Machining an ER32 collet chuck 

Thank you 😀

Hi. Thanks. You're right, first time threading on the lathe! The angle was 60 degrees, not 30. Not doing that mistake again. Cheers

Thank you Ronaldo

Hi Dermot. I don't know if you watched my first video, but the first thing I did with this lathe was break it down. The reason for this... well, there's a video coming up about it. So after rebuilding it, I must say I'm pretty happy so far. I made some changes (improvements?) and there are a few details yet to be addressed - starting with the bench which is far from ideal - but my opinion is that this is a good starter lathe.

Hi. The idea for this is to help press fitting some thin long rods in a shop press. This will be fitted to the end of the piston and there's a jig on the press plate to keep things repeatedly in place. Hence no through hole. I'm not sure if this will work yet, but that was the idea. Thanks.

Ah, you noticed that! Yes, we might have a couple of parts to address on future videos 😀

Sure, but for the purpose I think it will be OK.

Hi. The idea for this is to help press fitting some thin long rods in a shop press. This will be fitted to the end of the piston and there's a jig on the press plate to keep things repeatedly in place. Hence no through hole. I'm not sure if this will work yet, but that was the idea. Thanks.

Yeah, I noticed the taper angle, too. I would have assumed you would have needed to measure it to be sure. I think Joe Pie has a good trick on how to do it in an easy way in a video from years back.

They are plastic (PLA) covers to avoid having chips in the T-slots.

Thank you. I considered purchasing a new (Chinese) one, but then I thought this would make a great opportunity to try threading and taper cuts on this lathe. I'm glad I did it as I had some fun making the tool and in the end got something to share with all of you 😀

And yet, they can. Just like they can make whatever gadget you typed that comment from. Point being that ton of crap comes out of China but in most industries, machining, too they have good stuff, too. But surprise, surprise, it just costs more. Now, whether you want to buy from there or not, is another issue.

Hi David, you're absolutely right. Can you believe I'm posting a video about that right now?

​@@nbrworks That's great, looking forward to it:) Longer story, while I don't work in production and I am not an engineer, I am tinkerer with an analytical mind and I worked in China for a number of years. Through work, I have been in plenty of high end factories there and I have quite a few engineer friends. While there are issues in the country that I am not blind to, the "only crap is made there" statement hasn't held true in a long time. Another statement threatened Westerners like to go to is that "China only knows how to copy". That's also becoming less true. Some very innovative companies have popped up and they are showing the younger generation that this can be done. Now, main issue in production is the classic story of how a client approaches a factory to have a product made and while the samples look great and hold tolerances, the real batches go to shit soon after. Or the OEM simply steals the product and launches it as its own product before you even get yours. This happens, no doubt. Some of it is greed and lack of respect for IP, as in the latter example. But in the first, where quality goes downhill, sometimes it is greed but often it's how the bidding works there and the customer can often be partly blamed. What happens is someone goes to China to manufacture on the cheap. Now, China's wages are rising, as they should, so are living costs, so China is no longer as cheap as many expect - and a lot of smaller companies looking to oursource don't do their due diligence. So, the Western customer approaches a factory or two for samples and quotes and they look good and they send their bids. He says they are too expensive. They lower them. He goes with the cheapest. Now, here's what often happens: The factory already knew they could not make the final product at the quality of the samples at that final price they were pushed into accepting and the only way to do it is to lower quality. There's some cultural difference here. What we tend to see as disingenuity can often be explained as not wanting to lose face. Of course, in an ideal world, the factory would just explain this, but they don't. It's not always greed, though. Or it's a half cynical, half pragmatic approach where they are thinking if they don't take the contract, the factory next door will - at more or less the same "down graded" quality. The smarter Western companies working in China know this mechanism inside out and have their own QC and control engineers staff on site most of the time. But their products are alos not "cheap". But the people who want the cheapest possible deal would never do that. Also, sometimes the factory gets screwed over by its own material suppliers. While these mechanisms are uncool and we can mostly blame the factory, the client is not always without fault. Like the saying goes "if a deal is too good to be true..." The good thing is that this is changing. Lots of young engineers don't like these mechanisms either and want to be proud of what they are doing and what they can offer. But long story short, you can definitely produce to whatever level of quality you want in China. Just don't expect it to be dirt cheap.

@@AntiVaganza Thanks for your comment David. I had a bad experience purchasing a lathe that I now know was cheap. Later ended up buying a second one, also chinese, but this time I paid more money, not only for features, but for some level of quality control. I knew I was paying for that when I was buying the machine. I don't know if you've seen the new video but the point was to share that you can have similar models with different levels of quality. I didn't find that kind of information when I purchased the first lathe - although now it seems pretty obvious. Anyway I wanted to share my experience and hope someone out there can make a better / informed decision when buying. It's a matter of expectations as well. And this is valid for other stuff too... not only machines and tools. I'm pretty sure there's a lot behind it like you mentioned and agree that quality stuff can be made in China.

Hi Chris. You spotted it. Yes, i made that mistake and found out after looking up online as to why the threads looked like a saw blade. I didn't think I would have any views on the video, the channel was new... so I thought none of that matter, ahah! Turns out this was my most successful video so far, so more people seeing that mistake. This was to adapt to a shop press as an experiment to press fit long thin rods and trying not to bend, so thankfully it didn't actually compromise anything. And I learned that I need to set my compound just a tad over 60 degrees to be correct. Thanks for stopping by and pointing that out! Cheers