Making a face plate

[bazzz]

Hello all,

I don't have a face plate so I thought I would try to make one. I have some unknown .375 steel I found in the pile. Will this be thick enough to make a face plate out of for a mini lathe?

Thanks,

Dave

 

[Dave Sohlstrom]

Is you lathe spindle threaded for your chucks or do the chucks bolt on. .375 is a bit thin and steel tends to ring.
You did not say what size face plate you would like to have. You can get a disk of cast iron 6" dia by 1" thick for 26.97 plus freight from McMaster-Carr. this would make a much better face plate.
Do you have a milling machine so you can cut slots in the face plate for mounting parts with.

Dave

 

[bazzz]

Dave,
I have a 7x10 with the bolt on spindle. I do have a X2 milling maching to cut the slots with, just don't have a bit to cut T slots with. Does anyone have the faceplate LMS sells?

http://www.littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=1199&category=1

Or would I be better off to make one using cast iron from McMaster Carr?

Thanks for your help,

 

[ProdEng]

bazzz,

For a small lathe almost any type of metal will work and it isn't stricyly necessary to have slots, tapped holes are effective also. On a small faceplate the slots are rarely in the correct spot so I would make a faceplate suitable for the part you want to machine and add tapped holes as you go. When you run out of material simply make another one

 

[MachineTom]

The small lathes tend to have very thin face plates, leaving little thickness to thread, an often nuts don't fit in. My go to face plate is a 1" x 9" AL disk mounted in the outside jaws, easy to drill, takes lots of threads, has a center hole counterbored on the back which will take a quickly made spud if needed. I have a slotted face plate as well, but the AL plate in the chuck gets more use.

 

[Brian Rupnow]

3/8" is too thin for a faceplate.

 

[Tin Falcon]

I have a LMS face plate. do not recall ever using it but have one. any questions about it I can pull it out and take a look.
Tin

 

[bazzz]

Thanks for the information. I will leave the 3/8 steel in the pile. I found some 1" aluminum while I was cleaning up today. May try to cut that up tomorow and see what I can do with it.

Thanks,

Dave