I tell you I've had enough of this white stuff around me. Spent half the week moving snow around. Now we aren't as bad as some areas, however when you're not use to it, it just sucks. If we get any more I might run out of room for the snow I've cleared. Oh well can't beat Mother Nature she just keeps doing her thing. I am glad though that I bought a snow blower years ago, it definitely has gotten used this year.

Ok last week I left you with the Overhead drive mounted and the transmission installed. When I wasn't shovelling snow I managed to get some time to work in the shop. First thing I did was go to install the eccentric shaft on the front of the casting which is used to raise and lower the three step pulley assembly so that you can engage or disengage the drive belt. Also allows you to take pressure off the belt while you are not using the lathe. This shaft has a divot at one end where a pointed screw goes in to secure the shaft in the casting. Then on the piece of the shaft that extends outside of the casting is a machined flat spot for the set screw from the handle that goes on there. I installed the shaft so the screw engaged the divot then installed the handle so that the setscrew came out on the flat spot. Low and behold the handle does not sit where I expected it to and the movement makes no sense since there are two pins used as stops for the handle and the handle was no where near them. As well the handle has a ball bearingunder pressure from a spring that should go into two detents on the flange of the shaft when it is in the engaged and disengaged positions. After scratching my head for a while and sending off an email to the other owners who have this drive assembly I took a closer look at the shaft. After doing a close inspection at one end I noticed that the flange portion was actually a separate piece. Once we got this apart and cleaned up then the installation went as it should go. Here are some pictures showing what I mean.
First picture shows how the handle looked first time it was installed and you can see the two dots from the broken studs. Second picture shows the shaft with the divot in it as it was removed from the casting. Third picture shows the flange portion removed. Once this occurred the flange could be inserted in the casting and secured by the screw into the divot and the shaft was free to rotate in the flange piece allowing the handle to be mounted correctly so that it moved from stud to stud and the ball bearing went into the detents as it should as well.

Once that was done we could install the three step pulley assembly and then mount the chains on the sprockets. I had to remove the assembly once to adjust the location of the sprockets so that the chain could run true. The sprockets have set screws as well as woodruff keys to prevent them from spinning however there is nothing to tell you where to lock them down until you see how the chain runs. As it was they are locked down right against the new Oilite washers I installed against the casting arm. Here are three pictures the first shows the three step pulley assembly installed and the other two show the handles as they should be. Up for when lathe is running and putting tension on the belt and down when the lathe is not running so as to take tension off the belt. I should also mention you can see a threaded rod with knurled handle in the centre of the three step pulley assembly. This allows you to tighten or loosen the belt tension as the belt wears down over time.

I also quickly cleaned, primed and painted the two doors that go on the casting. I want to thank Tyler in California for allowing me to purchase the front door that went with this overhead drive. Later this summer I'll make a pattern for that door so we can get a new one cast to send back to him for his lathe. Here are four pictures showing the doors installed and what they cover.

 As well I took some time to clean and paint the guard that goes over the gears just to the left of the headstock. When I was moving stuff and cleaning up in the shop I found this on a shelf, evidently forgot to do this when I was working on that area. Here is a picture showing the parts polished and the bracket awaiting cleaning and painting.

 Now that this was done it is time to start working on getting my headstock back together. One of the first things we need to do is work on machining a new "shake adjusting nut". Previously I had purchased a 9" long pieced of 12L14 stock 3.75" dia to use to make the part. Cut off a 2.5" chunk and went to mount it in the chuck. Planned on using the three jaw since I had just confirmed it's accuracy earlier this week. I actually spent an hour checking out the lathe with a test bar prior to starting work on this piece. Was quite surprised at how good the numbers were. However the three jaw does not have reversible jaws and it was not big enough to mount the blank. So we removed this chuck and installed the four jaw chuck instead. Now, I find out that I don't have a chuck key for this chuck. So over to the toolbox to take out a couple of 1/4" drive ratchets and used them as chuck keys. Mounted the blank, dialled it in and started the machining process. I decided that the I would first work on the side that goes over the bearing that this nut presses up against. The bearing then is pushed against one end of the headstock to put tension on the whole headstock assembly. On my original nut there were three small knurled lines that would be used to grip the nut to tighten or loosen it. You do not put a lot of torque on this nut just enough to seat the bearing against the headstock wall. So essentially hand tight plus a little is all that is needed. Then there is a set screw that secures this nut to prevent it from loosening. I could machine this in the nut or I could elect to machine it similar to other machines which have three pin holes for a pin wrench or slots for a slot wrench. I've machined the piece down so I can still do either method. Once the outside was done I bored out the centre to the inner diameter needed to slip over the headstock shaft. Then we machined out the pocket where the bearing goes. This took a little bit of time as I don't normally take more than 20thous at one pass and I needed to remove almost 2.5" of material however the metal machined easily so the lathe did not have to work to hard. Now that this side is done I can flip it over and mount it back up in the 4 jaw dial it in and machine out the other side. This one will be a little more complicated as I need to machine to better tolerances to allow me to thread it so that it fits onto the other part of the headstock. So here are some pictures of the process. The first picture shows the receiver on the left that the "nut" screws into, the nut and the blank I bought. Second picture has my sawn off blank ready for the lathe. Just so you see the third pictures shows where the nut threads into. Even after cleaning and some honing of the stock it is still hard to get the nut into the receiver and to start the thread. I'll have to be real careful when I machine this areas as the tolerances must be very close. Fourth picture is on the lathe part way through the boring process, and the fifth picture shows the one half of the blank all done with the original nut laying beside it.

Now all we need to do is as mentioned earlier rotate the piece in the chuck and machine out the other side. Hopefully by this time next week it will all be done and I can report success. 

So until next week enjoy yourselves and congratulate your athletes who are over at the Winter Olympics. I wish them all the best and Go Canada Go.

Harold