Quote Originally Posted by komatias View Post
Tom,

I have the same little lathe but have uprated the motor drive electronics. The lathe is good enough for hobby precision ballscrew machining if you use carbide tooling. I have done this.

The other option is to anneal the portion of the screw you wish to machine. Wrap a wet rag around the portion of the screw you do not want to heat. build a little brazing enclosure out of 4-5 bricks, use a brazing torch or a plumbers torch to heat the end. You need to get it cherry red and let it cool at it's own pace. If you do not keep the screw cool, there is a chance it will warp but this can be rectified later too.

Again, I have done this with satisfactory results and the screw machines like mild steel.
Interesting on the DB7 electronics upgrade - I'd like to find out a little more about what you've done - but maybe offline. I fitted a cooling fan behind the motor and it can run at fairly low speeds without overheating, so it's at least better than the factory standard.

As to the ballscrew, I will try the annealing trick. I have about 3 inches to play with so even if it goes wrong I can just cut off the bad bit and start again..
As a matter of interest, after annealing, did you cut with carbide or would HSS do ? Reason I ask is that I don't have any carbide tools, but have lots of HSS available.