I just bought an Atlas lathe a few days ago! Same as this craftsman just renamed. Its my first Metal lathe and I didnt even know about Alignment.... Thanks so much I have learnt so much from all your videos!

I think this is brilliant and worth looking at for the tailstock to head , after the headstock & bed is aligned.

The method fails if the tailstock is either too high or too low to begin with. You have to verify or shim it first, otherwise the dial indicator will always read too low because it is vertically off center at the tailstock end. To check the height, make a test bar the way you do and sweep a test indicator across the top of each swapped end.

I was shown this method WAYYYYY back by my machine shop teacher in high school. I was going to do a video on it, but I see you've beat me to it. LOL. I love how some of these companies are trying to sell people a specially made alignment bar....precision ground....oooooh.....aaaawwwhhhh. Thank you for posting this sir.

This is the simplest method I've seen. Thanks

Nice simple technique, well done. Thanks

Thanks buddy! You’ve helped a lot!

Yes, this video is very helpful.

Thank you, as a beginner hobby machinist this was simple and very helpful. I am having issues with shafts being cut between centres and this should fix it.

Thank you for a very informative video, re-furbishing a 1964 Colchester Student at the moment and looking for tips and tricks, have been documenting its progress and will put the information on you tube as there seems to be very little in depth for this model regards Nigel Cox.

Thank you 🙏

Theresa faster way.. run the 2 centerpoints together. Take a thin piece of metal . About 6" or bigger. Place it between the points and gently crank in the point on the headstock.. the metal sheet will tilt in whatever direction the point is off.. you can actually eyeball a thousandth using this method....obviously the bigger the metal , the more it will tilt at the outer edge.

That is the same method described in my Grizzly Industrial manual.

Thanks!!

a machienest told me you can only do this with a tail stock alignment rod witch is highly precise

This video is very usefull for me, thanks for sharing it.

Do this with the CHUCK. Chuck one end and dead or live ctr the other end. Any piece of stock machined at both ends with the compound and cross slide dials set the same, will produce the 'current Z axis' for the lathe 'at that moment'. If that Z axis you've just machined (no matter what length the test piece), produces a chuck end dia of eg. .818 and a tailstock dia of .814, the tailstock must be dialed away from the tool point .002. It really is that simple because if the height was also a bit out, the trig takes care of itself when both diameters match. To put it another way, chuck and tailstock alignment may not be perfect on 'the machine' but they need to match and parallel exactly, the tool point on its up and down travel. That's why I say to do this set up using the working chuck.

How one can be sure that this is an tailstock aligment issue and not a headstock to bed rail aligment problem?

If you're vertical alignment is off, how do you correct it?

This was super helpful and I'll need to this soon. So, it doesn't matter if the test bar isn't perfectly straight? It's all about the area you turned down. Correct? If so, that makes it a bit easier since I had no idea where I would find a perfectly straight piece of round bar.

I use a cookie sheet for my shavings too :)

How can you rely on the tail stock for center drilling your test bar if its the tailstock you want to align?

If the vertical is out of alignment how do you adjust that, with shims? Thanks, I'm just earning about this.

This doesn't really test for tilt though. Any one please suggest a test?

Hi. What kind of lubricant do you use?