Bullet Bitten

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I decided the only way to resolve the issue of the of the top slide's accuracy (see Tuesday's post) would be to bite the proverbial and break the thing down and work out what thread screws I would need for the quadrant locking: you can see the two pairs of smaller diameter holes in the cross slide, one pair for each of the two possible positions of the top slide.

It turns out that my initial guess of 1/4" Whitworth was right, and I do still have a die and a couple of taps left in the small collection inherited with the lathe, but I will probably get some 1/4" Whit threaded bar online and make something to suit. As to the question of setting the top slide square, I'll jury rig a stand for the little quadrant test indicator that I still have with the lathe, fifty odd years on from Winson Street. I can set the slide roughly with this and then turn a piece of bar stock and use the indicator to check it for true, adjusting as I go. I'll work it out, anyway.

I suppose a more modern lathe would be the sensible choice - if I had need of extreme accuracy and deep pockets - but that's not really the point here, anyway. My father and my childhood are invested in this 80-year-old machine and I consider it rather a more spiritual than temporal exercise: there is a soul to the thing, to which I relate on a very deep level.

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