Rotating Bars O' Death

Please excuse the clickbait title, but this was the first time in nearly 25 years of machining that I felt a bit nervous around one of my machines. The bars rotate through an area where I would normally stand when machining with this lathe and I had to keep my head about me not to wander into this area. I was machining some extension bars flat in preparation for mounting a large sprocket type ring gear (seen hanging from my crane in the background) from a tunnel boring machine. I had hoped to make a video about machining this ring but when we tried to mount it on the bars we discovered it was warped axially and trying to machine it would have made it worse. In the end we dressed it down with an angle grinder and reinstalled it.

[@outsidescrewball]

Yikes….was hoping you would stop the lathe to see the product

[@Rustinox]

I can totally understand that it was a bit scary.

[@hmw-ms3tx]

The camera doesn't do it justice. It's pretty scary when you're standing next to it in person. Ken

[@hilltopmachineworks2131]

@@hmw-ms3tx I bet.

[@agust8474]

Why all that tool stickout?

[@hmw-ms3tx]

If I moved the carriage any farther forward the bolts holding the bars on the chuck would strike it. I had the compound rest as far forward as it would go as well.