Kirk Wallace wrote: > Has CNC changed the way keyways are made? I need to make some keyways > for my mill conversion, and I have no tooling so far for doing it. Since > I will may be buying tooling, I want to explore the options in order to > make the best investment. I actually prefer not having keyways and going > with set screws on countersinks. Anyone have thoughts on this? Thanks. > You can cut keyways on a lathe using the carriage as the power source, the X axis to step the feed, and a hand-made "shaper" type tool as the cutter. You want to shave off a pretty thin slice each time as the Z axis usually isn't very strong. I have done this manually on occasion, and even made internal splines this way.
If keyways were in it before, they probably had a reason. The only really good alternative is taper-lock hubs. The Bridgeport BOSS machines used them, for instance, on the axis drive pulleys, and they worked pretty well. You could actually make some taper hubs on your lathe, now that it is mostly working. It is essentially a collet. You have two pieces that are bored for the shaft on the ID, and tapered on the OD to match a taper cut on the ID of the sprocket. Then, there is a plate that allows small bolts to pull the pulley tight onto the collet pieces. You also need a scheme to push the pulley off the collet. Look in Grainger or McMaster-Carr's catalog (on line) and see if they have a good picture of these. Jon ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Still grepping through log files to find problems? Stop. Now Search log events and configuration files using AJAX and a browser. Download your FREE copy of Splunk now >> http://get.splunk.com/ _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
