Lathes for retrofit

David,

Snips, inserts below:

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com, "David A. Frantz"
<wizard@e...> wrote:

>As far as actual conversion what advantages foes the Lathemaster
>lathe provide over the others? It does seem to be difficult to
>get comments form people concerning the Lathemaster lathe. The
>are always plenty of comments on how to get the HF and Grizzley
>lathes running but very little on the Lathemaster.

The chief advantage of the lathemaster for CNC is what I mentioned;
there is less stuff to remove and/or work around to complete the
conversion. The reason there is not much about it on my 9x20Lathe
group is that for manual use, the "std" 9x20's are far superior,
except for a steel only shop where the lower speed at teh bottom end
is appreciated. Less so with modern tooling...

Which brings me to the next consideration for a CNC conversion, the
drive train of a CNC lathe is likely going to be an upgrade to a VFD.
A lathemaster has spindle gears which may allow for more flexibility
when using a cheap VFD setup (I'm not a fan of cheap Import gear
trains, so I'd just drive it direct.) But again , the Lathemaster has
less "junk" in the way to remove(Can we just call it a Bv20 style?
The "lathemaster" is just a popular version OF the Bv20.)

>It is interesting your comments on the manual aspects of the
>Grizzley, HF and similar lathes. That is all well and good but if
>you really want flexibility, even for manual operations, the
>rational thing to do would be to motorize those axis. Hardinge
>has been doing this for just about forever on their tool room
>lathes, unfortunately not direct drive but very flexible none the
>less.

You're preaching to the choir here<G> My 9x20Lathe group is the
opposite of here; nearly entirely manual users, so we tend to stay
OFF the subject of CNC, the same way here we stay OFF the subject of
manual machining... (Personally, I like and use both manual and CNC,
but not on the same machine! I still think preserving the handwheels
on a CNC retrofit is a poor choice.)

> Thanks
> Dave

You're welcome.

Ballendo