Machine small work unobstructed

[ieezitin]

George...

Nice........ by the looks of it I see you had Hex-bar handy, and i noticed you eliminated two machining steps with the screws... an even quicker way to make them.. well done.

[marfaguy]

Finished making these. I did them in aly. I may do another set in steel.
   

   

   

   

[EdK]

Nice job marfaguy! I was contemplating making some out of aluminum (aluminium) also. I see them as quick and dirty soft jaws for small parts.

Ed

[marfaguy]

(01-30-2014, 06:20 PM)EdK Wrote: Nice job marfaguy! I was contemplating making some out of aluminum (aluminium) also. I see them as quick and dirty soft jaws for small parts.

Ed

Exactly. Especially for thin disk type stuff. I made these a hair over .5. Then after mounting them I took a small face cut to even them out. I think you could probably take 'em out to .750 or so. Much more than that and I think they may start cantilevering (canting?) too much. I've taking some vacation days so I think I'll make another set at .750 in aly and see what happens.

[ieezitin]

Nice to see what you have done.. agreed this is a quick and dirty soft jaw alternative, i never thought of it that way...

its amazing to me how a thought gets totally transformed with like minded peoples in-put.

Anthony.

[f350ca]

I'll have to try a set of these for the one piece jaws on the Colchester.

[marfaguy]

These things work great. Here's the new 3/4" set I made.
   
   

After thinking about it last night I realized that unlike regular soft jaws these can be pre-loaded
against themselves. In other words, instead of tightening them against a ring or a disk you can instead
slip something the same thickness between the flat of the jaws themselves. I took some .002" brass shim
stock and cut three pieces approx. 3/4" X 1" and slipped them between the flats of the jaws then tightened back down.
   
   

I've got a tiny little boring bar I ground out of HSS that I used after drilling out a hole about 3/16" dia by 3/16" deep.
   

One of the advantages of these over normal soft jaws is that it's much easier to measure the actual diameter you're boring too.
Another advantage is there's a much larger area that you're gripping onto. I now think of these more as soft collets than soft jaws.
   
   

I pulled a piece of 2" dia scrap to test with.
   
   

I didn't get pictures of it but I faced off the scrap piece taking fairly heavy cuts. It worked great.
The piece felt very secure. All in all I think these things will be very versatile and make a very
addition to the shop. Also if you don't have a four jaw chuck and need to very accurately re-mount a piece keep these
in mind.