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Vacuum Chuck Question

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I have been having okay results with various home made chucks and the vacuum pump I bought from the frugal system guy. I am doing a variety of larger bowls and it seems to me that a flat faced chuck sized to fit all of the larger bowls would be useful. I was also wondering if rubber sheeting like that used as gasket material in some applications or as vibration isolation material would seal well and last longer than craft foam. It seems to be readily available in 1/8" and 1/4" thick sheets. So I am thinking of building a flat faced chuck with a rubber covered face. Is there some reason this is a terrible idea?

Most of the curved faced chucks I have made seem to be inclined to fit one particular bowl size/style really well and pinch/cut the craft foam making the foam a one shot deal. In some cases they have wedged pretty tightly into/onto the bowl. Maybe I didn't design them well, maybe I just need more sizes or styles, but it seems to me as if just using a flat surface might solve all that if it can achieve a decent seal. Granted it wont be self centering, but I can live with that as long as it stays centered once in place and the vacuum is cranked up.
 
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I am thinking of building a flat faced chuck with a rubber covered face. Is there some reason this is a terrible idea?

I can't think of any reason why this wouldn't work. If memory serves @Gary Beasley uses something like what you describe. If the chuck has a large face the pull will be very strong and you may want to throttle back the vacuum.

I have Bob Leonard's Frugal system and have had good luck just using the PVC pipe chuck he made for me. Good hold and the foamy gives lots of uses. But my applications are not the same as yours. Can you explain more about your work holding needs.
 
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My needs probably aren't all that special. I made a couple chucks when I started turning with a Harbor Freight mini lathe. I was and maybe still am fairly new to all this and maybe a little clueless. I was making small bowls and trying to learn as I went. The first chucks use 1"x8 tpi nuts to mount on the lathe. They worked well on the first bowls because the shape was made specifically for them. The idea was that they were supposed to be versatile, but they have been lees so than I had hoped.

I now have a nice new Jet 1642 and am making al little larger bowls. So far not all that large, but still am finding that my chucks are working, but are not optimum. They have not ruined a bowl, but I suspect I came close to splitting one that was wedged on crazy tight and had cut the foam. I expect that I will soon want to make some that won't fit these chucks at all.

Anyway I began to think that above some size I might prefer to just use a flat faced chuck either still using craft foam or maybe with rubber facing permanently attached.
chucks.jpg
 
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I made mine using a small faceplate and a piece of mdf. I got an old offset press blanket from the print shop I retired from and glued it down over the surface being very sure to seal the outside edges as the blanket has a fabric back. I’ll sometimes use the craft foam taped on top of that if the bowl wont seat well on the flat surface. My vacuum pump is a 15cfm GAST pump, a bit of overkill but its great having the extra capacity to overcome leaks. One tip is to wax the rubber surface so the finish on the inside of the bowl you have on it wont be so prone to stick the bowl in place.
12A7A889-CBF7-4FE5-9CB1-83D54C8EEF94.jpeg 1E5CFF72-D7AF-452A-9275-F79CAD67CDE7.jpeg
 
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Good to know that the flat face is working for you Gary. That gives me hope that I am not going down a dead end path since I already started building this and am waiting on glue to dry. I am not familiar with the material that you used, but will try the rubber like stuff I was planning to try. It is good to know that taping some craft foam on top is an option even with a flat plate. I might even seal it with varnish or epoxy and try it with craft foam first since I don't have the rubber stuff on hand. I can always try the rubber later and if the wood is sealed with varnish or epoxy it will be easier to strip off the rubber if I need to later.
 

Tom Gall

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I have been having okay results with various home made chucks and the vacuum pump I bought from the frugal system guy. I am doing a variety of larger bowls and it seems to me that a flat faced chuck sized to fit all of the larger bowls would be useful. I was also wondering if rubber sheeting like that used as gasket material in some applications or as vibration isolation material would seal well and last longer than craft foam. It seems to be readily available in 1/8" and 1/4" thick sheets. So I am thinking of building a flat faced chuck with a rubber covered face. Is there some reason this is a terrible idea?

That will absolutely work for flat rimmed bowls. Made my first one about 25 years ago. Any closed-cell foam, neoprene, or rubber will work....all available from places like MSC, McMaster-Carr, etc. However, the craft foam (1/8" or less) is perfect for this even if you have to butt-splice it. Don't make it too thick or you will feel some movement while cutting. If your bowl rim is not perfectly flat you can add some additional foam to compensate for this. The closed cell shipping foam works well for this (comes in different densities) - just cut a hole near the center and sandwich it between your flat chuck and the bowl.

The flat chuck can also be used to have some fun with off-center & multi-center stuff - as long as you have a shallow recess on the back side. Try it.....you might like it - and maybe take your turning in a new direction.:)
 
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I like the idea of closed cell foam as you don't need a dead flat surface. Get too hard of rubber sheeting and the wood has to be perfect. I've seen people get large diameter/large cross section o-rings. I think you can also get rubber cording.
 
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Thanks guys. Great food for thought. I'll start out with the craft foam. I have some on hand. Most of the issues I had with it were due to wedging issues due to the fit of the chucks. I have a feeling that with a flat surface it may not be nearly the same problem. I can experiment with other materials later if I feel the need.
 
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They also make Foam Backer Rod which is available in various diameters used to fill concrete joints prior to caulking. This is available in most big box stores and provides the level of compression for a closed cell foam to act as a sealing gasket joint. You can cut it to length with a razor knife and glue the two ends together to make an O-ring style gasket. Available in sizes from 3/8" to 2" in diameter.
 
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I have made several PVC vacuum chucks. The ones I made I used the Beall tap in wood. At some point I bought the OneWay 3 1/2” vacuum chuck. I enjoyed using that chuck so much I bought their 5 1/2” vacuum chuck. I still have a few PVC smaller chucks, but if I can use the OneWay I do. I make gaskets from the thin adhesive backed fun foam. You want a thin gasket to minimize uneven compression you could get with a thicker gasket. IMO the OneWay chucks are worth every penny. They always run true and no worry about leakage.
 

Tom Gall

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They also make Foam Backer Rod which is available in various diameters used to fill concrete joints prior to caulking. This is available in most big box stores and provides the level of compression for a closed cell foam to act as a sealing gasket joint. You can cut it to length with a razor knife and glue the two ends together to make an O-ring style gasket. Available in sizes from 3/8" to 2" in diameter.
I've found that any chucks using O-rings (or foam) are more difficult to make and have very limited applications....and in most cases not worth the effort. Of all the vac chucks I've made over the years I only have one with a rubber O-ring used on the OD and not on the surface. It was a two-part chuck and is only suitable for one specific application/product that I no longer make.
 
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I made mine using a small faceplate and a piece of mdf. I got an old offset press blanket from the print shop I retired from and glued it down over the surface being very sure to seal the outside edges as the blanket has a fabric back. I’ll sometimes use the craft foam taped on top of that if the bowl wont seat well on the flat surface. My vacuum pump is a 15cfm GAST pump, a bit of overkill but its great having the extra capacity to overcome leaks. One tip is to wax the rubber surface so the finish on the inside of the bowl you have on it wont be so prone to stick the bowl in place.
View attachment 32488 View attachment 32489
This is almost identical to what I use, though I've always had good results with 1/16" craft foam for the gaskets. Works great!
 
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I have a pump from Frugal, a Rotary Vacuum Chuck Adapter from Craft Supplies USA, and a set of PVC Coupling Vacuum Seals from Rubber Chucky. I built my own chucks out of threaded wood faceplates and schedule 40 PVC fittings from the big box.
 
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Well things seem to work fine on mine except that my perfectly true running chuck suddenly wobbles. I used a Beale tap to make a block that is glued to the back. Not sure if I used too small of a block or what. I really doubt it is the threads since they are quite tight. Gluing was probably a bad idea. A bigger block with screw attachment would allow shimming.

I have a 12" diameter sanding disk that I made of the same plywood that runs nice and true with larger backing block, screws, and shimming. It has a 3" aluminum ring that my chuck expands in to for mounting on the lathe instead of Beale tapped threads, but I hesitate to assume the mounting is the problem.
 
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Okay so I figured out what happened. I made a stupid mistake that I should have known better than to do.

This morning in order to sort things out, I took the threaded block off and added a faceplate. I trued it up with a couple layers of typing paper. Once it was as true as I could get it with shimming I realized that the whole chuck face was no longer flat. It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't flat either. Then it hit me that I had foolishly sealed one face of the chuck and not the other. I am sure it would get better or worse as the weather changed. Any way I sealed the back side and I expect it will be fine now. It seems to be flat and true already and I expect it to be stable now.

Edit:
For what it is worth the sanding disk was treated the same way wrt surface treatment and never warped. I guess the much larger backing plate did the trick there. I went ahead and sealed the back on the sanding disk any way, at least the part not covered by the backing plate.
 
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I made mine out of melamine covered mdf to avoid any problems like that. The face plate is the way to go for anything that big too. After I got it mounted the next step was to turn the rim edges even and smooth for balance and safety, no sharp edges or points. Also when I mounted the face plate I sealed it to the mdf with rubber cement to reduce air leaks.
 
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The face plate is the way to go for anything that big too.
Obviously a faceplate is a good way to go. That said, I have some nice aluminum that is a little over 3" OD and 4mm wall thickness. A ring cut from that can make a very positive attachment via my Nova Super2 chuck. Since I have some on hand it is free other than a little of my time cutting and truing it up vs buying a face plate for twenty or thirty bucks. If I hadn't had an extra faceplate sitting there I'd have probably cut a piece of that aluminum, trued it up, and mounted it in a ply or mdf backer plate like I did for the disk sander attachment (which actually seems more solid than the face plate).

I put a sealed bearing in the actual chuck disk itself so the tube from frugal runs through the spindle all the way to it. So in my application there is no need to seal the faceplate with rubber cement.
 

Tom Gall

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I put a sealed bearing in the actual chuck disk itself so the tube from frugal runs through the spindle all the way to it. So in my application there is no need to seal the faceplate with rubber cement.

The following is a post I made from Oct. 2019 (?). If you do a search you can find several discussions on vacuum chucking.

If at all possible I would eliminate all lamp rod and use the spindle itself as a vacuum tube.

When I got my “new” larger lathe (1996) I didn’t want to remake all of my vacuum chucks so I adapted them by cutting the lamp rod on the chucks to just enter the spindle by an inch or so. A small piece of 3/8” ID tubing slipped on the rod will seal off the spindle (can be temporary). All new vac chucks that I made eliminate the lamp rod and simply screw on the spindle. On the hand wheel side my rotary union (homemade) has a short piece of rod (2-1/2” or so) covered with tubing and simply slides in and out in about a second. A nice looking commercial rotary union is sold by CSUSA (Precision Machine?) but none of the options would fit my lathe.

Another rotary union I made for my mini-lathe (small spindle ID) uses a disc that uses 4 rare earth magnets to mount on the steel hand wheel with a foam seal around the spindle hole. This type may be useful in some applications.
 
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If at all possible I would eliminate all lamp rod and use the spindle itself as a vacuum tube.

I don't have either. I don't care for the idea of messing with lamp rod, but there is no lamp rod and I don't use the spindle as a vacuum tube. I am using the stiff tubing that comes with the frugal system. I think it is polyethelene. It just slips through the spindle and into the bearing. It is a tight enough fit to seal at both ends (into the bearing and into the vacuum hose). Just press it in on both ends, no muss no fuss. I actually like the system a lot and don't see much if any reason to change.

My initial concern was that the tube might rub and wear, but so far there has been no wear that I have noticed and it has been used quite a bit. I figure it will last long enough that if it ever does wear out I'll most likely replace it with more of the same. Maybe somewhere down the road i'll see some disadvantage, but at this point I am very happy with it.
 

Dave Landers

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My initial concern was that the tube might rub and wear, but so far there has been no wear that I have noticed and it has been used quite a bit.
I use the same system, and had the same concern (where the tube comes out of the handwheel). I wrapped that bit of the tube in gorilla tape, but as that shows no wear, I expect I too was concerned about nothing.
 
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My initial concern was that the tube might rub and wear, but so far there has been no wear that I have noticed and it has been used quite a bit.
I use the same system, and had the same concern (where the tube comes out of the handwheel). I wrapped that bit of the tube in gorilla tape, but as that shows no wear, I expect I too was concerned about nothing.

I have the Frugal system and you got me currious so I took a look at the tubing when I removed the vacuum chuck last night. Sure enough there is a shallow groove where the plastic tubing exits the hand wheel. The chuck gets some use and it would certainly be a while before this easily replaced tube would be penetrated, but I'll look around for a suitable sleeve or tape.
 
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Hi All,

It's been a while since posting here ... I was in need of a vacuum system because I got tired of messing with the jumbo jaws, and having bowls come flying out of them. I bought the Hold Fast system. It worked as advertised for a while before the seal on the bearing ripped, mid bowl of course. I contacted the manufacture and they sent me some more seals but they kept ripping. I ended ended up making my own seal out of craft foam, electrical tape and graphite powder. I also had issues with the vacuum chucks as they would always leave dents in the bowls. Fixed that problem by adding a layer of craft foam to help pad out the chuck.

I invested in the OneWay rotary adapter. It works so much better than the lamp rod. It is however, a real PITA to put it on and off the lathe as you have to remove the hand wheel each time. I started making my own vacuum chucks out of PVC, plywood, epoxy and craft foam. They seem to work better than the Hold Fast. I can also customize them to accommodate a wide variety of trinkets.

The Hold Fast vacuum generator works well, I've been thinking about upgrading to a vacuum pump as I've been finding more and more uses for vacuum around the shop.

Also, Carl Ford has a very good, extremely detailed tutorial about Vacuum Chucks. Here is the link http://www.carlford.info/pages/demos_classes/demos_classes.html Scroll down the page until you find the demo on Vacuum Chucks.

I hope this helps.
 
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I have the Frugal system and you got me currious so I took a look at the tubing when I removed the vacuum chuck last night. Sure enough there is a shallow groove where the plastic tubing exits the hand wheel. The chuck gets some use and it would certainly be a while before this easily replaced tube would be penetrated, but I'll look around for a suitable sleeve or tape.
Just curious. Do you leave the tube in the spindle all the time or is the wear from just the time of using the vacuum chuck? I do see a little ridge in mine, but not enough that I am concerned that it will be a problem for a very long time.

Does the vacuum line supplied with the frugal system fit in your hand wheel? If so that fits nicely over the tubing and would stay put on it. On the other hand 1/4" ID 3/8" OD polyethelene tubing is readily available and dirt cheap. I am pretty sure it is the same stuff Home Depot sells for about $6 for 25' ($18 for 100').

I'd be inclined to just move the wear point a little before it wears through by trimming an inch off of the chuck end of the tube. That way one piece would last a long time as long as it was long enough to trim a little off now and then to move the wear point, but at $6 for 25' you could just replace it any time the wear was bad enough to concern you. That is assuming I am correct that it is the same or equivalent stuff.
 

john lucas

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Dont know if I can do mb this from my phone but will try. I had my handwheel bored to fit this bearing. The other adaptor I got from Nova many years ago. Would not be hard to make. I cut some craft foam to fit in the Hand wheel. Works perfectly and is really fast to install or remove. Sometimes.i have.to.push on the assembly after turning the vacuum.on to get full.vacuum but it's such a simple thing I don't worry about it.
 

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I was going to order the JT Tools adapter, but they did not answer my calls or email. I then found a post of someone on Facebook saying that he has been waiting couple of months on his order from them and he is getting no answers.

Hope all is well with them, they have an adapter for Jet and Powermatic that is easy to use. I was trying to find out if they had any issues with model C since they specify models A and zB compatibility.
 

Tom Gall

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Just curious. Do you leave the tube in the spindle all the time or is the wear from just the time of using the vacuum chuck? I do see a little ridge in mine, but not enough that I am concerned that it will be a problem for a very long time.

Does the vacuum line supplied with the frugal system fit in your hand wheel? If so that fits nicely over the tubing and would stay put on it. On the other hand 1/4" ID 3/8" OD polyethelene tubing is readily available and dirt cheap. I am pretty sure it is the same stuff Home Depot sells for about $6 for 25' ($18 for 100').

I'd be inclined to just move the wear point a little before it wears through by trimming an inch off of the chuck end of the tube. That way one piece would last a long time as long as it was long enough to trim a little off now and then to move the wear point, but at $6 for 25' you could just replace it any time the wear was bad enough to concern you. That is assuming I am correct that it is the same or equivalent stuff.

Once again...if at all possible I would eliminate all lamp rod and/or plastic tubing and use the spindle itself as a vacuum tube. I saw Dave's picture with his vac chucks (storage) and all that tubing sticking out. All you need is your mounting method (faceplate, self tapped, whatever) on the headstock spindle end, and just slide your rotary union into your handwheel. 1-2 seconds IN - 1-2 seconds OUT. My rotary union is homemade from Dymondwood ®, a bearing, hose fitting and short piece of plastic tubing covering a short metal tube that slides into the headstock. Any tight-grained wood, Corian, or Delrin type rod can be used for the body.
CSUSA has a great unit for $65 (see link). I tried to buy one last year but it didn't fit my lathe (General 260) so I returned it. If you are frugal :D.....you can make your own.

https://www.woodturnerscatalog.com/...k-Adapter?term=vacuum+chuck&term=vacuum chuck
 
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Once again...if at all possible I would eliminate all lamp rod and/or plastic tubing and use the spindle itself as a vacuum tube.
I don't see a compelling reason why it is that much better than the plastic tube which also takes seconds to hook up and works fine. If it was a hassle I'd switch in a heartbeat, but I have not found it to be one. It doesn't take more than 5-10 extra seconds to hook up if that. I have a metal lathe and could make a fitting with o-rings and a sealed bearing for the hand-wheel, but I have not felt the need.

Using the spindle as a vacuum tube is great, I just don't see a compelling reason to switch from a quick, inexpensive, and simple system that works fine. Maybe at some point I'll have a chunk of aluminum staring at me and turn a piece on the metal lathe, but I really don't see a lot of benefit to switching. Given my penchant for tinkering I'll probably do it sooner or later.

Edit: It occurred to me that one advantage to using the spindle as a vacuum tube is that it wouldn't require a bearing in each chuck as long as you got a good enough seal with the spindle threads or morse taper used to mount the chuck.
 
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Just curious. Do you leave the tube in the spindle all the time or is the wear from just the time of using the vacuum chuck? I do see a little ridge in mine, but not enough that I am concerned that it will be a problem for a very long time.

Does the vacuum line supplied with the frugal system fit in your hand wheel? If so that fits nicely over the tubing and would stay put on it. On the other hand 1/4" ID 3/8" OD polyethelene tubing is readily available and dirt cheap. I am pretty sure it is the same stuff Home Depot sells for about $6 for 25' ($18 for 100').

I'd be inclined to just move the wear point a little before it wears through by trimming an inch off of the chuck end of the tube. That way one piece would last a long time as long as it was long enough to trim a little off now and then to move the wear point, but at $6 for 25' you could just replace it any time the wear was bad enough to concern you. That is assuming I am correct that it is the same or equivalent stuff.

I leave the white plastic tube attached to the chuck. I slip it through the headstock when I mount the chuck. The tube is smaller in diameter than the lumen of the spindle so the fit is loose.
 
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