New cross feed nut, gib adjustment

[Kennyv]

Did some maint on my lathe over the weekend adjusted the clutch for carriage feed/ cross feed . Also installed a new cross feed nut .

Had to do some cleaning up cross slide mating surfaces , and a bad spot on gib side surface. Well without going crazy taking off too much material i got er working smoothly with the new cross feed nut however bc of excess wear (i am guessing on the front side ) where the cross slide has been past 50 years. I was able to get cross slide to run nice and smooth without gib tight/ cross feed nut off.
However with gib properly adjusted she was not able to smoothly pass the centerline . Imo without stressing the new cross feed nut. She moves smoothly but is tight on the screw in that area . Any tips and tricks for repairing better without scraping all surfaces?


Gib Question ?
Ohh as far as Gib I did end up taking off material off to get her smooth. I used bluing and an oil stone. However i am at my last of last of gib adjustment now because i did remove all of the scaring . So now soon i may need a need to get a correct adjustment . For now needed to shim about .004 on the front side of the Gib for correct adjustment .

Any ideas anything i can do altogether for the crosslide other than shimming ?

thanks in advance
Kenny V

[Vinny]

Not sure how your cross slide nut is attached, but I had a similar problem with my Logan. Turned out the nut was not perfectly lined up. I loosened the nut, cranked the cross slide all the way in and re-tightened. All was well after that.

Now after re-reading your description it seems you're saying the cross slide was moving nicely until you adjusted it again. Over the years if you're only using a small section of the travel it'll get worn more than where it doesn't get traveled that often. You'll need to clean up the cross slide dovetail if that's the case.

[Kennyv]

Correction what I meant by front side was the cross feed furthest towards the operator . As I shimmed the gib .004 on the wider side of gib on the non sliding side next to the gib adjusting screw . Well prob is fixed no longer needed .

SEE NEXT POST " Blue tells the story"
****** New cross feed nut is installed gib is adjusted perfectly and crosslide works smooth with full range. ****
ps if ya want pics ya gona hafta wait ...

[Kennyv]

Well Good stuff OK  problem solved and the best part is no shim needed to get her to  work  smooth with now the full swing . Glad i tossed this around  . Unsatisfied with shimming for adjustment Last night I decided to take  back apart and get to bottom of it all.  Btw i was worried because prior to installing the new cross feed nut i did take out some of the scaring .

Here is what i did in order check for smoothness squareness and full range of motion with a properly adjusted gib. Blue tells the story ..

First thing set out to blue up all surfaces and inspect every avenue .. little by little i had isolated the two rough spots  (where the was original the scaring was) One on RH side of dove tail / gib ( Gib side . ) The other was on opposite side towards front of cross slide. I found both these minor errors by bluing /using the gib to slide with my finger tips listening to feel any resistance . Than I put all back ran friction tests ( by hand no cross feed nut) which resulted in stoning 2 areas on the gib that left the most impression . Next after truing up these surfaces , put back together, felt /examined the bluing on all mating surfaces . ( again without the new cross feed nut ).

At this point I was very impressed everything felt great ,was able to adjust the Gib and get full range of motion with same resistance at full travel. Yea !!! than last but not least found the culprit as to why I could not cross the center line without resistance. Now this time I was confident it was not a drag issue due to the mating surfaces .This one happened to be a high spot inside the cavity where the cross feed nut sightly rubbed. When testing the cross feed nut by itself it was not an issue . However fully assembled it was enough to graze the surface . At that point I took material off the radius on the bottom of the new nut and bada bing end of story. All problems fixed , smooth, cross feed , new cross feed nut with a properly adjusted gib . . Blue told the story but not the whole story..lol... Hey thanks for listing and let me talk it out its been therapeutic .One happy camper again.