first impressions with the Vermec sphere jig
john Lucas
John K Jordan let me borrow his new Vermec jig. I had to play with it today. First of all the literature was terrible. If I had not used a Sphere jig I probably would not have it set up correctly. There may be a video online, I didn't look.
this thing is solid as a rock. very heavy and extremely well built. One thing was apparent quickly. You can't put it on and off the lathe with the tailstock in place. It has a round lock down ring. I would have made it rectangular and given the locking knob more movement so you could loosen it, rotate the locking rectangle and remove it without taking anything else off the lathe. I sometimes use the tailstock and tool rest to rough turn the sphere and then use the jig. It's kind of in the way for some operations so I had to jury rig my tool rest to get around those limitations. It also didn't give you any instructions for adjusting the locking ring but that's pretty obvious to anyone who has any mechanical knowledge at all.
There wasn't any info on adjusting the height of the cutter. Since it uses a cupped cutter I assume it should be on the center line and then fiddled around until I found a collar with a set screw that you could adjust to fine tune the height. It was very easy to adjust once I figured it out. Then you need to lock the vertical swiveling part of the jig in a position that will let you turn the size sphere you want. You have to do this with a wrench. I think I would have used a large knob or wing nut but then again the wrench really secures it in place. I think a big wing nut would also but that's just me.
OK once I got everything in place and adjusted, you move the whole unit until it's directly under the center point of your planned sphere. It has a really nice point that is adjustable to you can easily find this point. however when I took the whole unit out of the box there were 2 little 0 rings in the bottom of the bearing assembly. Apparently they fit on this centering pin to let it slide up and down. There weren't any instructions to show me where. If put them on the bottom and pull the pin up too far the fall off into the bearing assembly. I assumed you put one on top and one on the bottom to hold this pin in place. That seemed to work as long as you don't pull the pin all the way up or push it all the way down. then the 0 rings fall of.
OK so much for the nit picking. Once it's all in place and adjusted it works like a dream. Very clean cutting. It has a cutter somewhat similar to the Hunter cutters. It's obviously different if you hold them side by side but the basic geometry is the same. cuts like a dream. The adjustment for moving the cutter in and out is super smooth and solid. I turned a sphere out of color ply and it cut this problem stuff very cleanly.
I'm going to try and find someone close buy to let me borrow a Carter jig again so I can compare them. If I remember correctly the Carter had some advantages to this but also had some disadvantages and I won't know until I hold one in my hands again to make sure.
