Vacuum Chuck Drums

[Alan Trout]

Well folks,

These are the last pieces that I need to complete my vacuum chuck system. This is what I came up with. I had planned on buying the aluminum adapter that JT turning tools sells but being December and wanting to insure my seven year old had a wonderful Christmas I decided what I could make for minimum dollars. December is a slow time of year for me so I am always starved for cash this month.

I made these 4 drums with stuff I had on hand other than the very large PVC fitting. I was wondering what I could use for the threaded insert? when it hit me. I always mix a little more resin that I typically need when I cast one of my pieces. I would rather wast a little than not have enough. Generally what I do with the left over is put it in a plastic drinking cup and then put it in a pressure pot till cured and the peel the cup off of the hardened plug of resin. I figured at some time I would find a use for these scraps. Well I decided to see how well the resin tapped. It taps wonderful. Very crisp clean tight threads that seal and seem to be plenty durable for this application. I turned them to size and epoxied them into the PVC fittings. The designed of the inserts morphed as I was making them. The first one I made was the second to the smallest and the smallest was the last one I made. The rims on the drums are black resin that I cast cut a recess and epoxied them onto the PVC fitting and then finished shaping them on the lathe with the drum screwed onto the spindle. The rim give me a nice smooth radius to put my sticky back foam seal to.

I tested each chuck and all will hold over 28" of vacuum on the lathe so they seal well and they run very true on both of my lathes.

Here are a few pics of the drums. This should do most anything that I need and if I not I will just make another. :)

Alan

[Steve Vaughan]

Alan, what a great job! Looks really nice and I love the color variety! Beats the heck out of that old aluminum and black plastic colors. You've got my interest up now - so the epoxy adheres well to the pvc? Did you have to do anything extra for them to bond?

[Jon McElwain]

Hippy Chucks - I love them!! And 28" is impressive! At first I thought maybe you had cut up an old bowling ball for the adapter. The use of extra resin sounds perfect! What did you use for the seal on the working end of the chucks?

[Alan Trout]

Steve,

I just sanded the PVC and it bonded very well. No problems at all.

Alan

[Roland Martin]

Wow, these have got to be the purdiest chucks I've seen. Nice job Alan, they ought to hold up very well.

[Alan Trout]

Jon,

I used the thin sticky backed craft foam that you can get at Hobby Lobby. The stuff works great.

Alan

[Jim Burr]

Nice work Alan!! After a new tool rest, a vacuum chuck is the first order of business! I'm working on being a Jr Baxter!!

[David DeCristoforo]

Those look fantastic! The donuts on the ends are great. I always have a problem with my foam seals coming loose because they are wrapped over a very thin edge. This looks much better. Could probably do something similar with wood. Gotta try that!

[Nate Davey]

Nice work on those Alan, first class as everything you do is.

[Alan Trout]

David,

I don't remember where but I saw a donut out of wood on a drum chuck. It may have been at one of my club meetings. So I ripped off that Idea but figured it would be better out of plastic. The foam does conform to the edge much better and also it will chuck onto various sizes and shapes a little better. Plus being that the donut was turned after is was glued onto the drum is is perfectly true as well.

Alan

[Ryan Baker]

I really like those! Cool idea. The rims are nice too. Should work great.

[Bob Bergstrom]

Very nice function and form. I think they are the first chucks that I've seen that could be considered "functional art"

[Bill Hensley]

I believe you have an opportunity to supplement your income. I'll take the smallest size, let me know how much and I'll let you know where to send it.;)

[Grant Wilkinson]

I have JT's hub, Alan. Your's are much more funky and likely more functional. I hope that you believe imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, because I would like to copy your idea.

[Alan Trout]

Anybody is more than welcome to copy them. I bet if you used a wood like Cocobole would tap well and hold up well and it is plenty dense for the rim as well. Just an idea to try. And thanks for the compliments.

Alan

[David E Keller]

Pretty cool looking set of drums, Alan! DD mentioned using wood for this, and I'd recommend trying the Aussie burls if somebody wants to give it a go... I've done a bit of hand chasing, and the Aussie burls work better than anything else I've tried. I used red mallee, but I'm sure many of the others would work as well. It's not quite as stunning as Alan's resin, but not much else is!

[Steve Schlumpf]

Impressive work on creating your drums!! The colorful threaded adapter is really cool looking and a great way to use up leftover resin! Nice work Alan!!

[Moses Weisberg]

Those are some very nice adapters. To thread those and make sure they were on center, did you use a large tap, or do you have access to a metal lathe with a lead screw?

[Alan Trout]

I just used a tap. To make sure they were concentric is I drilled and tapped the resin in my chuck and made sure I had a true face to register on the spindle. Then I just screw it onto the spindle and then turn the outside to to the needed dimension and it is accurate at that point.

Alan

[Baxter Smith]

Nice work Alan. The wider rims look great. Lots of times I have wished my PVC ones had them.

[Derek Gilmer]

I just used a tap. To make sure they were concentric is I drilled and tapped the resin in my chuck and made sure I had a true face to register on the spindle. Then I just screw it onto the spindle and then turn the outside to to the needed dimension and it is accurate at that point.

Alan
Like Bill said you could make some money off these. I'd gladly buy (well assuming the price isn't too crazy :) ) a few in 1x8 thread since I don't have a tap for that size to make one.

[Thom Sturgill]

Very nice Alan. I made mine with mdf and cut a groove to mount a straight fitting. yours look much better. I like the rim treatment too. After using mine a while I made one by laminating the thread block to a large (12") flat disk with a small hole in the center. I then dished the face about 1/4" and covered it with the craft foam. works well where the rim would be too close in size to a fittings. I had one bowl crack wide open when the pipe fitting fit just inside the bowl and there was a small, unnoticed crack in the rim. Your 'fat rims' may help prevent that problem some too.

[Alan Trout]

Thanks for all the kind compliments. As far as making chucks to sell was not really in my plan however Let me see how the threads holdup over a little while in real life use. So far so good but you never know. What I might do is make some per-threaded resin billets that others could use for to make their own chucks which in my mind would make a lot more sense.

Thanks,

Alan