Thursday 26 March 2020

Mini-Lathe - Cross slide lock

Mini-Lathe owners are forever chasing ways to stretch these little machines and many modifications are aimed at making them more rigid. It's always a challenge to remove play from the cross slide, but still have it easy enough to operate without strain leading to pain in your hands.

A good option is to add a couple of screws to load the cross slide gib - you don't want to mess up the adjustment, but adding two screws means that a temporary lock can be provided and the machine returned to normal settings very easily.

The cross slide is cast iron, which is easy to drill and tap:


Watch for the drill catching as it breaks through on the 30 degree feature inside.


These are tapped M4, and I've marked the ones used for locking with an 'L'.

Here it is in situ. I've changed the grub screws that are used to lock the slide to cap heads - to make it obvious which ones you use.


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