High Speed Steel lathe tooling kits

So what is the real reason for this thread then? Free YouTube videos to instruct beginners on how to be gunsmiths. Really? I had no idea it would be that easy.

I've seen a lot of videos both from pros and amateurs. Check out the AGI series. Even they lack some details and are mostly for reference. Hopefully you will have a teacher in a College course go through the vids and discuss with practical experience to really learn something. The pro vids on YouTube are usually just teasers to get you to buy the DVD's.

The amateur YouTube stuff is for entertainment mostly. Sometimes they get it right. Do you know if it is or not? Try learning welding via the internet and YouTube. See how well that works. ;)

Just throwing it out there folks. I like inserts and I can see where HSS inserts will have their use and I'm not putting them down and they have been around for many years. They are just not widely available. If you want to pay a premium go for it. I sure like my 60° carbide threading inserts. They are top quality and a good price too and be had anywhere. I use to grind my HSS toolbits to get close to the shoulder for threads. I still use HSS bits for making odd grinds to get into recesses and such.
 
trevj said:
Ishootguns,


' You are under 100 years young, right?

A lathe cutting tool is in it's simplest form, is just a sharp edge presented to the work. Clear some space under the edge closest to the work, and you have created the front releif. Do the same, create some clearance on the side of the tool blank that will end up face on to the chuck, you have side releif. Look at the tool from the top, and you don't want the heel of the cutting edge (the part farthest from the chuck) to hit the work and mark it up, so you taper it that way, to produce tip clearance. Put a wee radius or even just a flat spot on the tip, to make it less fragile, and you can use it as-is.
Some careful stoning of the edge will much improve the cutting edge. Pretty much depends on how it is done. But it's easier than getting a decent edge on a pocketknife blade.

Rake is put on by tapering back the top of the tool, again, away from that same point.

You want all three of the tapered parts to be closest to the work at the top, nearest the chuck.

The sharp edge reaches the work first. Kinda the basic principle. The rest is the details. The devil is in the details, but you can fudge a lot, just putting the sharp edge in contact with the work first!"

trevj
Yes I am under the century mark.
That was a great description of grinding a cutter no matter what the material. I wish some of my instructors could have described it that way back when.
Personnaly I find that with all the inserts available these days it is not very often that those shapes won't cover my needs. As for material of the cutter, I use what is cost efficient and leaves a good finish, sometimes carbide sometimes HSS.
Bob Pastor was showing what he used and worked good for him. It is an insert so that makes it easy. They are also cheaper in the sense that the tool company will sell individually for $4 an insert instead of having to buy a package as many carbide suppliers do.

So you didn't agree with some of the things Bob said, thats fine. Maybe instead of pulling apart what Bob said it could have been better to give that description of grinding cutters and explained why you thought that was better than what Bob was recommending.

I'm sure you will agree that no one including you enjoys having someone criticize something that you know works. Bob showed what worked for him.

I'm positive his intentions were nothing but to demonstrate a method and tooling that works well for him. So he was trying to help out some people who wanted to see it. As he said before he deleted his comments "he had many people PMing him thanking him for showing that" If they choose to grind cutters of either material if they were new,chipped or whatever that is their choice.

There are many ways to do the same job, no one has the ultimate only way to do something. If you disagree so be it. However to come on and criticize and not offer an alternative method is a hollow criticism at best.

I feel the more a new person to making chips is exposed to different methods and tooling then the better they will be. If I see someone doing something that will not work or is dangerous then I will definately step in and tell them why that won't work. Then I will show them what I think will work or will be safer, that way it is a productive experience instead of something negative.

Unfortunately I feel this thread went the negative route rather fast, when it could have gone the other way and passed on some great information to people that wanted to learn.
Dave
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That He plastered his stuff in about every corner of the 'net, I could have lived with, had he not managed to fluff out his commentary with un-facts and near-useful misinformation along with it.

I figure we were pretty much sure to have a train wreck when the best Bob could come up with to support his fairly wild statements about how these tools were the answer to every new lathe hand's problems, was to make snide comments about how we were all stuck in the past and that we were all trying to force everyone to commit to something near indentured servitude in order to be in the trade long enough to become good at grinding tools.

What is the phrase that the computer guys use? FUD? Fear Uncertainty and Doubt, if I am correctly informed. That fits a lot of the 'filler' that was shared, along with the actual facts about the tools. Had he stuck to "these are what I use, and this is what I like about them" rather than adding all sorts of hooey about how hard it is to grind a useful tool, and how poorly carbide supposedly cuts, to the already considerable pile of bad information that is around, I would not have had a problem with that.

Really, those tools are pretty good stuff. They are just a luxury item, rather than the answer to the FNG's problems. And not at all cheap either!

From what I saw of his posts elsewhere, he had about $2500 in those HSS insert tool holder sets, that he was so proud of.

Dunno what that represents outta your budget, but outta mine... That'd be a new lathe or mill in my shop, not a shiny new box of tools that don't really do many things any better than one ground from a $2 blank. And yeah, I know that you don't have to buy the whole set, but the guy got religion on them. OK. That's allowed. But sell me on them, for what they DO do, not talk #### about all the other options, and try to sell them as the greatest thing since fire cooked a steak, eh.

All that and a video camera, to boot!

Thanks for the compliment, by the way. I'll try not to let it go to my non-photogenic head! :D

Cheers
Trev
 
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