Other Smithy Owners ?

[AntonLargiader]

Reading back through the thread a bit there were a few mentions of the drill chucks. The chucks (tailstock and mill/drill head) and keys were kind of a disaster on my 1340. The two no-name chucks didn't take the same kind of key (one used a Jacobs pattern and one didn't), one of them didn't hold well, and neither of them worked with the keys that were supplied. I needed a new chuck for my drill press so I bought a couple of new Jacobs (name brand) chucks that all used the same key and an extra key. Now I can grab any key from anywhere in the room and it will work, and I often use two keys at once to hopefully get a more even tightening force.

If I get around to it I would like to gear the motor down a bit and clean/inspect/replace? the lathe spindle bearings. I have a lot of flex in the spindle that I think isn't actually flex.

[torchroadster]

Smithy makes a speed reduction pulley kit for the 1340. (Product Code: 40-300G ) I installed it on my machine and would recommend it for slow speed work. It also helps the motor run cooler because the motor speed stays high enough to provided fan cooling even though the machine is running at slower speeds.

[AntonLargiader]

Smithy makes a speed reduction pulley kit for the 1340....

Smithy says, "Item no. 40-300G is not required on Granite MAX and Granite I-MAX Series or on any Granite models manufactured after September 2004." Apparently they already have this. My machine is labeled Granite 1340-MX on the mill head and G1340MX on the data plate, but I do not seem to have this. My motor spindle has a 2-speed pulley that drives the lathe spindle directly.

I keep it in the slow position, and it goes plenty fast for me. What would people use the fastest combination (apparently 2800 RPM) for?

[AntonLargiader]

Answering my own question here, based on info from the Smithy Yahoo group. When Smithy phased in the 2HP brushless motor (to replace the 1.5HP brushed motor) the speed reduction kit was considered unnecessary. One of the members of that group upgraded his Granite to the newer motor and removed his reduction kit, so I guess there is truth to the idea. The new motor does have pretty good low-RPM torque.

Torchroadster, do you have the old motor or the new one? The new one has a square finned aluminum housing with a controller box mounted behind the machine.

[75TH RANGER]

Wanted to know if anyone with the 1340 Granite has encountered a vibration when using the Lathe.
When I take mine out of gear the vibration goes away. As I am looking at the Gears in the Pulley Box, I notice when the Lathe is engaged I can see the Upper Spindle moving with quite a bit of runout and that runout matches the rotational vibration.
It also happens when the Mill Head is activated because the both work off the same Upper Spindle.
I will call Smithy to find out what to do but wondered if anyone here as ran across this and has a fix for it.

Ranger

[Grandpa's Barn]

I bought a new Smithy 1220LTD, early 2019. Thought I already had enough tooling to get started, ha. Have since purchased more tooling than the cost of the machine, and that doesn't include the 4" Kurt vise given to me. I chose the smithy due to space limitations and because of it's weight, thinking that would translate to rigidity. And it does in the lathe but not the mill. I'm not dissatisfied but coming from Bridgeports at work, there was an expectation. I've added DRO, QCTP and depth stop on mill head. I've milled a small relief in the tailback base to clear the carriage and gained 1.5" approaching the chuck. Am currently working on installing a 1 hp, 3 phase motor with VFD on the mill to attain slower speeds and quicker speed changes. Have all the parts for a Clough42 electronic lead screw which will make using the table power feed quite useful. With the DRO and holding my mouth just right, I can hold .0005" tolerance, but casual machining is .001". Though I didn't buy the Smithy to make money, I did a job that paid for it several times over. Not bragging, just wanted other owners and potential buyers to be open minded about the Smithy line.

[olf20]

Any one have a steady rest for a 1220 that they don't use??
Thanks for any help!
olf20 / Bob

[olf20]

Any one know the angle of the 1220 bed ways? Going to make a stop /
dial indicator.
Thanks for any information.
olf20 / Bob

[Dan Krager]

Earlier this year I bought a new Granite 1324 with DRO and the new brushless motor. I sold the older model I had just to get the DRO and brushless motor features of the new one. I have been a woodworker since 1967, and spent 20 years or more making a living doing only custom woodwork. (insert long varied careers) After several years of "retirement", wife suggested I take a welding course at the local college because as a senior citizen it was free. So I got into metal working both fabricating and machining. (Little did she know......$$$$$$$) In one of my efforts to earn money I spent three years in a machine shop as a programmer, so machining wasn't new but the welding part was. Long story short, I ended up with a pretty well equipped metal shop AND a woodworking shop. It's all jammed into about 1200 sq ft at our "new" residence in southern Indiana. (We're IL refugees seeking asylum in IN).

I'm glad to have found this thread just to hear about other's experiences and share my own.

The used Granite 1324 I bought had been dumped on it's head at some point in the past and the repair was pretty decent. I ended up putting a new motor on it to replace the abused one that failed. Abused because it was run too slow to cool itself and it died. Found the jack shaft parts and installed them with the new motor no problems thereafter. Until I got the wants for the capability of the new brushless motor and DRO. So far I'm liking the DRO but as mentioned a while back, the manual is Chinglish and takes a bit of code breaking to work through it. Only tackled beginner stuff locating holes in a plate etc so far. I also own two Fox Supershops (that use the same motor and controller as older Smithy....stuff is 1975 tech) and one of their lateral feed gear motors ate a small gear that I need to make. I've studied on that problem of making this odd little gear for almost a year now, and have begun to understand what I'm facing. The company that made the motor is alive and well in St. Louis, but they had a catastrophe and cannot supply anything of their old motors by part number. They don't have good customer service that might go measure and pick one, so I will take up the challenge of making it. I have to find the parts again that got shuffled in this move, then find the papers that remind me of what I have and need to make. I've read through all the gear forum posts and am fascinated by the home made tool forum.
DanK

[torchroadster]

Good luck with the gear! I've had my 1340 for over 15 years, and I've done a lot - but I've never machined a gear. Show us how it turns out!

[Dan Krager]

Will do, but it might be later in the fall before the round tuit surfaces. It can't be postponed indefinitely because I want to be able to use the lateral feed on the machine where it broke. Fortunately I have an intact gear to compare to if I take the other machine's lateral feed apart. It's a compound gear, meaning a larger and smaller gear are pressed together and it was the smaller gear that stripped. They look like sintered metal pressed into gear shape and the broken parts are ragged, sharp, and crystalline. So a mild steel gear will be much stronger. It's a small diameter gear with 11 teeth (ugh), so my gut says a cutter, (the smallest made) for 12 teeth would not work very well. But I have no experience to make that call. I'm intrigued with making a cutter (zero degree hob) and indexing the blank to get an approximated faceted volute. I think that would work very well. I will post a couple pictures of the before with my calculations to be verified.
DanK

[Dan Krager]

Has anyone found a decent manual for the DRO Smithy is sending with the new machines?

The Chinglish manual that came with it doesn't adequately cover lathe functions. The method it describes for lathe users is to use the UCS system to set predetermined locations relative to the absolute system which one zeros out at CL and one master reference end point, ie, each diameter and one end point of it are presets that become the landmarks to work towards. That works OK for preplanned and drafted (drawn out specifications) operations but not so much for "on the fly", which would be more common for hobby users like myself.

For example, I wish to turn a 3/4" x 2" rod down to 1/4" x 1" to make a small drift for my 2T hand press which is drilled for 3/4". This is a trivial learning example to understand how the DRO can be helpful. I'm hoping there is a lathe function that I can zero out the 3/4" diameter, enter a target diameter of 1/4" and the display result gives me a countdown to target.

I guess I could use the calculator function to take half the difference between 0.750" and 0.250", transfer that to the Y axis and countdown to zero, changing the sign if necessary.

Yes, I'm being lazy, but that's one reason I bought the DRO !!!

DanK

[Dan Krager]

Oh, and another thing. Has anyone obtained or built accordion style way covers for the 1324 or 1340? I made some flat fabric stuff but it bunches up and doesn't stay where I put it. After reading about accordion style, I realized I could put metal straps to hold the fabric in place on the ends, but then it would still bunch up. The accordion covers can be home made and with a bit of creative folding be formed to drop down front and back as well as cover the top of the ways. Has anyone done that? I really want to protect the pristine ways.

DanK

[Dan Krager]

I guess I'm talking to myself here.

I reworked a cheap and poorly made angle vise that came among the tooling with a previous Smithy Granite. I made the decision to machine the moving jaw ways once I determined that the bottom was reasonably flat. My inspection influenced that decision because it showed that one side of the ways was parallel to the bottom well within 0.001" (an accident probably) but the other side was not parallel to the bottom and the lowest point was 0.009" below the "good" side. I hesitated taking anything off the ways because the movable jaw relies on those surfaces to keep itself from spinning around on the one shaft that controls it's linear movement. Sure enough, when I got both ways flat and parallel to the bottom, the movable jaw had 0.005" clearance between it's feet and the ways. What to do? I went to the hardware store and bought some nylon bolts and drilled/tapped for one on each side. This allows me to adjust out the slack I created under the movable jaw. After confirming that I had the vise installed against a repeatable stop, I milled the fixed jaw to be perpendicular to the base and parallel to the carriage travel. Clamping a parallel between the jaws then allowed me to machine the face of the movable jaw parallel to the fixed jaw. I dressed up the rough casting on the top of the jaws and milled flats on the tilt dovetail ends so I could easily zero out or confirm zero tilt by feel. There is an adjustable stop for that. Then I could replace the improper screws that held the jaw faces in place. The last step not done is to trim the fixed jaw screws flush with its face. I debated whether to turn the screws around for a more appropriate orientation (bolt heads countersunk in the removable jaw and threaded into the body of vise and moveable jaw, but the new bolts seemed to work OK. The fixed jaw face is resting on a freshly milled step, so the bolts are not the only thing holding it in place.

Now I'm ready to re-machine about half the pins that I need for the long threaded rod handscrews I'm making. This time I'll use the notch in the fixed jaw of the vise so they cannot slip. Somehow, they got drilled and tapped almost 10° from perpendicular. I was holding them in a 5C collet with a stop and didn't notice or remember that such collets only grasp the part at the end of the collet. The pressure of the drilling must have pushed them catywampus. The collet really didn't have a chance on such a short part. A machinist's jack would have cured the problematic setup had I noticed it happening. Zu früh alt, zu spät klug.

DanK

[olf20]

Hi Dan glad you are posting your work.
I have a 1220 and have used it for 20+ years.
I don't do production just odd jobs. I recently started to put a Electronic Lead Screw
on mine. I've got just about all the parts and started making the mounts, boring pulleys,
and so on. I'll be using a Arduino and a nema 23 stepper. I like those little Arduino's.

Another thing that I always wanted was a DRO on the tail stock so I know the depth
i'm boring. I got a cheap digital inch / mm caliper and mounted it with 5 small magnets
to the tail stock. Made a clamp ring for the tail stock drilled a hole in the caliper and
have a cheap functional DRO.

Keep posting. I don't visit this often because it was silent for long periods of time.
Now that your posting maybe a few other will chime in with some of their stuff.
olf20 / Bob