Holding kitless work

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Amihai

Amihai

Member
Joined
Oct 8, 2021
Messages
117
Location
Israel
Hello,
How do you hold your kitless works on the lathe?

I use a collet chuck and a tailstock live center, but with the live center attached, I can't work on the outer side of the pen.

If I don't use a live center, the work wobbles too much for turning or applying finish. I'm afraid it might even break!

Guess you can turn half of the work and then reverse and turn the other side. But what about applying finish? Shouldn't it be applied all at once? How would you even grab a half finished piece without damaging the finish?

Any tips on your working order and equipment will be appreciated. Thanks!
 
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I make custom steel mandrels on my metal lathe for my kitless pens. I can then mount them in my Beal collet chuck, or even a regular chuck. The mandrels are threaded and match the sleeves in the pen. This gives great rigidity and eliminates the need for a love center in the tail stock. Gabe Castro has some good Youtube videos on kitless pen making. B'hatslacha!
 
Mandrels are the way to go. Rick will make them for you on this site. I think turners warehouse or exotic blanks carries them. No affilition with any of these businesses.
 
RichAldrich said:
Mandrels are the way to go. Rick will make them for you on this site. I think turners warehouse or exotic blanks carries them. No affilition with any of these businesses.
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I made mandrels from Ebonite.
However, they don't seem to hold the work well. It still wobbles at the other hand.
Maybe make long ones with a sleve?..
 
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I use a small metal lathe for my pen making and most of the time I hold the parts in a 4-jaw chuck. I have made some mandrels from brass and steel recently to make certain operations easier, but I don't find them necessary.

As far as order of operations, for a cap or barrel I start by cutting off a length of material long enough to make the part plus a little extra for clean up. I bury the stock in the chuck deep enough to hold solidly but with enough material exposed that I can turn the exterior to size for a length long enough to grab in the chuck for the second operation. I'll drill and shape the interior and exterior, cut the threads and bring the finish up to almost done. Then I reverse the part in the chuck, dial it in to under a half thou of runout and finish the exterior. Final finishing is done off the lathe. Sections I do roughly the same way if they are single piece. (Most of my sections for cartridge pens are made in a similar way to commercial pens. I use a metal joint that's threaded to fit the barrel and the nib unit and then make an exterior sleeve for the grip section.) I turn and thread the back to fit the barrel and drill and bore through to fit the cartridge or converter. If I'm using a threaded converter I'll cut those threads aswell. Then I flip the part in the chuck and dial in on the bore. I'll face it, open up the bore to fit the nib housing and cut the threads. Then I'll turn and shape the exterior and finish it. I've never had any issues with parts wobbling or not being supported well enough, but gripping hollow parts with a chuck without a plug in the part can result in parts that aren't perfectly round.
 
I mostly used either brass or aluminum mandrels. If I need to do some shaping on the ends, I will use files or 220 grit sand paper with little pressure. If more pressure is required on longer bodies, I will use a steady rest on the metal lathe.
 
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