What a wonderful review you did on this 5C lathe chuck . Considering the final runout accuracy and the reasonable price point , I would purchase one . Great video

Excellent video, thank you!

I read comments about ER collets. I started out with ER 25 collets because of the feed through limits of my lathe. I purchased a cheap set off eBay and a couple of extra front nuts. I decided, since no one seems to sell one, to make my own ER collet chuck. Using some BMS in my four jaw chuck I bored and threaded the matching thread for the nose of my Myford lathe 1.125*8 if memory serves. I then machined the mating surfaces for the mandrel into the blank. I'm fortunate in having a spare mandrel with which to check. The block was then mounted on the lathe directly and the outside, nose thread and inner 16° included taper cut. The chuck is not ground as I don't own a toolpost grinder yet and for the work I'll use this for it's more than adequate . When it came to testing runout of the inner taper of the chuck was negligible as to be expected for an on machine made part. The collets proved differently. On examination I discovered that every collet in the set was dirty. Not just grime but swarf from cutting the numerous slots with a slitting saw. To clean them out I used a long bladed utility knife and went through each slot until all the junk was removed. Then washed in degreaser and oiled to prevent rusting. Subsiquent tests showed runout to be less than 0.0005" in most cases some better. Certainly acceptable for what I intend to use. As to Precision Mathews I have just purchased a Chinese mill through them. Their numbering system has a T in the number if it's made in Taiwan and nothing in the Chinese number. Difference from what I see is the Taiwan warrantee is five years instead of three, there's shorter wait time if they don't have stock and the Taiwanese are generally a bit more expensive for similar parts. As to service I've not heard or read anything adverse. Clough 42 had a total replacement of a mill he purchased because he couldn't tram the nod out of it. Bad machining somewhere. Blondie hacks has just recieved, free, gratis, a new mill for all the nice things she said about her pm-25. She also has one of their smaller lathe's. As someone already said Adam Booth of abom fame recently installed a PM lathe in his new shop and that's a major departure from his usual made in USA mantra. So there's three major Yt contributors using their products so it must say for something. I've always heard that Matt's the guy to talk to and I've certainly had emails acknowledged within ten minutes and replied to within 24 hours, working days, as a rule. You pays your money and yous takes your chances.

First time seeing your content. Very nice take apart and evaluation! Liked & subscribed and looking forward to more interesting videos.

A more than good enough video for me to subscribe. No needless talking, unnecessary music, pleas for likes and to subscribe, and just what your testing found. Overall it looks to be fairly well made chuck. I would have loved to go with the 5C collets but wasn't willing to trust to luck for what I'd get with the average and generic brands of collets. And a full set from Hardinge is out of my budget. Instead I bought a set of Bison ER 40's for my BP clone and get dual use on the lathe. Much slower to change sizes or parts and far less capable as far as all the additional options 5C has of course.

I purchased a similar chuck but without the "set true" feature. My Myford lathe has a screw on mandrel so I machined my own base plate on the machine. When it came to machining the nose section that fits into the recess of the chuck I made it about 0.010" smaller in diameter. The chuck was then mounted with the three bolts from the front, snug but not tight. Using a small soft hammer I tapped the appropriate side until a DI on the inner bore read zero. The bolts were tightened to about 50ft/lbs with a torque wrench and runout checked again. Still virtually zero. A clean 1/2" 5C collet was mounted with a 1/2" end mill inserted. Runout on the shank of the mill was less than 0.0003" at the mouth of the collet. Quite acceptable for what I need. I also dismantled my chuck as it felt rough. I too had difficulty opening it until I realized that if you took the three bolts that held the two halves together and inserted them into the adjacent threaded from the rear holes you could use them as Jack screws to push the two parts apart. On opening I found lots of machining bits in the grease like it had been picked up off the floor. The whole was washed out with degreaser and blown dry. There were lots of sharp corners that had to be debured. I used a slip stone on the gear teeth that were too hard for a file. A needle file of various shapes sorted the rest. I then regreased with a little lithium grease and reassembled the chuck. It runs much smoother now. Then the chuck was mounted and tested as above.

Looks like you got a sweet example - it has the quality of my Bison 5C chuck. From the comments it doesn't look like all of the PM units are this good. In my experience with lots of different Buck and Bison chucks the Adjust-tru/Set-tru centering is best done with the locking screws kind of tight. Yes, the screws fight each other a little, but there is almost no walking out when final tightening is done. Hard to say how tight, but not loose.

thanks for the video. that looks like a very well made chuck at an affordable price. I'm looking at the ER-40 collet chuck because i already have a collection of ER-40 collets for my mill.

Excellent video…I’ve seen so many people bashing the nose trying to split the body, instead of using the screws… I really don’t understand why people use grease in chucks, it just acts like a magnet for dirt and metal chips….a light oil like 3 in one is all that’s needed, There are no high speeds or temperatures that require grease… I’ve never used grease on any drill or lathe chucks in 50 years and never had any issues….it also makes future maintenance so much easier…Grease can harden overtime and actually seize the chuck

Excellent review. I recently purchased the same PM Chuck but unlike yours mine was way out of alignment. The backplate had to be reground parallel and the boss was so tight in the Chuck that the set true screws had no effect and I had to turn it down a few thousands. Then when I could adjust the set true to center a dowel close to the nose the end of the dowel would precess almost 25 thousands. I am currently working on re grinding the back of the Chuck. On inspection while set up I find the back of the chuck surface is 5 thousands out. While going through all of this I also found that only a few of my collects were accepted into the chuck. After careful measurements the back of the receiving hole was only 1.249" or 1 thou too small. Enough to make a difference. That has been honed out. Like you I found the fit and finish to be excellent. I was disappointing to learn that these chucks are made in China. But unlike you the chuck that I received was not as precise as what I expected from Precision Matthew's. Color me disappointed.

Thank you. Very good video.

I think you did a nice job on video just for my curiosity I looked up PM chucks not bad for price not sure if they are hardened at the collet nose if so they should work well for a home shop. You will probably have some variance from collet to collet and will have to rest chuck for each size you use. Even my $3,000 dollar set of Hardinge collets will have .0003 run out in a Harig spin indexer just the way collets are.

I would love one of these chucks…

I wonder if they make for ER collet sizes. After trying the ER collets for accurate lathe and mill work, I won't go back to the R-8 or 5-C collets. Currently, there are no soft ER collets made but a good grinding shop can grind ER collets for accurate fixtures.

I received my 5C Matthews chuck today. I am not going to take it apart at this time but wondering what oil will you be using in the ball oil port ?. Great idea to check the mounting plate by itself. When I Aline the chuck thinking of using the ID collet seating taper. Again I really enjoyed your well produced video. Thank You BillB

Very nice review. Do you think the set true feature was worth the difference over the economy chucks. I have been looking at this same model. Just subscribed to your channel. Thanks for sharing.

Thank you for this. 👍 Since I saw Clough42's teardown video of his cheap Ebay collet chuck I was wondering if the PM version was really a step up in quality (certainly a step up in price) or just another cheap clone with PM's logo and the set-tru adjustments being the only "enhancements" for the price difference. I see that it definitely is a big step up to justify the difference. I wished your teardown went a bit slower to show a better shot of the ring gear, but I paused it and it appears to be MUCH more evenly machined/ground than what was in the cheap one in Clough's video. I also wished you had checked the hardness of both the pinion and the ring gears. Clough's reason for tearing his down was that he noticed it's action was getting worse and on teardown it appeared the pinion gears were too soft and getting deformed. Outside of those nit picks, great video and now this 5C chuck is on my list as the one to get. Again, thank you.

Is this 5C chuck better than the lever collet closers in terms of gripping power?

Хороший чак

regardless of how good this chuck is, I'm sorry I ever got one (different brand, but that's not the point), these things have way too much overhang, so they will vibrate because of the overhang regardless of how low the TIR is, also too much weight on the spindle. its mind boggling that bench top size lathe spindles have morse taper rather than 5-C.

Nice truer , but didn't see you finally torquing the bolts , to clamp firmly??

Not at all interested in the insides of the thing, what I want to know is how does it perform...........I get better runout with my Chinese 3 jaw chuck and that is now 40 years old.

Precision Matthews are the same as Warco and Chester engineering machines in the UK they import Chinese or you would hope Taiwanese machines under there name which they inspect before selling to you but they are still clones of Colchester/Harrison lathes and Bridgeport and others not sure what USA company still make made in USA lathes (nice to see Colchester lathes still set the bench mark which all lathes company follow and still do today) anyway the 5C collet chuck PM is selling to you is still a import clone from China or Taiwan which come from them factory's you see on Aliexpress and Ebay difference is its got a name on it ie Precision Matthews and others which means they might take a bit more care when making it, Ebay are generally the seconds not quite up to scratch, Warco charge £162 shipped for the exact same 5C chuck and using there collet less than 0.001mm run out, can the name PM worth a extra $150+ from the same Chinese/Taiwanese factory your choice but it still needed finishing so do they inspect them before selling to you i doubt it.To prove a point about cloning look at a new Colchester/Harrison manual lathe and then look at the Colchester cloned version precision matthews is selling Abom79 as one

Video starts off "Welcome to the Shop". White coat, gloves, that's not a shop, that's a freaking lab, or a surgery center. Although the next time I have surgery, if the surgeon breaks out a collet chuck, I'm out.