How many members are using the Chinese Faceting machines?

[Faceting Frank]

I would forget about angles for the moment, they are easily close enough to cut stones.
As I was saying before about adjusting the lap base to suit the swing of the quill (after the quill is aligned with the mast). The area your interested in is from just short of the centre nut, swinging toward you to the end of the lap. That is the small arc you will be using to cut the facets.
One reason why having the quill tipped to one side is not easily spotted is because it has no effect on the side to side swing.

[JBK]

Thanks again mate. Good knowledge for the amateur (me)


This gives me a little hope that possibly I haven’t wasted  my penny.

[RoughCreations]

My original comment about the 45 deg dop holder not needing to be 45 deg came from the picture in JBK’s reply 18. As you can see, he just needs to lower the faceting head till the holder is flat on the table, but the hole for the dop must be 90 deg to that flat surface.
Maintain that angle with the hard stop and raise the faceting head up high enough to fit the dopped stone.
So, you could make the dop holder with the angled dop any angle you like, 30, 40, 50, 60 deg, as long as you have a flat surface to align up with the lap.
I have made machines in the past with keyed dops, this does set the index position, but not the angle of the quill.

I checked the angle of my Facetron 45 degree adapter in another plane, other than the one it is 0.5 degrees out. I think there are 3 planes to consider? Two vertical, and one horizontal, all orthogonal to one another. The other vertical plane was spot-on, which gives me some reassurance. I suspect it must be easier to drill accurately in certain orientations or plunges, however I am not a qualified machinist or toolmaker, lol. Sometimes I wish I was!

RC

[Faceting Frank]

Yes, your right RC there is several planes to consider, in fact all three X, Y and Z axis are involved. I don’t think I have ever checked to see how accurate my 45 deg dop is. I set it up lying flat on a 1200 grit lap using the hard stop and ink mark the surface, adjusting as required till it’s level. After that cutting the table using the hard stop seems to work ok, with only minor changes to get the table aligned with the required meet points. As I said before the angled dop on the holder could be any angle.