One advantage of making your own is you could make it longer. And the longer it is, theoretically the more accurate it would be, or less prone to machining discrepancies. I never made one but here is how i would attempt:
- get a piece of straight aluminum tube, maybe .75" OD (aluminum is light, tubing is rigid in this application)
- machine 2 steel end bosses machined to fit tube ID on one end but larger diameter boss on the other end, say 0.85. The larger end would be center drilled 60-deg. Basically these mimic the Edge but only semi machined for now
- attach the bosses to the tube with Loctite or whatever
- now with centers in both headstock & tailstock take a skim cut off the boss on the headstock end only. You'll nee a dog which I didn't have. Lock the cross table in this position.
- flip the bar end for end & take the exact same skim cut off the other boss. Ideally they will now be as equal as you can make them and pre-centered because of the countersink
Hopefully your tailstock is not too far off to begin with. The bar length plus the thin length of boss OD will diminish the discrepancy effects but if the TS is out, this will result in an ever so small taper.
