pipemakersforum.com

Hi All. I can't believe it's mid November and I haven't logged in since October. My priorities have shifted a bit: my wife has requested that I turn some candlestick sets for our daughters, daughter in Law and her. I have a chuck I bought from Trent Rudat with the special jaws, but it also has the 4 regular jaws as well.

Anyway, I switched out the briar jaws and put in the regular jaws that came with the chuck.
The problem is I can't get them to scroll. They are in their correct locations on the chuck, they will scroll if I only install two of the jaws; but they won't scroll with all four jaws in place.
Here are a few pics.
If anyone could shed some light on this for me it would be appreciated.
Thank you all in advance.
Kind regards
Chris

Let me try and rephrase this. Whatever difficulties I'm having are solely because of operator error or my lack of knowledge. My understanding is these are reversible jaws. One side with steps, the other side just for clamping. The clamping side closes just fine like in this picture below.

While the jaws that have the steps only close as far as the photo above.
Hmmm, maybe a light bulb moment and thinking the stepped sides are not supposed to close any closer in? Argghhh

You answered your own question. The stepped side can be used to turn larger material stock.

I may be all wet, and I am not a lathe maven either, but won’t the teeth on the jaws that engage with the scroll be curved?
If that is the case, then I don’t think that they will engage very far on the scroll because they will bind as the scroll becomes tighter (shorter radius).
DocAitch

Those aren't reversible jaws.

OK, I'm still confused, I'm still thinking the jaws are reversible.
I can't get the stepped side to go closer together and I can't get them to align properly.
In the first picture on the left hand side you can see a small, inset ball-bearing. I only discovered today while trying to work the scroll that the little ball bearing can be pushed in and it feels like there is a spring in there. After using the chuck for 4 years I only realized that the ball bearing can be depressed because I thought, "What exactly is this for and to my surprise it could be pushed in. I have no idea what is for.
Any comments or ideas?
P.S. Doc, yes they are curved.
Thanks guys.

The ball bearing is an oiling point.

As I said, the jaws are not reversible, that's why you get two sets, an internal and an external set. If you try and use them the wrong way as you are doing you will damage the chuck and the jaws.
Trust me, they are NOT reversible.

Thanks Chris! That makes sense. So which is the correct way? Stepped sides in or the other way?
I sure hope I haven't damaged anything.

Yep, turn them 180deg. You don't have a set of "external" jaws, Trent used 2 of them to make the pipe jaws (and presumably kept the other 2 for use on other chucks). You might be able to buy a set of external jaws for the lathe, ask Trent which model it is and where he bought it, you may get lucky. Otherwise you need another chuck.

Thanks again Chris. I understand now. I do have a Nova Chuck and some small pen jaws that I use for Delrin and rod material. I have several jaw sets for it that I use for other various projects and hobbies. I only use Trent's chuck for my briar.
All good!

Oh and in that picture with the jaws closed you have a jaw out of sync, that's why they don't meet. You must install them in the correct order and correct timing on the scroll to get them to align properly.