Compact 5 steady

Hi All,
First a short introduction:
I am Tristram Budel, I have been an instructables member for quite some time now but never uploaded a completed instructable.
I have a bachelor in chemistry and a passion for machining.

I still have my first Lathe, it is a very portable Emco compact 5. I have noticed that there are loads of these compact 5 lathes out there but unfortunately Emco has stopped the production of these fine hobby machines and I have found that high quality accessories are hard to find. Long ago I have equipped this small lathe with the original steady, which so far I might have used once or twice. Because it is absolute rubbish. 

In this build I am going to share how I build a new steady for my Emco Compact 5 lathe.
Total cost: about 15 euro's in materials
Total shop time: about 7 hours
Total design time: about 3 hours

General rules of thumb:
Safety goggles
Gloves
Earplugs
Organic vapour mask when cooling with ethanol
Remove chips and cuttings with a dry clean paintbrush
Always clamp your work piece in a machine vice when tapping or drilling
Always use some cutting oil when tapping or drilling

Attached you will find all my G-code files, these work fine with EMC2 (thats what I use) mind you that the feed speeds in the files are much higher as recommended. I reduce the feed speeds to my liking in EMC2.

Step 1: Tools and materials

Materials needed:
Aluminum stock 6060 10*100*150mm
Tool steel stock 10*10*300mm
6pcs M5*20mm hex socket screws
2pcs M5*30mm hex socket screws
3pcs M3*8mm hex socket screws
3pcs bearings 4x10x4 rs-components order nr 612-5802


Tools used:
Wabeco LF1400HS CNC mill (my pride and joy)
Hand drill
Bench drill
Hack saw
Some 80,250 sanding paper
M3 tap
M5 tap
6mm solid carbide flat end mill
3mm solid carbide flat end mill
2mm solid carbide flat end mill
Calipers (ofcourse)
sharpie
4.5mm drill bit
2.5mm drill bit
5.0mm drill bit
8.0mm drill bit

Hammer + small aluminium round bar (I know not very subtle but it works)

Programs used:
Google Sketchup Pro 8
CAM program
EMC2 Linux

Comments

[Dr Qui]

Very nice work, the steady is the one piece of equipment that I have never used on a lathe, all my time as a fitter was spent on stuff that was no longer than 5-6" long so I just never had need to use one, also never got in much work on 4 jaw chucks either.

 I just got an old Compact 5 back to life once all the broken PC gubbins was removed, now i'm slowly trying to acquire the few essential bits and pieces that allow. you to start making the other bits and pieces.

There is nothing crude about tapping the bearings on with the alu bar, my old engineering tutor often referred to hammers as the gentle persuader.  at least you used something soft as a punch.

[cold_steel]

Thanks, I spend some time tinkering with sound suppressors on my Compact 5. Then having such a steady really comes in handy. Especially for threading somewhat longer and thicker tubes. But I used it only a hand full of times, still it's handy to have one around.
True true, some times some gentle persuasion is all that it needs. Although I was a bit afraid I was going to ruin my bearings with a wrong tap.
Thanks for your comment

[sleeping]

Really nice. Thanks for the Instructable.