# 14x40 tailstock arbor stuck & tuneup



## PeterT (Apr 14, 2019)

For some reason my lathe tail stock arbor got stuck in the MT quill socket. I’m not certain why because it always ejects when I retract it back below ~ 0.5”. I guessed maybe I wiped it too clean or embedded a chip? It was stuck in there good. I removed the handle & unscrewed the leadscrew so I could see the end of the arbor from the end of the TS casting block. I put a rod in there & tapped it pretty good but still no go. I was worried I might damage something else so I disassembled the TS (for the first time actually). The procedure is: unscrew the lead screw so it un-threads from the quill & detaches internally, remove the double jam nuts, remove the spin handle, remove the ball off the quill lock handle & resting pin so it can unwind from the brass lateral quill lock thingy, drift out the brass thingy. Now the quill will slide out towards the headstock.

Once I had the quill out with the arbor still stuck I wasn’t too worried about drifting it a bit harder. Still no go. So I sprayed some WD-40 in the barrel & heated the quill with my heat gun, some more knocks, then it came. Whew! So no pics of that operation but I thought I’d share some internals in case you run across something similar.


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## PeterT (Apr 14, 2019)

The slot shoe & dissassembly


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## PeterT (Apr 14, 2019)

Parts cleaned up. Shows how the shoe engages the slot.


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## PeterT (Apr 14, 2019)

The brass clamp, color coordinated cap screws  & slightly cleaned up shoe in position before quill insertion. I stoned the slot sides so I did not want to remove material off the sides of the shoe. I cleaned up the nose & chamfered the burrs. Its running smooth now.


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## PeterT (Apr 14, 2019)

schematic


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## PeterT (Apr 15, 2019)

Interesting - was just watching demo of PM 1440 GT & that tailstock has what looks like a drift slot?


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## John Conroy (Apr 15, 2019)

I had a l


ook at mine and noticed for the first time that it has a slot for a drift key


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## PeterT (Apr 15, 2019)

That looks like an improvement to me. A typical quill drift is a lot more effective than disassembly & back tapping.

Thinking about this tailstock assembly some more if I understand the internals
- big fat chunky tang on the end of the arbor engages something inside the quill to prevent rotation
- but quill engages the the tailstock casting via the keyway slot and that little shoe slider part, essentially the round pin segment that fits in the hole
- so anti-rotation torque is held until that pin shears + any 'stiction' force from the MT arbor/socket fit

Maybe its this way by design? You want to break that pin & not the casting or quill.


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