The lathe Face Plate

[Tin Falcon]

This post was prompted by the recent thread and discussion of 4 jaw chucks.
Since work holding is such an important part of lathe work and castings and other awkward shapes can be a challenge to set up I thought I would start this discussion.
In reading many of the old machining and Model engineering books it seems like face plate work was the norm a hundred years ago and for a long time after.
In modern times we are spoiled by many types of chuck and collet systems and the face plate sits in a drawer ,in a cabinet or on a shelf somewhere.
My face plate work has been minimal . I have used the face plate as a drive plate for driving the dog while turning on centers and I have used a face ple as a friction drive when truing up a round disk that was saw cut and I have trepanneded one or twice. with the same setup.

So I would like to hear some comments and get a friendly discussion going. I expect some guys have a face plate they never used and some of the guys who have machined for decades can share there experience with face plate setups. And if you know of a good books that shows a good face playe application that applies hear lets see that too.
Looking forward to the posts.

TIA
Tin
PS if we can make this a good thread and stay on track I may make this a sticky.

 

[goldstar31]

I'm afraid that my touch typing was never 'touch' and I have 'one fingered' my way- but into an earlier post. Move it if you think fit.

As you rightly say, faceplate work is a huge subject. Actually, friend Sparey did a great write up in his ancient but still constructive 'The Amateurs Lathe' I am pleased to say that I bought it when I was a young Goldstar NCO in the RAF in 1949 and it still on my table- battered like me- today.

Regards

Norman

 

[aonemarine]

I think I have only used the face plate for machining a few times, and it was a long long time ago. Im pretty sure that at the time I was using the face plate that the lathe was my only piece of equipment so having to find a way to make things work I had to use what I had.
I can see where a face plate could come in handy for attaching a fixture to for repetitive machining operations and odd shaped parts. I will have to put more thought into using it and what can be accomplished on one..
Hopefully we get some good pictures of set ups on a face plate to open our eyes...

 

[Jasonb]

I think one reason that the faceplate tends to get less use these days is that far more hobby engineers have access to a milling machine. Go back a few years and most just had a lathe so odd or large work either had to go onto a vertical slide or the faceplate.

I still use mine for larger castings where the auto feed on the lathe can be better for boring and facing than handfeeding on the mill or if the mill is too small. Also about the only way to hold a 5-spoke flywheel.

Here it is being used for two different jobs on the last engien made

J

 

[kvom]

D1-3 faceplates for my lathe are scarce and expensive, so I haven't got one. I have a dog driver plate that has stood in for a faceplace on occasion, most recently for machining locomotive wheels.

 

[bazmak]

I had a std faceplt with the sieg lathe and used it quite a lot
I then made the T slot fabricated face plt SEE THREAD and used it even more
Probably less use now i have a mill but still invaluable.Used it last on the twin horiz engine see photos to bore/recess for ball bearings.The alternative would be micro boring bar in the mill,if i had one

 

[RonGinger]

My friend Rollie (the Rollie whose Father taught us the lathe alignment method) used to be a heavy user of the faceplate. For that he made a very usefull tool. First he made a replica of his lathes spindle nose out of a piece of steel. This was bored and mounted on a ball bearing- Rollie favored the water pump bearings from old Volvos because they were quite long, and he had lots of them because he ran a Volvo repair shop.

The bearing was mounted on a piece of 2" angle iron about a foot long. This would be clamped in the bench vise with the spindle nose pointing up. He placed the faceplate on this so it was laying flat like a turntable. In this position he placed the object to be worked on the plate and clamped it down. He had a 1/2" rod that stuck up form the end of the angle iron on which he could mount an indicator.

In this position you can rotate the plate freely while you indicate in the part, then tighten all the clamps. Laying flat like this nothing falls off or has to be held in place. Once the work was indicated in and firmly clamped the angle iron is removed from the vise and held vertically them reclamped. Now the faceplate is in a position as it will be on the lathe and you can spin it freely to add balance weights. Once balanced the faceplate is removed from this fixture and put on the lathe ready to go.

 

[Swifty]

I worked as a toolmaker all my life and only had to set up a faceplate in trade school in the early 70's, just to pass that particular test. Never used one since, I've had my home lathe for over 10 years and the faceplate still has the protective paper that was on it from new.

Paul.

 

[chucketn]

I worked as a toolmaker all my life and only had to set up a faceplate in trade school in the early 70's, just to pass that particular test. Never used one since, I've had my home lathe for over 10 years and the faceplate still has the protective paper that was on it from new.

Paul.

I've had my lathe(SEIG C3) for 10 years. Bought the faceplate several years after the lathe thinking at the time to use it for some project. Still havent't used it, though I did take the brown paper off, LOL! Probably didn't do the project, either.

Chuck

 

[ShopShoe]

I have used the faceplate for my 7x MiniLathe 3 or 4 or more times for items too large to use a chuck. Most recently I used it to clamp the table of my 6-inch rotary table with shaft attached for "clean-up" machining.

I have been studying different setups with faceplates posted on this forum and elsewhere and I think that they are worth having, even if seldom used. I hope to get a bigger lathe someday and I will try to get the faceplate when that day comes. (And I do have a mill, too).

FWIW: My present order of necessity and use seems to be:

1. Three-Jaw Chuck
2. Four-Jaw Independent Chuck
3. Collet capability
4. Faceplate
5. Oversized 4-Jaw Independent Chuck
6. Four-Jaw Scroll Chuck (Don't have one - Many other things to buy before one of those.)

--ShopShoe

 

[Charles Lamont]

I offer as examples of faceplate work, as I often do, my own Seagull engine pages, because I know where to find suitable examples easily rather than from any strong desire to have people admire my work all the time.

Faceplate set-ups allowed accurate geometry and dimensions to be achieved, in a way that would be well-nigh impossible with these castings in a 4-jaw chuck.

It is true that, had I posessed a milling machine at the time, some of the work would probably have been done with it.

In some cases I could have used the 4-jaw, but a faceplate set-up avoided any possibility of distorting the light castings. On this forum I often see people wanging workpieces it the milling vice without a thought as to how much they are springing them.


http://www.charleslamont.me.uk/Seagull/crankcase.html

 

[Tin Falcon]

Charles thanks lots of good pics on your page.
Tin

 

[SmithDoor]

I use a maximum size 4-Jaw Independent Chuck on my lathe. I found a long time it was fast than a face plate for setup .
The rotary table is the most of my face plate work.
Very rare do I need face plate on a lathe.

Dave

 

[kf2qd]

Face Plate for odd shaped parts that won't mount in a chuck.

Once bored an 8 horse Briggs engine for a new sleeve by mounting on its base on the faceplate. Was a nice 17" lathe.

 

[aonemarine]

I offer as examples of faceplate work, as I often do, my own Seagull engine pages, because I know where to find suitable examples easily rather than from any strong desire to have people admire my work all the time.

Faceplate set-ups allowed accurate geometry and dimensions to be achieved, in a way that would be well-nigh impossible with these castings in a 4-jaw chuck.

It is true that, had I posessed a milling machine at the time, some of the work would probably have been done with it.

In some cases I could have used the 4-jaw, but a faceplate set-up avoided any possibility of distorting the light castings. On this forum I often see people wanging workpieces it the milling vice without a thought as to how much they are springing them.


http://www.charleslamont.me.uk/Seagull/crankcase.html

Beautiful write up!!!

 

[RichD]

Charles your work is so thorough it makes me feel like a hack. Excellent job!

Back ~ 1968 or so I worked in my Father's machine shop turning up rough castings in a production setup. One phase of operation involved mounting the casting that had been previously bored and faced on one end in another lathe onto a face plate. My Father had attached a large disc turned to the correct diameter to mate with the shallow bore in the casting. The disc was threaded internally and held concentric to the faceplate by a long drawbolt through the spindle bore (The faceplte spindle hole was previously bored true and the disc had a smaller male pilot that centered the disc to the faceplate as well).

To mount the casting, you simply held the bored/faced end of the casting onto the male pilot diameter of the disc, inserted a "U-clamp" that was a little longer than the bore diameter across the casting and disc, then tightened a single nut and washer across the "U-clamp".

The setup was as solid as can be and drive torque was provided by the friction between the faceplate and the faced end of the casting.

Simple yet elegant!

A male boss ~ 6" in diameter and ~.125" thick was then faced/turned onto the far end of the casting to complete the lathe work.

The casting then was removed and placed into a special made jig/fixture for drilling/reaming for a set of miter gears and bushings.

We used to do batches of 200 each.

Rich

 

[goldstar31]

Rich
It sounds quite elegant. The nearest equivalent is a Keats plate. At one time, one made them and certainly in the UK, they are now commerically available.

I think that few now seem to understand 'faceplate' work. I used to have a sort of fabricated one that took Tee nuts but had screws to make it into a sort of 4 jaw independent chuck.

My latest effort was to use the U bolts and pipe brackets from a scrap satellite dish.

Thanks for sharing, folks

Norman

 

[Blogwitch]

I don't think most model engineers appreciate just how useful a faceplate can be, especially if you have a mill and RT as well.
Over the years, I have made all sorts of adaptable tooling that will easily transfer between the lathe and mill with the piece part still attached, a real godsend at times.
All I did was to decide on a system that I would use, in my case, the Myford nose thread.
Dead easy to make a MT fitting that converted my large lathe from D1-4 to Myford threaded nose using the MT up the spindle, and the same for my RT. I purchased a new 9" Myford faceplate for less than £40.
Another bit of kit that makes the awkward four jaw almost redundant, especially if you have multiple parts of the same to make, and that is the Keats angle plate, which costs less than £30.
Armed with a faceplate, a few easily made clamps and the Keats, there is very little that can't be machined to great accuracy on both the lathe and mill.
I think I have only used my four jaw once in many years, and that was to get the outside skin off a few sash weights as my 3 jaw wouldn't hold them.

John

 

[goldstar31]

Agreed John!
I can transfer most things from lathe, to mill, to one tool and cutter grinder to another, faceplates rotary tables, dividings heads, face plates and my tide tables for HongKong Harbor, ALL with a Myford spindle nose.

With a face plate, you CAN use it as a makeshift boringhead and a lot of things. The limit to a faceplate is the limit to what can be fitted between two ears!

Meantime, John, hope all is improving healthwise.

Cheers

Norman

 

[RichD]

What if you mounted a rotary table onto a faceplate off-center. You could then index turning operations for multiple eccentrics.
Just thinking out loud...

I remember my Uncle Dan setting up a job in our old Bullard Vertical Boring Mill so that multiple items could be machined to a radial arc length in a single operation. The pieces were all arranged radially like the spokes of a wheel on the huge 4' faceplate. (I'm just guessing about the size of the faceplate...I was pretty young then)

Rich