7X12 Mini-Lathe Apron Hand Wheel Gear Chip Guard

thingiverse

This cover is designed to prevent chips from entering your large handwheel gears that drive the apron towards and away from the spindle. It's installed between the lead screw and the apron, where you can clearly see the exposed gears. You will need to scale this object up by 12.5 times or with an X, Y, Z measurement of 84.3mm x 60.12mm x 6.55mm. I have a Grizzly G8688 7x12 Mini-Lathe, which is a "made in China" lathe that many other companies sell. I believe SIEG is the original manufacturer. This cover should work on all 7x12 mini-lathes, but to be sure, I've included the original .blend file for you to experiment with. The final model has a corner cut out, which was not included in my original .blend file. I had to make this cut with a saw and it only took two minutes. The .stl file is an estimate of where the cut should be, so if needed, you may have to file off a small amount. I attached this cover to the apron using RTV Black Silicone, which works very well as long as the backside is cleaned with alcohol. You can also install screws if you prefer, but it's not necessary to disassemble or drill anything if you use the silicone, and I'm confident that this will stay on for the life of your lathe. In the picture, you can see the cover installed between the lead screw and the backside where the apron gears are. You can also see the chip guard I made for the apron rail ways, which can be found here: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1905502