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The standard saddle lock on an ML7 lathe was a 1/4" Whitworth bolt which was tightened by the use of a spanner. This modification involved the manufacture of a short handled lever to be fitted as a permanent fixture to the lathe, this would make searching for the spanner a thing of the past and make locking and unlocking the saddle a much quicker operation. Here are a couple of pictures - before and after. |
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Original Saddle Lock |
New Saddle Lock |
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To reuse the clamp mechanism itself, the correct thread had to be used. This was a BSF thread of 5/16th diameter with 22 tpi. A brass washer was used under the clamp handle to set the lock and unlock positions so that the lever would be out of the way. The photo above shows the clamp in the locked position. Unlocked, the lever turned about 30º anti-clockwise. |
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After this success, I decided to make a similar handle for the tool-post bolt. At the same time I ordered a new quick change tool-post from RDG tooling. Once the tool post arrived I made up a handle in the same.The handle was kept short on purpose to avoid it getting in the way. |
Tool post locking handle |
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Since making the saddle lock I found that the lever gets in the way if the top-slide is rotated anti-clockwise the full amount and the cross slide is wound in. A corner case situation but worth knowing. This probably explains the design of the original Myford solution. |
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