Welcome BadBad!

Your English was easy to understand, much better than my French!

Which 7×12 did you get? Post a picture or two of your setup when you get a chance. If you need any help let us know. There are several seasoned veterans here who are happy to help. A few are even teachers, so they are good at explaining everything in an easy-to-understand way.

When you get a chance, update your profile so everyone can see where you're from (notice mine says Seattle, WA). I spent some time in and around Paris a few years ago and absolutely fell in love with Versailles when I went there to see the castle and the Hall of Mirrors. You live in an amazing country my friend.

Anyway, welcome to the forum!

Until the "light pop up"? Do you mean until the sun comes up?

Anyway, boring can be tricky so don't feel bad. It sounds like you've got chatter. Here are a few things to consider.

• is your tool set to the correct height? (usually centerline)
• What kind of tool are you using? (people swear by carbide, but I've had better luck with HSS in many situations)
• Is your tool sharp / ground correctly? (most of my issues with carbide are due to the poor factory grind on cheaper tools)
• have you eliminated excess overhang? (see below)
• is your setup ridgid? (i.e. adjust the gibs on your cross slide so that it is solid)
• are you taking too deep/fast a cut? (1-3 thou depending on material, speed, and size of lathe, .005 or more might be too much)
• do you need coolant for the material your cutting?
• is your spindle speed appropriate for the size (diameter) of the hole you're boring? (check your machinery's handbook)

To answer these we would need a bit more information about what your cutting and how you're cutting it. But if you check all the things I've mentioned you'll probably find one that could be improved. My guess is tool height or overhang. If you have a 6″ boring bar and you need to bore a hole 1″ deep, make sure that your boring bar is only hanging out as far as needed for clearance. If it's hanging out more than 1.5″ you've got excess overhang. The further out your boring bar hangs, the more force is placed on your cross slide.

I've probably forgotten something (so someone else please feel free to chime in), but the things I've listed above should give you a good start. Let me know how it turns out. If you're still having trouble post a little more info (for example, what material?) so we can dig a little deeper.

So I have to ask, is that a box of bandaids taped to the wall? Heck-of-a first aid kit!

So were you able to get the boring bar to cut without chatter or do you still need help? Your setup looks fine to me, but it's hard to tell if your tool is on centerline.

Also, just a quick tip about your pictures.  They are staggered because of your alignment. If you change the alignment to "baseline" they will look normal.

To do that, edit your post and click on the picture you want to change the alignment on, then click the insert/edit image icon. There you can change the alingment from "Left" to "Baseline".

Eventually the creators of this forum software are going to release a fix for this, but until they do using "baseline" is the only way to get them to align correctly.

Good, I'm glad I could help.

Keep your questions coming. For me that was the hardest part about breaking into this hobby – I needed someone somewhere to help me answer the questions that kept coming up. I had two close friends that were always ready to help, but I realize others might not be so lucky. So my goal with this forum is to make sure everyone has a place to go when they have questions.

I just hope that between myself and the other members no questions will go unanswered.