I'm in the process of making a spindle lock. Below is the plans on the Yahoo group. They were made by one of the members there. It calls for crs for the parts. I don't have the 1/2"x1"x3" called for. So I got to looking and figured Cast iron should work for this. So I cut up a old B&S engine crank and using the counter weights part of the crank I'm whittling out the sizes shown. I'm getting some mill time anyway. I'm using a 1/2" 4 flute bit and around 700 rpms(faster than the recommended speed) it's cutting real nice I'm taking only around 0.025 per pass. I don't have a clue if I should cut deeper per pass or not so I think I'm going easy on the machine?

I think you have to join this group to view the plans, but they look nicely done, plus the whole fixture is inside of the head. A lever on the outside is pulled forwards and locks a block in the front pulley's teeth. It's spring loaded to retract. I like the looks of it better than the fixture that is sold and mounts on the top front of the mill. If you have this mill or one similar to it you might want to take a look it looks like  good project. The only down side of it is if the thing would come loose or the spring beak and not retract and you start it up with the tooth engaged that wouldn't be very good.

http://finance.groups.yahoo.co…..k%20Plans/

Need some cast iron for a small project like I do for this spindle locking device? Here is my source for the cast iron a small B&S crankshaft. this should get me enough material and some extras like a small gear as used on the reverse tumbler gears for the G0602 lathe.

cutting up the crank is easy if you use a band saw here is one loped off counter weight. Which has been already milled some.

It was well  over 1/2" thick I've machined it down to 0.545 and have about 0.045 to go to get it to the 0.500 thick called for in the plans.

The cast iron is over 3.00 long I need  3.00 inches in length and 1.00 tall by 0.500 thick so there's my part locked up in there just got to get it cut out.

The remaining cast iron will later be cut up into shafts/ small plate and that gear so it all will get used for projects.

The only hard part is holding it to cut it up, I haven't found any hard lumps in the cast iron so far it machines nicely.

I've thrown away many of these old cranks now that I have a use for them I'll just cut them up and reuse them. this material should be good for projects using cast iron as long as the parts needed are not too big.

some of the work done today on the spindle lock

the cast iron is milled square and the holes drilled

here the slot has been milled and the radius done on the end.

rough cut out of the block for the locking tooth

the smaller block has been squared up, it fits nice in the slot. Now to the hardware store to get the bolts for this. I even have the steel rod for the lever, it came out of a worn out printer. I don't know if it is stainless or not but it is nice and shiny might be chrome plated 5/16" in dia should work fine. All that needed is bolts a knob and work done on the mills housing, oh yea I need to find a spring.

the lock is behind the pulley not much room but everything clears

My dirty hand testing out the lever it works good now to put the mill all back together and do something besides building tools. This was a very well designed lock and it worked the first try I didn't need to fiddle with it at all.

Cast iron is nasty to machine but it's what I had to work with. The plans called for cold rolled steel either metal works the steel shouldn't get you quite as dirty. I got the shoulder bolt at Fastenal and the knob at the hardware store. I just happened to have a spring from an old sewing machine that worked. I spent less then $10.00 for materials.

Follow the drawings and it works very good!!