as "keep your booger-hook off the bang switch" for the gun guys. :) Yes, lots of people have had injuries caused by mills, lathes, drill presses and bandsaws. The thing you have to remember though, is that...

This thread is a perfect illustration of the hidden aspect of machine tools, the part no one tells you 'til you've already bought the machine. :) The idea that you have to have tooling roughly equal to the weight of, and around twice the value of, the machine itself.... just so you can use it...