Just for kicks..

[7A749]

Here's a shot of some work I did a couple days ago. Had to make some base plates for a set of moveable fabric covered screens that were building for a customer.

303 stainless. .250" per cut, indexable carbide tooling on a 1940's Pratt & Whitney engine lathe with eight speeds. Around 536 RPM. Can't recall feed but we didn't go too fast. It's a pretty limited machine as far as speeds and feeds go, but many ppl who ran it decades before I ever did got the job done just fine with what they had to work with. It'll hold +/- .005 or better if you take your time.

The machine is running on a cobble job, unbalanced rotary phase converter in my boss's shop. (GASP! )

I plan on taking a piece of this stuff home to run on my 60 plus year old Monarch (running on a static phase converter GASP! ) with the closest speed and feed I can to what I did at work. Sure, it's not 304 but still, it's a 1/4" cut and the machine didn't bat an eyelash. I had to turn 1.5" stock down to a 3/4" shaft with a full diameter 1.5" top. They will be inserted into holes precisely drilled into the hardwood floor to hold the bottom of the screen assembly. The fabric covering them is $200/yd.

To clarify, I'm not against VFDs. I just think too many ppl on the internet get way too hung up on thinking they need one when in reality, you really do not for general purpose, non production type work. Yea, they're nice to have but long before anyone even heard of one, hard working men (and I'm sure a few women too) were getting the work done just fine with eight speeds and some good old American ingenuity lol.

IMHO of course

[motolife313]

Dang 1/4" doc that's impressive, I liked to take a bigger cut too and use a really slow carriage speed. Coolant helps big time

[docwelder]

that old iron can still do the job. from the looks of it so can you nice work.