LATHE MACHINE

Prepared by: Wrya Luqman Hussein

Erbil Polytechnic University

Mechanical and Energy Engineering
Appendices

1. A quick review on the lathe machine

2. Types of lathe machines
3. Parts of the lathe machine
4. Safety
5. Instruments and measurement tools
6. Workpiece
A quick review on the lath machine
The lathe is an ancient tool, dating at least to ancient Egypt and known to be used in
Assyria and ancient Greece. The lathe was very important to the Industrial Revolution. It
is known as the mother of machine tools, as it was the first machine tool that lead to the
invention of other machine tools.
The origin of turning dates to around 1300 BCE when the Ancient Egyptians first
developed a two-person lathe. One person would turn the wood work piece with a rope
while the other used a sharp tool to cut shapes in the wood. Ancient Rome improved the
Egyptian design with the addition of a turning bow. In the Middle Ages a pedal replaced
hand-operated turning, allowing a single person to rotate the piece while working with
both hands. The pedal was usually connected to a pole, often a straight-grained sapling.
The system today is called the "spring pole" lathe. Spring pole lathes were in common
use into the early 20th century.

Exact drawing made with camera obscura of horizontal boring machine by Jan

Verbruggen in Woolwich Royal Brass Foundry approx. 1778 (drawing 47 out of set of 50
drawings)
An important early lathe in the UK was the horizontal boring machine that was installed
in 1772 in the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich. It was horse-powered and allowed for the
production of much more accurate and stronger cannon used with success in
the American Revolutionary War in the late 18th century. One of the key characteristics
of this machine was that the workpiece was turning as opposed to the tool, making it
technically a lathe (see attached drawing). Henry Maudsley who later developed many
improvements to the lathe worked at the Royal Arsenal from 1783 being exposed to this
machine in the Verbruggen workshop.
During the Industrial Revolution, mechanized power generated by water wheels
or steam engines was transmitted to the lathe via line shafting, allowing faster and
easier work. Metalworking lathes evolved into heavier machines with thicker, more rigid
parts. Between the late 19th and mid-20th centuries, individual electric motors at each
lathe replaced line shafting as the power source. Beginning in the
1950s, servomechanisms were applied to the control of lathes and other machine tools
via numerical control, which often was coupled with 
Types of lathe machine
1- Woodworking lathes
Woodworking lathes are the oldest variety. All other varieties are descended from these simple
lathes. An adjustable horizontal metal rail – the tool rest – between the material and the
operator accommodates the positioning of shaping tools, which are usually hand-held. After
shaping, it is common practice to press and slide sandpaper against the still-spinning object to
smooth the surface made with the metal shaping tools. The tool rest is usually removed during
sanding, as it may be unsafe to have the operator’s hands between it and the spinning wood.
Many woodworking lathes can also be used for making bowls and plates. The bowl or plate
needs only to be held at the bottom by one side of the lathe. It is usually attached to a metal
face plate attached to the spindle. With many lathes, this operation happens on the left side of
the headstock, where are no rails and therefore more clearance. In this configuration, the piece
can be shaped inside and out. A specific curved tool rest may be used to support tools while
shaping the inside. Further detail can be found on the woodturning page.
Most woodworking lathes are designed to be operated at a speed of between 200 and 1,400
revolutions per minute, with slightly over 1,000 rpm considered optimal for most such work, and
with larger workpieces requiring lower speeds.

2- Duplicating lathes
One type of specialized lathe is duplicating or copying lathe also known as Blanchard lathe after
its inventor Thomas Blanchard. This type of lathe was able to create shapes identical to a
standard pattern and it revolutionized the process of gun stock making in 1820's when it was
invented.

3- Patternmaker's lathes
Used to make a pattern for foundries, often from wood, but also plastics. A patternmaker's lathe
looks like a heavy wood lathe, often with a turret and either a leadscrew or a rack and pinion to
manually position the turret. The turret is used to accurately cut straight lines. They often have a
provision to turn very large parts on the other end of the headstock, using a free-standing tool
rest. Another way of turning large parts is a sliding bed, which can slide away from the
headstock and thus open a gap in front of the headstock for large parts.
4-Metalworking lathes
In a metalworking lathe, metal is removed from the workpiece using a hardened cutting tool,
which is usually fixed to a solid moveable mounting, either a tool-post or a turret, which is then
moved against the workpiece using handwheels and/or computer-controlled motors. These
cutting tools come in a wide range of sizes and shapes, depending upon their application. Some
common styles are diamond, round, square and triangular.
The tool-post is operated by lead-screws that can accurately position the tool in a variety of
planes. The tool-post may be driven manually or automatically to produce the roughing and
finishing cuts required to turn the workpiece to the desired shape and dimensions, or for
cutting threads, worm gears, etc. Cutting fluid may also be pumped to the cutting site to provide
cooling, lubrication and clearing of swarf from the workpiece. Some lathes may be operated
under control of a computer for mass production of parts (see "Computer numerical control").
Manually controlled metalworking lathes are commonly provided with a variable-ratio gear-train
to drive the main lead-screw. This enables different thread pitches to be cut. On some older
lathes or more affordable new lathes, the gear trains are changed by swapping gears with
various numbers of teeth onto or off of the shafts, while more modern or expensive manually
controlled lathes have a quick-change box to provide commonly used ratios by the operation of
a lever. CNC lathes use computers and servomechanisms to regulate the rates of movement.
On manually controlled lathes, the thread pitches that can be cut are, in some ways, determined
by the pitch of the lead-screw: A lathe with a metric lead-screw will readily cut metric threads
(including BA), while one with an imperial lead-screw will readily cut imperial-unit-based threads
such as BSW or UTS (UNF, UNC). This limitation is not insurmountable, because a 127-tooth
gear, called a transposing gear, is used to translate between metric and inch thread pitches.
However, this is optional equipment that many lathe owners do not own. It is also a larger
change-wheel than the others, and on some lathes, may be larger than the change-wheel
mounting banjo is capable of mounting.
The workpiece may be supported between a pair of points called centers, or it may be bolted to
a faceplate or held in a chuck. A chuck has movable jaws that can grip the workpiece securely.
There are some effects on material properties when using a metalworking lathe. There are few
chemical or physical effects, but there are many mechanical effects, which include residual
stress, micro-cracks, work-hardening, and tempering in hardened materials

5- Cue lathes
Cue lathes function similarly to turning and spinning lathes, allowing a perfectly radially-
symmetrical cut for billiard cues. They can also be used to refinish cues that have been worn
over the years

6- Glass-working lathes
Glass-working lathes are similar in design to other lathes, but differ markedly in how the
workpiece is modified. Glass-working lathes slowly rotate a hollow glass vessel over a fixed- or
variable-temperature flame. The source of the flame may be either hand-held or mounted to a
banjo/cross-slide that can be moved along the lathe bed. The flame serves to soften the glass
being worked, so that the glass in a specific area of the workpiece becomes ductile and subject
to forming either by inflation ("glassblowing") or by deformation with a heat-resistant tool. Such
lathes usually have two head-stocks with chucks holding the work, arranged so that they both
rotate together in unison. Air can be introduced through the headstock chuck spindle for
glassblowing. The tools to deform the glass and tubes to blow (inflate) the glass is usually
handheld.

7- Metal-spinning lathes
In metal spinning, a disk of sheet metal is held perpendicularly to the main axis of the lathe, and
tools with polished tips (spoons) or roller tips are hand-held, but levered by hand against fixed
posts, to develop pressure that deforms the spinning sheet of metal.
Metal-spinning lathes are almost as simple as wood-turning lathes. Typically, metal spinning
requires a mandrel, usually made from wood, which serves as the template onto which the
workpiece is formed (asymmetric shapes can be made, but it is a very advanced technique). For
example, to make a sheet metal bowl, a solid block of wood in the shape of the bowl is required;
similarly, to make a vase, a solid template of the vase is required.
Given the advent of high-speed, high-pressure, industrial die forming, metal spinning is less
common now than it once was, but still a valuable technique for producing one-off prototypes or
small batches, where die forming would be uneconomical.

8- Ornamental turning lathes

The ornamental turning lathe was developed around the same time as the industrial screw-
cutting lathe in the nineteenth century. It was used not for making practical objects, but
for decorative work – ornamental turning. By using accessories such as the horizontal and
vertical cutting frames, eccentric chuck and elliptical chuck, solids of extraordinary complexity
may be produced by various generative procedures.
A special-purpose lathe, the Rose engine lathe, is also used for ornamental turning, in particular
for engine turning, typically in precious metals, for example to decorate pocket-watch cases. As
well as a wide range of accessories.
9-Reducing lathe
Many types of lathes can be equipped with accessory components to allow them to reproduce
an item: the original item is mounted on one spindle, the blank is mounted on another, and as
both turn in synchronized manner, one end of an arm "reads" the original and the other end of
the arm "carves" the duplicate.
A reduction lathe is a specialized lathe that is designed with this feature and incorporates a
mechanism similar to a pantograph, so that when the "reading" end of the arm reads a detail
that measures one inch (for example), the cutting end of the arm creates an analogous detail
that is (for example) one quarter of an inch (a 4:1 reduction, although given appropriate
machinery and appropriate settings, any reduction ratio is possible).
Reducing lathes are used in coin-making, where a plaster original (or an epoxy master made
from the plaster original, or a copper-shelled master made from the plaster original, etc.) is
duplicated and reduced on the reducing lathe, generating a master die.
10-Rotary lathes
A lathe in which softwood, like spruce or pine, or hardwood, like birch, logs are turned against a
very sharp blade and peeled off in one continuous or semi-continuous roll. Invented
by Immanuel Nobel (father of the more famous Alfred Nobel). The first such lathes in the United
States were set up in the mid-19th century. The product is called wood veneer and it is used for
making plywood and as a cosmetic surface veneer on some grades of chipboard.
11-Watchmaker's lathes
Watchmakers lathes are delicate but precise metalworking lathes, usually without provision
for screwcutting, and are still used by horologists for work such as the turning of balance staffs.
A handheld tool called a graver is often used in preference to a slide-mounted tool. The original
watchmaker's turns was a simple dead-center lathe with a moveable rest and two loose head-
stocks. The workpiece would be rotated by a bow, typically of horsehair, wrapped around it.
12-Transcription, or recording, lathes
Transcription or recording lathes are used to make grooves on a surface for recording sounds.
These were used in creating sound grooves on wax cylinders and then on flat recording discs.
Originally the cutting lathes were driven by sound vibrations through a horn and then later driven
by electric current, when microphones were used in recording. Many of these were professional
models, but there were some used for home recording and were popular before the advent of
home tape recording.

Parts of the lathe machine

A lathe may or may not have legs, which sit on the floor and elevate the lathe bed to a working
height. A lathe may be small and sit on a workbench or table, not requiring a stand.
Almost all lathes have a bed, which is (almost always) a horizontal beam (although CNC lathes
commonly have an inclined or vertical beam for a bed to ensure that swarf, or chips, falls free of
the bed). Woodturning lathes specialized for turning large bowls often have no bed or tail stock,
merely a free-standing headstock and a cantilevered tool rest.
At one end of the bed (almost always the left, as the operator faces the lathe) is a headstock.
The headstock contains high-precision spinning bearings. Rotating within the bearings is a
horizontal axle, with an axis parallel to the bed, called the spindle. Spindles are often hollow and
have exterior threads and/or an interior Morse taper on the "inboard" (i.e., facing to the right /
towards the bed) by which work-holding accessories may be mounted to the spindle. Spindles
may also have exterior threads and/or an interior taper at their "outboard" (i.e., facing away from
the bed) end, and/or may have a hand-wheel or other accessory mechanism on their outboard
end. Spindles are powered and impart motion to the workpiece.
The spindle is driven either by foot power from a treadle and flywheel or by a belt or gear drive
to a power source. In most modern lathes this power source is an integral electric motor, often
either in the headstock, to the left of the headstock, or beneath the headstock, concealed in the
stand.
In addition to the spindle and its bearings, the headstock often contains parts to convert the
motor speed into various spindle speeds. Various types of speed-changing mechanism achieve
this, from a cone pulley or step pulley, to a cone pulley with back gear (which is essentially a low
range, similar in net effect to the two-speed rear of a truck), to an entire gear train similar to that
of a manual-shift auto transmission. Some motors have electronic rheostat-type speed controls,
which obviates cone pulleys or gears.
The counterpoint to the headstock is the tailstock, sometimes referred to as the loose head, as it
can be positioned at any convenient point on the bed by sliding it to the required area. The tail-
stock contains a barrel, which does not rotate, but can slide in and out parallel to the axis of the
bed and directly in line with the headstock spindle. The barrel is hollow and usually contains a
taper to facilitate the gripping of various types of tooling. Its most common uses are to hold a
hardened steel center, which is used to support long thin shafts while turning, or to hold drill bits
for drilling axial holes in the work piece. Many other uses are possible.[3]
Metalworking lathes have a carriage (comprising a saddle and apron) topped with a cross-slide,
which is a flat piece that sits crosswise on the bed and can be cranked at right angles to the
bed. Sitting atop the cross slide is usually another slide called a compound rest, which provides
2 additional axes of motion, rotary and linear. Atop that sits a tool post, which holds a cutting
tool, which removes material from the workpiece. There may or may not be a leadscrew, which
moves the cross-slide along the bed.
Woodturning and metal spinning lathes do not have cross-slides, but rather have banjos, which
are flat pieces that sit crosswise on the bed. The position of a banjo can be adjusted by hand;
no gearing is involved. Ascending vertically from the banjo is a tool-post, at the top of which is a
horizontal tool-rest. In woodturning, hand tools are braced against the tool rest and levered into
the workpiece. In metal spinning, the further pin ascends vertically from the tool rest and serves
as a fulcrum against which tools may be levered into the workpiece.

Safety

 Wear appropriate safety glasses. It may be necessary for others in the area to wear
safety glasses too as objects will fly off the work.
 Ensure entanglement hazards are removed (e.g. loose clothing, jewelry, etc.).
 Keep the floor free from obstructions, or slip hazards.
 Ensure that lathe has a start/stop button within easy reach of the operator.
 Follow job specifications for the speed, feed, and depth of cut for materials being turned.
Make sure all work runs true and centered.
 Centre-drill work deeply enough to provide support for the piece while it is turning.
 Secure and clamp the piece being worked.
 Adjust tool and tool rest so that they are slightly above the center of the work.
 Use a lifting device to handle heavy chucks or work. Refer to Materials Handling for
additional information.
 Inspect chucks for wear or damage. Flying pieces can be very dangerous.
 Remove chuck wrench immediately after adjusting chuck.
 Use a barrier guard when operating the lathe in semi-automatic or automatic mode.
 Guard all power transmission parts.
 Remove all tools, measuring instruments and other objects from saddle or lathe bed
before starting machine.
 Keep all lathe cutting tools sharp.
 Ensure that the chip and coolant shields are in place.
 Shut off the power supply to the motor before mounting or removing accessories.
 Stop lathe before taking measurements of any kind.
 Use a vacuum, brush, or rake to remove cuttings only after the lathe has stopped
moving.
 Keep working surface clean of scraps, tools, and materials.

Instruments and measurement tools

Unless a workpiece has a taper machined onto it which perfectly matches the internal taper in the
spindle, or has threads which perfectly match the external threads on the spindle (two conditions
which rarely exist), an accessory must be used to mount a workpiece to the spindle.
A workpiece may be bolted or screwed to a faceplate, a large, flat disk that mounts to the spindle. In
the alternative, faceplate dogs may be used to secure the work to the faceplate.
A workpiece may be mounted on a mandrel, or circular work clamped in a three- or four-jaw chuck.
For irregular shaped workpieces it is usual to use a four jaw (independent moving jaws) chuck.
These holding devices mount directly to the lathe headstock spindle.
In precision work, and in some classes of repetition work, cylindrical workpieces are usually held in
a collet inserted into the spindle and secured either by a draw-bar, or by a collet closing cap on the
spindle. Suitable collets may also be used to mount square or hexagonal workpieces. In precision
toolmaking work such collets are usually of the draw-in variety, where, as the collet is tightened, the
workpiece moves slightly back into the headstock, whereas for most repetition work the dead length
variety is preferred, as this ensures that the position of the workpiece does not move as the collet is
tightened.
A soft workpiece (e.g., wood) may be pinched between centers by using a spur drive at the
headstock, which bites into the wood and imparts torque to it.
A soft dead center is used in the headstock spindle as the work rotates with the Centre. Because the
Centre is soft it can be tried in place before use. The included angle is 60°. Traditionally, a hard dead
center is used together with suitable lubricant in the tailstock to support the workpiece. In modern
practice the dead center is frequently replaced by a live center, as it turns freely with the workpiece
—usually on ball bearings—reducing the frictional heat, especially important at high speeds. When
clear facing a long length of material it must be supported at both ends. This can be achieved using
a traveling or fixed steady. If a steady is not available, the end face being worked on may be
supported by a dead (stationary) half center. A half center has a flat surface machined across a
broad section of half of its diameter at the pointed end. A small section of the tip of the dead center
is retained to ensure concentricity. Lubrication must be applied at this point of contact and tail stock
pressure reduced. A lathe carrier or lathe dog may also be employed when turning between two
centers.
In woodturning, one variation of a live center is a cup center, which is a cone of metal surrounded by
an annular ring of metal that decreases the chances of the workpiece splitting.
A circular metal plate with even spaced holes around the periphery, mounted to the spindle, is called
an "index plate". It can be used to rotate the spindle to a precise angle, then lock it in place,
facilitating repeated auxiliary operations done to the workpiece.
Other accessories, including items such as taper turning attachments, knurling tools, vertical slides,
fixed and traveling steadies, etc., increase the versatility of a lathe and the range of work it may
perform
Workpiece
Chess pieces made by lathe machine (top) live center (bottom) dead center

Chucks

Parting and grinding tools

Parts of lathe machine