Wilton Drill Press Vise Minimum Lift Mod

[Paul Jones]

JR,

Good to know the "monster sized" lathe tailstock bottom clamp plate significantly improved your tailstock lock-down capability. In my case, the original smaller cast iron tailstock clamp plate did not go to waste. This morning before going to work, I wanted to finish parting-off a part and needed my steady rest but the bottom clamp plate was missing. I used the old one from my tailstock and the smaller size fit perfectly. I will keep it on the steady rest. Here is a photo:



The aluminum part is a temporary end-cap for machining 2" OD x 1.75" ID extruded acrylic tubes to size. I am working on an improvement to the pool ozone injection system (rarely used except after a big pool party).

PJs, I like your tailstock improvement and using the LMS cam lock. Ironically, I have not added the the "monster sized" lathe tailstock bottom clamp plate to my mini lathe and need to do it to improve the tailstock drilling. The mini lathe now has an ER32 collet chuck and used exclusively for small collet work. After "bumping and setting" the collet chuck to almost perfect TIR, there no reason to remove it for other work that can be done on the large lathe.

Thanks for the feedback.

Paul