Where's the best place to

[Gary Max]

I am going to set up a vac chuck on my lathe. Where is the best place to buy all the hardware----I bought a gast pump off ebay today.
I looked at Packard and CSUSA and they have the same prices.
Also I read a post that said I want a 5 1/2 chuck--is this correct???
Oh another question---how close to the lathe does the pump need to be???

Thanks in advance

[Chip Sutherland]

http://www.joewoodworker.com

I don't have the funds for a vacuum chuck, yet. But the above is a site the I found looking for gast pumps and DIY veneering pump plans. Turns out the technology for a vacuum chuck is basically the same. Another site is Bill Grumbine's web page (http://wonderfulwood.com/). I have a through hole in my headstock that I plan on using but Bill shows how to do a chuck on the spindle side of the lathe when you don't have a headstock hole.

And http://www.oneway.on.ca/ has some information, too.

[Cecil Arnold]

Gary, I used the vac. system from Packard that goes through the headstock. I don't think you need to worry too much about the length of line from pump to chuck as long as it is not excessive and gets in the way. I made a 4" and 6" chuck from MDF and PVC. The major cost of these is the faceplate. You can get gasket material from Packard (they included directions with the "O" ring material). As long as you don't need too long a chuck you might be happier using PVC butt connectors as they seem to be truer than normal PVC as well as being slightly larger than the nominal diameter. The major difficulty I have heard about in using the MDF/ply/PVC chuck is sealing the MDF. I made up some thinned yellow glue and painted it on the chuck while it was under vacuum and it sealed everything up nicely.

[Andy Hoyt]

Moose your way through threads that Jim Ketron has started. Pretty sure he did a whole thing about this.

[Dave Wimmer]

Gary, Regarding vacuum chucks
Nothing sacred about the size. Just depends on the job at hand. I made three from pvc couplers, 3", 4", 5". I use the mid-size (4") the most.

[Jim Becker]

Johnny Tolly in Texas is a good source for the "hardware" and he has published some articles on building your own drums. (Other than my pump, which I bought surplus, and my drums, which are from OneWay, all my tubing, filters, etc, came via Johnny) Contact info for Johnny is in the Vacuum Chucking article (http://sawsndust.com/a-vacuumchuck.htm) on my site.

[Jim Ketron]

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=18864
You can look at mine here.
On how close. Make it accessible while your are turning Just in-case you need to turn it off in an emergency situation