Dogmeat Helical Milling 

We all know Tom's an amazing machinist and can basically fab anything and turn anything into anything else. But being able to explain it and make it seem like the easiest, logical thing in the world? That's a different skill. One hell of a good teacher. Keep on, sir!

That 7 degree collet nut wedge lock is pretty neat design. Elegant actually. Excellent video Tom, wish you would have shown side view showing how encoder was linked to handwheel better.

Very cool Tom- When you said 1 in 14 ....it made me think that you were rifling a 22 caliber barrel (for lightweight bullets). Thanks for taking us along!

I've search long and far for the best method of cutting helicals... that search stops here. Thanks

Keith Rucker has released a bunch of videos recently about fixing up a low lead attachment for his horizontal mill for this same purpose.

Great. Electronics and machining, two of the things that I know just enough about to be dangerous at what I do. For me, combining the two is likely a recipe for disaster. Sounds like fun

I love how after showing us the indexer, the books, the difference between a helix and a spiral; you use the "diaphragm powered lung stored air oral blower". Very technical stuff right there.🤣🤣🤣 Love the video!!! 😁👍🏽

When Keith Rucker showed the empty gearbox for his dividing head a few weeks back, I immediately though that a modification of the Clough42 Electronic Leadscrew (ELS) project would be the way to go these days. This seems to be a version of that, but putting most or all of the smarts in a smart motor rather than a dumb motor and a smart controller.

I don't think the average viewer appreciates how much time and thought went into that! I have the same Ellis dividing head so I found this very interesting!! Great video Tom!

Been doing this for 20 years and it's not the 5 axis stuff that amazes me, it's rigs like this. It's the ww2 industry mobilization that makes my jaw drop. Great content.

Nice! Same principle as Clough42s electronic lathe lead screw

It's only January and Tom Lipton has put out the best video on RU-vid for 2021! I'm in the middle of a build following the " Arduino rotary table for Dummies" guide. This Helical milling project has a massive amount of potential for the home shop machinist. Thank you Tom (and Mr Bill)

Thank you yet again for showing all of us that are not in the trade the possibilities of the mill and lathe. I have purchased a mill and lathe in no small part because of your teaching and passion for your craft. I have many questions that I am sure you will answer in upcoming videos. You are very gracious with your time and knowledge. All I can do is say thanks and keep watching. I think it is worth mentioning to your subscribers that you never monetize your videos thus just further demonstrating your desire to teach and pass on knowledge and skill. I wish some of your other compatriots felt the same and quit trying to monetize their videos. You sir along with only a handful of others are truly a gift to this RU-vid community. I wish I could be of more help to you and them. Until then my deepest thanks.

Watching a legend at work. Thank you for sharing your time Tom.

Thanks Tom, looking forward to seeing future improvements.

If yall ever wanna play a fun game. Try drinking everytime Tom says uhh.

Creative indeed! Thanks for a long overdue and competent exposition of hybridizing basic motion control onto a neolithic manual turret mill. I expect a keyboard and LCD screen digital index ratio box in your next video possibly with the DivisionMaster or any of a dozen other self-contained indexer packages to follow. Cutting leads and precision indexing on a manual mill has always been a huge, tedious, time-wasting PITA - scrounging neglected attachments, calculating ratios that work with the gears on hand, counting turns, re-setting the sector, trying to figure out whether to leave one fat tooth or cut two skinny ones, etc. Bleh! I did it all when I was a young fellow eager to meet challenges and dodged like hell after I gained a little seniority. "Let young Timothy do it. He'll never learn that kinda stuff any younger." And hero-worship shown from Timothy's naive eye upon me, the cynical slacker. Adding lead and indexing capability to a turret mill fetches a helical DIY tooling, low helix thread milling, gear cutting, etc. If you're lucky enough to have a mill with a swiveling table helical gears, worms, helicoidal surfaces are all within your grasp. Amazing how one cabability impells the next. Ours is a wonderful trade, indeed - if you can afford the trinkets to implement your dreams.

Love the MJK reference at the end. Nice demo/setup.

Ah, motion control. Takes me back to my days of working on apparatus to move humans and animals around in space. The components are much smarter and precise now. Great idea and nice implementation. Thanks Tom.

Exceptional video! Digital controls will put new life in manual machines. TOT has put digital controls on his MAHO mill for all three axes.

Wow. This is a lot easier and better than what i was thinking of doing. I have a lot to learn. Thanks for the help.

Thank you Mr Bill for the help.

Tom, like you said it gets the creative juices going and also demonstrates the versatility of this fixture. Thanks for the well orchestrated explanation and the practical demo which for me, at my age, is the best way for me to learn. Thanks very much

I came here after your melon drill project, and have to say that is a very cool idea. Thanks for sharing how you did this. When taking my machining night school there was a day student's project on one of the Fort Worth universal mills set up with the table canted in X, a dividing head, and all sorts of gear train and drive shafts in order to cut helical features on the piece that was being made. All very fascinating stuff!

I know Tom is a tool fan, but I didn't know he was a TOOL fan. 8-)

You are a very clever boy, Tom Lipton. This is a much cleaner set up than Keith Rucker's Rube Goldberg gear train. Nothing like 50 years or more technological advancement. VERY interesting video, thanks.

Oxtool, we were putting this same electronic outfit on converted spar mills way back in 1978 for spiraling drill collars for the oilfield industry. The electronics were provided by Sabina Electric in California. Don't know if they are still around or not, have no idea. Of course back then, the controlling motor was a 10 hp Baldor DC motor and the slave motor was a 5 HP Baldor DC motor. Pretty much the same type of encoders-feed back units were used. The leads were calculated by percentages just like you are doing here. We cut leads from about 30" up to 80", part length was always around 31 foot long. Nice to see someone has recreated this down to a compact package for industrial/ home shop use. Thanks for sharing, Ken

This is fantastic! It can give a bunch of people an opportunity to get the most out of their dividing head, especially if the dividing head is older and missing some accessories (like mine!). Absolutely impressed. Thanks for all you do.

Tom, you're a national treasure.

Nice use of the internal programming of these modern steppers! Will be interesting to see what UI gets added to this, then it'll be a nice, self-contained system.

I've had an idea to do this on a manual lathe with a taper attachment. Replace the TA with a servo driving cross slide and encode the z axis. Program custom profiles to act like a tracer lathe. Looks like Tom and his collaborator have done most of the hard work for such a project.

Great content ! You and your books ! I am 73 and Audels books were all we had and we made do. I may send you a care package of some my old books . take care Tom

I learn something new every time I watch your channel. Mr Lipton you never cease to amaze. Keep up the awesome work.

Respect for the old school

This is a very cool alternative to a similar device that Keith Rucker has been working with lately, a K&T Low Lead Attachment. The benefit to the electronic version is that you don't have to change any gears. You could even change the ratio along the way and make the helix get looser or tighter. I've seen variable helix devices on production lines where beer cans come into a machine back-to-back. The cans enter the helix device, which is turning to capture a can. As the helix turns, the cans get spaced farther apart, over about 24 inches of travel. The cans then exit the helix device several inches apart. The speed of the line is over 1000 cans per minute, so this works great. Sometimes a can gets caught in the helix and gets crushed as it passes through (beer everywhere). With your device, you could even reverse the motor's direction half-way through the horizontal movement and make Herringbone gears (or double-helical gears).

Very cool. I've pondered doing something similar to my lathe for turning tapers. Electronic taper attachment. Now, you've got me pondering again...

Great Video Tom. I have machined many helical parts on horizontal mills in the "Old Days" using the change gear set up. Incorporating a servo and encoder to create an electronic change gear config sure makes for a nice upgrade. It may be worth mentioning that in order to perform this task on a horizontal mill, the mill must be a "Universal Mill". All this means is that the table must be capable of being swiveled on the X axis to the correct lead angle and correct hand of the helix for the part being cut. I have seen many people try to helical mill gears with the wrong table angle only to have the form cutter break right off the arbor. This is not an issue on Vertical Mills as the cutter does not project into and out of the groove being cut. Keep up the great work.

Nice redesign of an old machining process.

I am happy to see two people with the skills to make this happen are teaming up. Keep it up.

Hi Tom ! What a nifty little contraption you got there ! It's worth copying instead of starting restoring a bunch of gears and their boxes ... like Keith Ruckers project ... oh, it's a big project, I think ... but luckily he got some part send in from viewers ! Yeah, that extra little box to change some parameters is a nice thing too ! I think I'll try some 'hard'-thinking ... and then see what it's end up with ! THX, for sharing ... again ... a nice thing from you !

This man is worth his weight in gold

Great video and a big thanks for sharing the tapered collet style arrangement for fixing the pulley. Seems like a superior arrangement over set screws

I just got done fumbling my way through a helical milling project. Can't wait to see how I could have done it better!

Very good video,Tom. Going back in time I remember an ingenious engineer,Helmut Fath, devising a toothed belt drive that converted the plane of motion through 90 degrees from the end of an engine crankshaft to drive disc valves controlling the intake port opening/closing periods. Fath used toothed belts and twisted them through 90° via 2 idler pulleys which ran on the smooth back face of the drive belt. It has occurred to me a few times that such a simple drive could be employed for helical milling. To alter the helix ratio would require a number of different sized toothed pulleys,very much like lathe back gears. Edit to add: now subscribed to your channel.

That worked really well! I know that I'm guilty of resorting to CNC for a lot of stuff like this but I could really see using an attachment like this on my manual for a project that I've been working on. Thanks for sharing!

Gday Tom, you guys a wizards, old school mixed with new school equals a bloody awesome setup, fantastic mate, thanks for sharing, cheers Matty

Great demo. Adds a whole new capability to a standard mill. Sherline makes a 4 inch rotary table ready for a motor or with a motor and controller. The controller won't do this job however. An Animatics smart motor can be programmed to do many things. It has a great feature to follow an encoder with a ratio. This feature takes only a line or two of code. I used this to make an electronic gearbox for a Hardinge toolroom lathe to cut metric, and odd pitch threads. When I did the gearbox 20 years ago I programmed the motor to read 3 digits of thumbwheel switches to set the thread pitch. You can get hollow shaft encoders that might go on the lead screw easily. Ten years ago I made an electronic gear hobing accessory for the mill. I can make a whole gear in the time it takes to cut two teeth manually. For that I have an encoder on the spindle. If I move the encoder to the X or Y axis it will do helical milling. When a helix is easy you find all sorts of uses for them.

Clever mix of modern and old tech! Nice job!

This is a more realistic option for most of us than pulling a Keith Rucker and finding all the right pieces for an old mill to make it work like in those books.

I appreciate the advantages of using the electronic coupling between the 2 drives. As you said, some simple controller work can provide indexing nicely.

I can't help but to think about James's (Clough42) electronic lead screw. Seems like an almost identical solution applied to different mechanical situations. Still, I found this REALLY awesome and fun to watch!

It looks like Tom is making a (left handed) rotabroach for soft cheese. Maybe we'll get to see Stefan make one for quark and Robin do one for scrapple!

That is a fantastic combination of old and new school. So cool!

Great video Tom, good mix of traditional and new technologies. Really well put together and explained. Thanks for sharing. Cheers, Jon

Nice idea, would integrate well as a fourth axis on a 3 or 2.5 axis CNC mill. Food for thought. Great vlog Tom, thanks for sharing. Best regards from the Black Country UK. John.

This little jobbie should be able to be setup to cut progressive and tapered flutes pretty easily too - very cool!

Neat setup with the electronic gearing making for easy changes of ratio etc.

I have a Cincinnati Monoset that does the same thing but buy the use of a sine bar attachment to regrind flutes on cutters when they are damaged. Also used to cut flutes in cylindrical blanks . It has its limitations. I can grind a 30 degree spiral on 1/4" is about its maximum. There is a formula on the back of the machine so can pickup any spiral if tool has the lead etched on it. You can still do it without being marked but you need to indicate the flute . I fluted six millimeter drills from carbide blanks that were extra long. That's the only reason I did it because they were a non catalog item.

Very cool you did that with a semi-universal. Even better I already have all the parts to do it except for the pulleys but that is cheap to get. I have a BS 1 type dividing head so may have to setup the fixture a little different but your concept here would still apply. Thanks allot for sharing.

You are going to bankrupt me. Now I got to buy a servo motor and an encoder. This is like a drug habit.

The creative juices are the best - Thanks Tom! 👍👍😎👍👍

Back in the seventies I used to have a gear train coming off a shaft out of the back of the dividing head onto the milling machine bed lead screw. I was a toolmaker milling three fluted core drills or large diameter reamers.

First time I’ve ever seen a video that said ‘no views’ yet. Glad to see this all new never before seen footage.

That is really clever, I suspect that was how they made the fuseei's on the old chain driven watches and clocks over 200 years ago, (but with out the stepper motors). David

Great addition to a basic milling machine. Nice

Very cool way to do this without having to make a bunch of different gear sets

Great video Tom. Thank you

Many thanks for another great video. Have been watching Keith Rucker's project with interest. However that is only applicable if you have a truly industrial horizontal mill and the attachment and can locate or make all the specific parts. It's a great thing to watch, but it has no application in my little basement shop. This is very intriguing because it's totally possible to do with resources I have. Thanks for some great inspiration!

Really cool Tom, you could setup a button cutter and rifle the inside of a pistol barrel.

Necessity is the motherhood of invention you are all over it great job 👏

Excellent Tom ! thanks so much for the video ! you did a great job on the mechanism Joe

For screw cutting, you'd probably want the servo to drive the table and the encoder to be on the dividing head to help keep your feed rates reasonable.

Another upgrade you can do is to find a way to put an encoder on the shaft that holds the chuck, then have a second little box that can set index positions. Because the second encoder is on the final shaft, backlash doesn't need to be accounted for when indexing, and because the indexing is now electronically controlled, you have basically every possible position within the resolution of the encoder, giving far better range than the indexing plate with very high accuracy. But at that point, it might be easier to just make/adapt a proper fourth axis. As there's really no place on the indexing head for an encoder, unless you make some kind of intermediate plate between the indexer and chuck where the encoder can sit, but then wiring can quickly become a concern.

Exceedingly cool Tom, thanks for sharing!

Interesting project and fun to watch. I am always fascinated by such devices.

I can now foresee home made rifling buttons!

I just bought a dividing head. This is so cool. I will use an all in one PLC/HMI. Thanks for the cool video

I am part way through a stepper motor controlled indexer for a rotary table. Arduino controlled . With a little display and a number pad you can dial in whatever you like. I would think that you could combine that code so that you don't need to disengage anything to index. Just instructor stepper to drive absent input from the rotary encoder. Your helixes are beautiful.

Was anyone else blowing on the screen in an attempt to clear away the chips? This is really cool. Tom makes it look so easy I think I can do it. That might be a little dangerous...😉

A new twist on a old idea! 👍 The holy grail would an app for your phone to put in whatever ratio you wanted.!

very good video oxtoolco..thanks for your time

this is really an interesting project. it could put a lot of old dividing heads back into action. I'll be interested to see how you set for more precise indexing i have a k&t and b-s dividing heads with aux shaft capabilities that i think would be a relatively easy hook up to your system and it would keep the indexing function intact can't wait to see more..

Slick setup Tom, nice work. I like the coupling you made for the pulley. In the shop I used to work I think they had the same Cincinnati mill shown in your book. They got rid of the mill but hung onto the change gears, tail stock, and dividing head. I recognized them from the photos.

I asked our CNC guys to make a 3-start part out of plastic just like that one, and they said it couldn't be done. Hope they see this video!

i have a old 1 1'2 brown and sharpe universal milling machine some where before 1908 or so with the universal head i got from Keith Rucker several years ago . i need to find that book so i can learn a bit more about helical milling

Love the little colletty-thing that you made. Definitely better than a grubscrew.

I saw an article about your work place. Berkeley lab Made and captured “einsteinium “ the 99th element. Very cool and congratulations.

This is cool. It would be slicker to take the the position feedback from the DRO scale thus eliminating backlash. edit: Most DRO's use single ended or quadrature ttl. These are easy to convert back and forth with cheap parts, and likely one of these is the same format provided by the rotary encoder. The DRO scale will eliminate the backlash in the X axis of the mill which would tent to create some inaccuracy at the end of the cut where the table reverses. Mainly this will be slicker because it will be less stuff to setup on the mill. It could be done with a splitter cable going into the dro display.

Brilliant idea and project. Added to the list of Things I'd Love To Get Around To Doing.

Nice bit of design.

That was fantastic Thanks for showing this. Creative juices and humble pie. I have enjoyed your channel Thank You so Much Mark - Colorado

Cool!! Now I'm racking my brain to think of a project for which I REALLY NEED this.

OMG! You just became my favorite machinist! Behind robin. You know... The 'everything has to be perfect or your fired' robrenz. The millionth tolerance guy :D

Great vid Tom.

As you mentioned, with an Arduino you could automatically index ready for the next cut. And then with that in place, there is no need for all the indexing plates. Set the number of indexes for the helix or teeth for a gear and just push "next index".

Thanks Tom

If you reverse direction, there's a little backlash in the X leadscrew, but the servo is turning... and simultaneously taking the backlash up in the indexer worm gear. There is some helix pitch where these perfectly cancel out. I'd be willing to bet it's negligible for a table in decent condition, probably less than the effect of reversing direction of cut with the end mill. Edit: if you knew the backlash precisely, you could program that motor to cancel it.

Very cool! Some good ideas in there for other applications too. Thanks for sharing!

Awesome project Tom, thanks for sharing.

Nice work! Perhaps you could pick up the encoder pulses directly off the X Axis DRO scale for the linear input count, that would eliminate any backlash issues between the lead screw and the table?