Model Engineers’ Workshop – August 2019

12 http://www.model-engineer.co.uk Model Engineers’ Workshop

Turret Small Parts

Dimensions with * see text for comment

Indexing Hub

Mat’l: Mild steel, 1 off

Ø1.

Ø0.

0.125 0.

2BA (2 places)

5/8 x 26

0.5*

0.25*

1 0.

Dimple 6 places with

3mm drill, see text

Peg Key

Mat’l: 2BA grub screw

2 off

Ø0.

2BA

0.

0.

0.

Bush

Mat’l: Bronze, 1 off

**Assemble into main body

with Loctite

Locking Collar

Mat’l: Mild steel, 1 off

0.06^1 0.

== 2BA for locking screw

Drill Ø3.2mm x 0.

deep (2 places)

Notes

1. Holes at 120° to each other


2. Fit copper plug under grub
   Ø1.25 Ø0.750 Ø1.186 5/8 x 26 screw to protect 26 TPI thread
   Ø1**

Length Screw

Mat’l: Mild steel, 6 off Locking Collar

Mat’l: Mild steel, 7 off

(includes 1 off for adjustable stop)

0.

0.

Knurl

3.5 0.

Thread 5/16 BSF Knurl

5/16 BSF

Ø2.4mm x 1/8 deep

(6 places)

Drill Ø2.4mm

through Ø0.

Ø5/8 (beforeknurling)

Ø12mm(beforeknurling)

knurling done. Before knurling though,
it’s worth centre drilling the face and
supporting the work with a tailstock centre
as knurling is quite a tough operation.
Incidentally, Paul didn’t have any material
of large enough diameter, so planned on
using some 2.5” diameter that he had in
stock. This would mean that the knurled
section would be slightly larger than 2.5” in
diameter due to the surface being raised,
which is alright. I would advise, however,
not to reduce the smaller outside diameter
to 2.4” as the ‘wall thickness’ between the
tapped hole (for the length screws) and
the OD would be rather less than I would
wish for. A reasonable compromise would
be to reduce this diameter to 2.45” which
would give a greater ‘wall thickness’ whilst
retaining a diameter diff erence between the
knurled and plain sections.
The next operation is to bore out the
centre of the turret body to the dimensions
shown on the drawing. The basic turning
operations are now complete, and the body
can be removed from the chuck.
Now for the interesting bit. There are
six 5/16”BSF threaded holes for the length
screws to be placed at 60 degrees to each
other, and six drilled and tapped holes for
the detent springs, also to be placed at 60

degrees to each other. The holes for the

length screws and those for the detents are

placed at 30 degrees to each other.

How you tackle these holes will depend

very much on the equipment to have

available. I decided to describe using my

George Thomas Versatile Dividing Head

(VDH) as that was the equipment that

I would have had available at the time.

Initially I set the job up using a 3-jaw chuck,

and for the length screw holes the set-up

would be fi ne. But, when it came to the

holes for the detents it was a diff erent

matter, as the chuck jaws were ‘open’ to

such an extent that they fouled the cross-

slide. Time for Plan B, in which I fi tted the

body to a mandrel, and this was then fi tted

into the VDH using a collet, photo 5. This

photo, and the next three are posed to

show the set-up that I would have used.

Please note that for these photos I have

used the indexing hub and the stop rod

as the mandrel, as I didn’t see the point in

making a special mandrel just for a posed

photo (too lazy?). I would not recommend

this set-up in practice as you would run

the risk of drilling the dimple in indexing

hub too large and too deep meaning that

the balls could drop into the indexing hub

and then the indexing function will not

work and the mechanism could jam up

completely and be impossible to dismantle.

It would be better to make a special

mandrel.

Drill tapping size for the length screws,

and then tap 5/16” BSF preferably using the

lathe chuck to guide the tap to ensure that

all holes are square to the face of the turret

body. If you have a variable speed drive

then you can probably do this under power

using the ‘jog’ function, otherwise it will

need to be done by hand, not forgetting to

turn the power supply off.

Before setting up to drill and tap the

holes for the detent springs and balls, it is

worth marking the periphery of the turret

body with a lightly scribed line to help

in setting up for number stamping. Only

lightly scribe the line as it has to be polished

out once the number stamping has been

done. As there are several ways of aligning

the turret body for number stamping, it

might be best to scribe the line in all six

positions so that you cover all options.

Now that the 5/16” BSF holes have been

drilled and tapped do not remove the

work form the VDH, but turn it through 90

degrees on the cross-slide and drill and tap

as drawn for the detent positions (another

posed picture - photo 6).

Fig.