I finally burned myself on a cheap collet set from Amazon

Tbh I spent $40 on a 10-piece ER32 collet set off Amazon and the runout was all over the place. First part I tried to machine ended up with a 0.010 taper on the bore. Had to scrap $80 in 6061 aluminum. Has anyone else had luck with the name brand ones or is it all the same Chinese stuff?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_harper12d ago

Wait hold up, you had a 0.010 taper on a bore from a cheap collet? That's bonkers man. I've seen some bad runout before but that sounds like the collet was basically just a hunk of metal with a hole in it, not even trying to hold concentricity. I picked up a set of Lyndex collets off a guy retiring from his shop a few years ago, and they hold within 0.0003 or so, which is night and day compared to the Amazon stuff. The cheap ones are fine for roughing or holding drills but for finish work they're a total gamble.

barbara42911d ago

Yeah @the_harper I get where you're coming from and those Lyndex collets are nice, but I think this is one of those things where you kind of get what you pay for and sometimes people get lucky with cheap stuff. I've been using a set of Chinese ER collets I got for like 30 bucks on a CNC lathe for about two years now and they hold within a thou or two on most things, which is fine for the kind of work I do. Sure if you're doing aerospace or really tight finish work, then yeah spring for the good stuff. But for a small shop like mine where it's mostly one offs and prototypes, the cheap collets have been a pretty good deal honestly.