I bought an inexpensive mini/midi wood lathe— yes, that 'Central Machinery' 10 x 18 job. Figured it would be fine for the light duty of cork and reel seat insert turning. I'm having trouble finding a small, (2 or 3 inch), self-centering 3 or 4-jaw chuck for it though. Has a 3/4 X 10 TPI (oddball) spindle and a 3 in. backplate with 4 mounting holes. I like the fact that the spindle is hollow so I don't want to use a chuck with a #2 Morse taper which will close off the spindle hole. I spent hours searching already but just getting more confused. Has anyone used a spindle adapter— 3/4 X 10tpi to, say, 1 X 8 to overcome the problem?

If you are talking about this Item # 65345 Specs say it is a 3/4 by 16 then check out little machine shop.com If it is 3/4 by 10 then I am not sure where to find it.

Lucky J's custom rods

Hi Jim,
The adapter simply screws onto your existing 3/4 X 10 TP Iallowing you to use any chuck that has a 1X8 TPI. Penn State Industries (PSI) sells such an adapter and they also sell a variety of chucks. In my latest catalog, they list two chucks which I believe are their proprietary chucks as well as a series of Barracuda chucks. When I bought my lathe, I bought a Nova Chuck for my midi lathe and have been very satisfied with it. I suspect others more experienced than I am will give you similar advice. Good luck.

Mike Blomme

These guys should have whichever one you need

[woodenpost.com]

Try Grizzly tools- they seem to have all of the oddball threads and in stock- 3 or 4 jaw chucks- I bought the 4 jaw 5" 3/4 X 16tpi chuck for about $50.00 # H8041-4 jaw chucks are more accurate than 3 jaw for centering.

Like Mike says, it's a simple adapter from Penn Stae

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

What about getting a 'plain back' chuck and mounting it to the existing 3" backplate?
Has anyone there used this approach?

[www.grizzly.com]

This page on the grizzly catalog, shows the head stock adapter- 3/4 X 10 and it will bolt up to either of the chucks that are shown above on the same page.
Should work fine for you
Roger

Here is the Vicmarc lathe and adapter:

[www.vicmarc.com]

[www.vicmarc.com]

It looks like if you purchased the smallest of the Vicmarc chucks, you might be set.

p.s.
I did a bit further checking and I do find that it is an Australian machinery maker. So if you purchase one of these chucks and adapters, you will have to do it via overseas shipping.
But the Australian dollar is at an ok trade rate, so depending on the price of the chuck and shipping, it still might be the way to go. I checked the currency exchange rate and I see that an american dollar is worth about $1.15 Australian. So the us dollar will buy a bit more Austalian products than in america
Give them a call or drop them an e-mail and ask for particulars.

Roger



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2010 06:16PM by roger wilson.

Jim,
If you decide on a chuck made abroad, you might want to look at American suppliers. This is likely to save you some money. Currently Amazon is selling the Vimarc VM90 for $200, the Nova Chuck Midi chuck for $80, and the Nova G3 chuck for $115. The barracuda chucks are priced in that range as well. One thing I liked about the Barracuda chucks is that they included several sets of jaws for the chuck. I know my Nova chuck did not include any other jaws and I have had to spend money for them. You might want to check with Vimarc about the different jaws that come with the chuck. just something for you to think about.

Mike Blomme

I have the 4 jaw self centering chuck from grizzly and have used the heck out of it for a few months now and it is great! I paid like 50.00 fo rit, less than 1/2 the cost of others. It holds tight and does not looen up on you when turning. It is a pleasure to work with.

Thanks for all the responses. The winner is...

a 3/4 X 10 to 1 X 8 spindle adapter from PSI
and
A 3" 4-jaw self-ctr 1 X 8 chuck from Grizzly.

or, at least that's what I just ordered.

Total cost with shipping, about $72.

Hopeful.

(Turns out that Grizzly makes (packages) the very same lathe as Central Machine with a 1 X 8 spindle instead of the oddball 3/4 X 10.)

Did this work out for you?

.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/11/2016 08:40AM by Tyler George.