Efficiency Suggestions

Ronno6 · Saturday at 10:09 AM

Another member strongly urged me to post here for suggestions.
I make several parts for obsolete pellet rifles.
Either to make available parts that are not obtainable anywhere else, or to
offer more affordable alternatives to those who supply obsolete parts at outrageous prices.
These two parts restore function to some obsolete Daisy pellet rifles.

Both are turned from 6061 aluminum on a manual Logan 820 tool room lathe, and I make about 300 of each per year.
I have been thinking of ways to make the process simpler, more efficient and with more repeatable accuracy.
It has been suggested that I find a good second operation turret lathe, such as a Hardinge DSM-59.
I live in south Mississippi; not exactly the machining mecca of the universe...

I have been looking at adding a turret tailstock, moreso for the washer than the button.
the washer requires up to 4 drilling/boring/reaming operations, along with a facing, an O.D. reduction and 1 cut to machine the flange and a parting off.

The button requires a facing, O.D. reduction, concave shoulder cut that also requires a Z-axis move, the turning of the smaller diameter and parting off.

Would machining of these components benefit from a lever production cross slide?

I am not a professional machinist, but do OK with what I have to work with..
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks.

magneticanomaly · Saturday at 10:21 AM

I have never run a turret lathe, but your parts look to me ideal for one. If you fed stock through the spindle, the button looks to me like just 3 strokes
1 Fed through spindle to stop (one station)
2 turn two diameters with stepped tool or two bits clamped in one holder
3 Turn undercut and part off with stepped cutoff tool

Photo of ring is not clear enough for me to be sure, but might be

advance
drill
bore
part

jim rozen · Saturday at 10:29 AM

Short answer: yes. These would be trivial jobs on a turret lathe. The concave radius is a form tool operation.

DavidScott · Saturday at 10:47 AM

Yes, but once you got the machine set up to do them you would want to make a few thousand parts to make the set up worthwhile.

Keep in mind a turret lathe is only as usefull as the tooling you have for it.

Ronno6 · Saturday at 10:50 AM

The concave radius is done with a .120" D cutter. The plunge is centered .050" from the end of the part, so a .020" minimum Z-axis traverse is required.
I have located a tool with a .060" radius on the left corner and flat edge to the right, so this could be
done with just the plunge cut.

The washer has a projection on the front side and a recess on the reverse.
I face, center drill, pilot drill for the counterbore, counterbore, then drill to enlarge the original pilot hole. Along with a hand deburring, a max of 4 turret operations.
I have been looking at options for adding a turret tailstock.
There are a smattering of turret tailstocks out there for the 820, as well as turret heads that insert into the stock tailstock using a 2MT .
But, I am unsure of the usefullness of these methods.
I have been switching drills etc. in a Jacobs chuck....

Ronno6 · Saturday at 10:51 AM

DavidScott said:
Yes, but once you got the machine set up to do them you would want to make a few thousand parts to make the set up worthwhile.

Keep in mind a turret lathe is only as usefull as the tooling you have for it.

So, doing 100 or so on a machine that I use for several other parts may be more tedious than practical?

Ronno6 · Saturday at 10:57 AM

Turret tailstocks for Logan lathes are out there, but mostly for 11" lathes rather than my 10"
I spoke with Scott Logan about this. He told me that turret TS for 9", 10", and 11" lathes were all the same with the exception of the location of the tool holder bores. These would need to be plugged and rebored on my lathe. He went on to say that, even if I located a turret TS for a 10" lathe, he would recommend reboring the tool bores anyway to mate to my lathe. Interesting.

TGTool · Saturday at 10:59 AM

DavidScott said:
Yes, but once you got the machine set up to do them you would want to make a few thousand parts to make the set up worthwhile.

Keep in mind a turret lathe is only as usefull as the tooling you have for it.

Have you actually done the calculations on the material and inventory carrying costs of several thousand parts when the annual usage is around 300? I'd be astonished if the labor time for setup is anywhere near the loss of return on investment for that much inventory.

DavidScott · Saturday at 11:06 AM

Ronno6 said:
So, doing 100 or so on a machine that I use for several other parts may be more tedious than practical?

Yes, those parts are going to take YOU a few hours each to set up and get running smoothly. Once running they are 20? Seconds each or less.

pan60 · Saturday at 11:39 AM

hi guys i had recomened Ronno6 start this topic for some input.
i had recomended the hardinge because they are so afordiable these days and i figurege he would be ahead of the game verses making his Logan a production machine.
if i recal i think he said he was don 75 or a 100 of these a year so my thought would be set up a little hardigne run a 1000 or two at a time then put the lathe to work making something else.

i urrged him to post the topic here becuaes this comunity would be better suited in offering advice do to the know how here in regards to production.

even if he stays with his logan i figured he would get some of the best adice he could here with our little community.

DDoug · Saturday at 11:53 AM

Why not any 5-c collet turret lathe, doesn't need to be a hardinge, and use a bar feeder as well.

pan60 · Saturday at 11:57 AM

i had only recomended the hardigne because of the size and i see so many of them for sale at what i think is bargian basment deals.

Booze Daily · Saturday at 12:10 PM

I have a DSM-59 and as mentioned, they are tedious and time consuming to set up. Once set up you could blast out 300 in a couple of hours.

They don’t have any power feeds so any consistency in your parts is going to come in consistency in your hand feeding and how firmly you push against the stops.

If you have dozens of different parts you want to make you may get tired of all the set ups you’ll have to do. There’s all kinds of cool attachments but they’re fairly pricey.

My preference would be a small gang tooled CNC lathe, but that’s because I have loads of CNC experience. Might not be the best option for you.

DavidScott · Saturday at 12:13 PM

TGTool said:
Have you actually done the calculations on the material and inventory carrying costs of several thousand parts when the annual usage is around 300? I'd be astonished if the labor time for setup is anywhere near the loss of return on investment for that much inventory.

No, since I don't think the cost of having that little bit of material on the shelf would matter, if it does the parts are not worth doing. As far as labor he is going to do it anyway so at the end of say 5-7 years he will be way ahead due to only one setup vs 7ish. I do this all the time with more involved setups. I run an extra week of production to save 2 or 3 days of setups on a few jobs. My customer covers the material cost and having all that $$$$$ sitting there just waiting for the order gives me a warm fuzzy feeling, especially when I get the order and all I have to do is put the parts in the car and deliver them.

Ronno6 · Saturday at 12:18 PM

As it is now, I feed about 2 1/2" of bar out the collet, machine the OD to size, then make/part off 5 buttons (or 10 or so washers) before advancing the bar again. I have a QC tool holder and try to get all tools to zero at the same crossfeed setting. So, it does take me a few minutes to turn the first part in a series, but tthen may be a minute or less to part them off. Most time is spent changing bits and counterbore in the Jacobs chuck when making the washers....

I also make parts out of brass barstock that require drilling and tapping, but nowhere the same volume as these 2 aluminum parts.

DavidScott · Saturday at 12:19 PM

IMO the only way to make one of these little turret lathes work well is to grind custom form tools, but you will need a surface grinder and related tooling to do it.

Booze Daily · Saturday at 12:25 PM

You could have a WEDM shop cut you form tools with chamfers, radii whatever on them. Might make set ups a little quicker.

Ronno6 · Saturday at 12:27 PM

Is it worth my while to pursue a Logan turret tailstock for my lathe?

Booze Daily · Saturday at 1:07 PM

I think you may be trying to do too much at once.

Face, turn and part them all off.
Bore soft jaws and to chuck on and drill them all.
Bore them all.
C’bore them all.
Etc.

I think it would be faster than switching all those tools around to try to get complete parts in one shot.

Ronno6 · Saturday at 2:12 PM

When making the washer,I turn about 2-1/2" of stock to size, face,
center drill, drill the c'bore pilot hole an inch or so deep, then it is just a matter
of c'bore, final bore 3/8" deep or so,
debur,groove, debur and part off.
The repeat the c'bore , etc steps.
I do not need to face nor drill the pilot hole for the next few parts, but have to drill the pilot hole deeper as required. I have searched for a tube size that would work, but have yet to find it...
So, that goes pretty quickly, and, other than some finishing deburring, it yields finished parts.
I would have to think that plunge,rotate,plunge,rotate plunge, debur, groove, debur and part odd would be quicker. But, having never operated a turret, I cannot say for sure from experience.

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