UNDERSTANDING THE LATHE THREADING DIAL

I have written this guide as an aid for people who want to understand what the threading dial does and
how to use it. Understanding how it works helps to remember how to use it better than relying on
Chinese charts that are often wrong, or memorising all possible settings.

The basic purpose of the dial is to allow the carriage to be reversed quickly when multiple pass
threading operations are taking place. The alternative is to leave the half nuts engaged and reverse the
lathe back to the starting point for the next pass. If you are using a very slow RPM for threading or
cutting a long thread then this can be tedious (you cannot change gearing for a fast reverse, you will
loose the thread position for the next pass).

THREADS BASED ON THREADS PER INCH SYSTEMS

A typical set up for the threading dial may be to have a 16 tooth pinion gear engaged with the 8tpi
leadscrew and this gear drives the indicator dial. The dial will be marked with some lines and some of
the lines will be numbered. 8 lines with alternate lines numbered 1, 3, 5 and 7 is one possible design.
Other options may be a 16tpi leadscrew (found on some mini-lathes) matched to a 16 tooth gear, an 8tpi
leadscrew with an 8 tooth gear, a 6tpi leadscrew with 12 or 18 tooth gear and metric pitch leadscrews
which are detailed later. The dial may be marked 1 to 8, alternate lines may be marked 1-4 (or 1-6 or 1-
3 for 6tpi leadscrews).

When not threading it is often possible to disengage the gear from the leadscrew to avoid unnecessary
wear. When it is engaged sometimes the dial will rotate and sometimes it will be stationary. There are
six possibilities:

1. Half nuts engaged, leadscrew stationary, carriage stationary - result, dial stationary.
2. Half nuts engaged, leadscrew rotating, carriage moving - result, dial stationary.
3. Half nuts disengaged, leadscrew stationary, carriage stationary - result, dial stationary.
4. Half nuts disengaged, leadscrew rotating, carriage stationary - result, dial rotating.
5. Half nuts disengaged, leadscrew stationary, carriage moving - result, dial rotating.
6. Half nuts disengaged, leadscrew rotating, carriage moving - result, dial may or may not be
rotating, it depends on how fast and what direction you move the carriage.

We can ignore 1 and 3 above, it is the “at rest” situation. We can also ignore situation 6, if this is
happening you are combining 4 and 5 which are discussed below. Item 2 above is what will be
happening when either a thread is being cut or the carriage is being reversed back to take another pass
for cutting the thread with the halfnuts left in the engaged position for the whole process.

That leaves 4 and 5 to be explained. I think it is easier to explain 5 first then consider 4 as closely related
to 5.

As stated earlier there are a number of possible setups for the leadscrew and the dial gear, I will use the
8tpi leadscrew and 16 tooth gear for this explanation. If we cut the first pass of a thread and stop at the
end and back out the tool we have two options, reverse the drive to go back to the start point for the next
pass (item 2 above) or disengage the halfnuts and move the carriage back to the start ready to engage the
halfnuts for the next pass (item 5 above). The problem is where to move the carriage to in order to re-
engage the halfnuts. If we consider what happens if we move the carriage one inch we can realise that
we will move 8 pitches of the leadscrew which will move the gear 8 teeth or half a revolution. A further
inch will complete the rotation and the carriage will have moved 2”. If this does not occur then the lathe
either has a different leadscrew tpi or different gear combination. It is possible to have the wrong
number of teeth on the gear and then the threading dial will never work correctly (a gear for a metric
leadscrew may be fitted to an inch leadscrew by mistake). For a lathe with a threads per inch leadscrew
one revolution of the threading dial should always give a carriage movement in whole inches. I
recommend engaging the threading dial and, with the leadscrew stationary, see what movement of the
carriage gives one revolution of the dial for your lathe.

We now know what to do to move the lathe back along the leadscrew either 1” or 2”. For any thread
with a whole number of threads per inch either of these points will be correct to pick up the correct point
on the leadscrew to make the next pass. If you have a dial that gives one revolution for 2” of movement
then it is also good for threads that have a half in their tpi, eg 4½, since over 2” the number of threads
will be a whole number.

So what is good about this whole number of threads? We know that the leadscrew has 8tpi so we know
that we can always re-engage the leadscrew if we disengage the half nuts and move the carriage either 1”
or 2”. We also know that if we move 2” along one of these threads we will have moved an exact number
of pitches, (1” will do for threads without the ½). So the simplest rule for these threads is move the
carriage a multiple of 2” back to re-cut the thread, or 1 revolution of the dial. This is the
recommendation many people will give, it means as long as you always align the same number on the
threading dial you can always re-engage the halfnuts and successfully cut the existing thread deeper.

Now let’s consider case 4. Suppose you need to cut a thread 5½” long in an item supported by the tail
stock. However the tailstock prevents you from moving the carriage back 6” to give three complete
revolutions of the thread dial. You can move it back 5¾” to clear the thread but the number you are
using on the threading dial does not quite make it to the point where you want to engage the leadscrew.
At this point you can rotate the spindle forward which will turn the leadscrew and the thread dial will
rotate. The required threading dial number will come into alignment and the spindle can be stopped and
the leadscrew engaged. Are we at the correct place? The answer is yes. The way to imagine this is to
think what would happen if you moved the carriage 4”, engaged the halfnuts, turned the spindle enough
to move the carriage ¼” towards the headstock, disengaged the halfnuts and moved the carriage a further
2” to where you want to start the threading cut from.

So in summary what we know so far is that the threading dial is telling us the movement of the carriage
and leadscrew relative to each other. We could stop here and just stick to either leaving the halfnuts
engaged and reversing the lathe or using the same point on the threading dial all the time, it would cover
nearly all threads likely to be cut on any lathe. If you want an explanation of the other points on the dial
then read on.

For the next part I will treat both case 4 and case 5 the same and refer to moving the carriage along even
if the carriage is stationary and the leadscrew is rotating to the correct position.

One revolution of the dial we have been considering is 2” along the leadscrew. That is 16 pitches of ⅛”
and the halfnuts can be engaged in any of these positions. If we are cutting an 8tpi thread then any point
we re-engage the halfnuts will match up to the thread we are cutting as we will move 1 pitch along the
thread. The same is true for multiples of 8 such as 16tpi, 24tpi etc. where each ⅛” along the leadscrew
will move 2 pitches, 3 pitches etc. of the thread being cut. If however we halve the tpi and want to cut
4tpi we get a thread pitch of ¼” which is 2 leadscrew pitches. This means we need to move the carriage
back in multiples of ¼”. If the thread dial is rotating 16 pitches of the leadscrew in 2” and is marked
with 8 lines then each line is 2 pitches of the leadscrew or ¼”. So to cut 4tpi we need to engage the
halfnuts when any line on the threading dial is aligned. This is also true once again for multiples of 4
such as 8, 12, 16, 20.

All other even numbered threads are multiples of 2 so while we will probably never cut a 2tpi thread we
will use it as the basis for the remaining even numbers not covered so far such as 6tpi, 10tpi, 14tpi etc.
A 2tpi thread has a pitch of ½” or 4 pitches of the leadscrew or ¼ of 2” which is also ¼ of a rotation of
the threading dial. Since the threading dial has been marked with numbers as well as lines we can use
these to guide the engagement of the halfnuts. There are two possible numbering systems for the dial, all
8 lines are numbered 1-8 or alternate lines are numbered 1-4. There is little to be gained by numbering
all lines so you are likely to have alternate lines numbered 1-4. In this case each number will be at 1/2”
intervals along the leadscrew which is what is needed for 2tpi. So to cut a 2tpi thread you would engage
the halfnuts when the numbers are aligned with the mark. Once again this holds true for multiples of 2,
or all even numbers including those already covered by the rules for multiples of 4 or 8.
Next consider the odd numbered threads such as 3tpi, 5tpi, 7tpi etc. The points at which the leadscrew
can be engaged are 0”, ⅛” ¼”, ⅜”, ½”,⅝”, ¾”, ⅞”, 1”, 1⅛” 1¼”, 1⅜”, 1½”,1⅝”, 1¾”, 1⅞”, 2”. The
points along the 3tpi thread are 0, ⅓”, ⅔”, 1”, 1⅓”, 1⅔”, 2”. It can be seen that the only points where we
have moved an exact number of pitches of both the thread and the leadscrew are at 1” and 2”. This
means that to re-engage the halfnuts for this thread we need to move the carriage in multiples of 1”. As
the dial is rotating half way per inch we can use any two points opposite each other for this thread.
Typically the chart supplied for the lathe will suggest 1 and 3 as the numbers to use as it is easy to
remember odd numbers for odd numbered tpi values. What is true for 3tpi is also true for all other odd
numbered threads. Move 1” or 2” and you will move an exact multiple of thread pitches.
That only leaves threads with fractional threads per inch such as 11½tpi. It turns out that the only place
these threads with ½ in them match up with the leadscrew pitches is at 2” intervals or one point on the
threading dial only, pick position 1 as it is easy to remember and always move the carriage in multiples
of 2”.
Finally there are threads that do not have whole numbers of threads in 2” such as metric threads, 4¾tpi
(if it is ever used, which needs 4” of carriage movement) or any other specials that someone might want
to produce. The usual rule is that if you want to do multiple cuts to form the thread it is best to leave the
halfnuts engaged and reverse the lathe to get back to the start point. It should be pointed out however
that it is possible to cut metric threads and to disengage the half nuts if you want to but it is likely to be
error prone. It relies on the fact that there are multiples of metric thread pitches that match an 8tpi
leadscrew. For instance 5” is exactly 127mm, so if you are cutting a 1mm pitch thread you can move the
carriage back 5” and pick up the leadscrew in the correct place to continue cutting the thread. Other
metric pitches also match up when you move 127 pitches back as follows:
0.35mm 1.75” 0.6mm 3”
0.4mm 2” 0.7mm 3.5”
0.45mm 2.25” 0.75mm 3.75”
0.5mm 2.5” 0.8mm 4”
You can do this for all metric pitches but the distance to travel gets larger and unless you have a digital
readout to set to zero before moving the carriage there is a risk of making a mistake. Even with a digital
readout it would be easy to forget to zero the starting point before moving the carriage and any
movement of the leadscrew will also cause errors.
USING THE DIAL ILLUSTRATED WITH 16 TOOTH GEAR AND 8 THREADS
PER INCH LEADSCREW
1 ANY POINT WHERE THE HALF NUTS 8tpi AND MULTIPLES SUCH AS 16tpi,
ENGAGE 24TPI, 32tpi….
2
4

3 ANY LINE 4tpi AND MULTIPLES SUCH AS 8tpi,

12tpi, 16tpi….

ANY NUMBERED LINE ANY EVEN NUMBER tpi SUCH AS 2tpi,

4tpi, 6tpi, 8tpi, 10tpi….

ANY TWO OPPOSITE POINTS, FOR ANY THREAD WITH A WHOLE

EXAMPLE 1 AND 3 NUMBER OF tpi SUCH AS 3tpi, 4tpi,
5tpi….

ONE POINT FOR EXAMPLE 1 ANY THREAD WITH A WHOLE

NUMBER OF tpi AND ANY THREAD
WITH A ½ SUCH AS 4½tpi, 10tpi, 11tpi,
11½tpi….
As mentioned earlier this combination of 8tpi leadscrew and 16 tooth gear are not the only combination
but will likely be the commonest. I have a Smart and Brown lathe with a 6tpi leadscrew and 18 tooth
gear. The dial has six lines with three marked 1-3. It can be engaged at 2 points between the lines but
these locations are only good for 6tpi and multiples such as 12tpi, 18tpi etc. For all other threads the
even threads are cut at any line because they show ½” movement along the leadscrew and the numbered
lines, which show 1” of movement are good for all threads with a whole number of tpi, odd or even.
Threads with a ½ in them are best done with the halfnuts left engaged but I have never needed to cut
these pitches anyway.

With this write up I would hope that the system now makes sense so that if you have a different
combination for your threading dial you can work out your own details.

METRIC PITCH THREADS

If you think about the pitch of an 11tpi thread it is not hard to see that it has a pitch that cannot be
written down exactly as a decimal number, but the same is also true for 3tpi, 6tpi, 12tpi and others.
Metric threads based on millimetre units (mm) use this as a system, threads are designated by their
diameter and pitch such as M10 which is 10mm diameter and the standard coarse pitch is 1.5mm. From
the smallest to a typical maximum pitch likely to be encountered in a small workshop of 6mm there are
24 pitch values that are metric standard pitches. I list them below in groups that are relevant to
threading.

Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 Group 5 Group 6

0.2mm 0.4mm 0.45mm 0.8mm 1.25mm 0.35mm
0.25mm 2mm 4.5mm 4mm 2.5mm 0.7mm
0.3mm 6mm 5mm 1.75mm
0.5mm 3.5mm
0.6mm
0.75mm
1mm
1.5mm
3mm

And in a group all on its own 5.5mm

What is the relevance of these groups? Well a metric leadscrew equivalent to an 8tpi leadscrew on an
inch based lathe has a pitch of 3mm. All the threads in the first group can be fitted into 3mm an exact
number of times. This means that if you are cutting a thread with any of these pitches you would not
need a threading dial, just re-engage anywhere to cut deeper or just take a polishing cut. The next group
requires 6mm or two leadscrew pitches to fit an exact number of pitches into, then three, four, five,
seven and finally eleven leadscrew pitches for the 5.5mm pitch thread. So for any pitch after the first
group a threading dial is needed for successful correct re-engagement of the halfnuts. So how many teeth
do we need on the gear driving the dial? Well let’s consider 16 like the inch version from earlier with a
dial having 8 lines and four of them numbered. This will allow all of group 1, any point, all of group 2,
any line and all of group 4, any numbered line, to be cut successfully with multiple passes. This only
covers half the possible pitches, a different number of teeth will be required for the other pitches. If we
replace the 16 tooth gear with one having 15 teeth we can now have 15 lines with every third line
numbered 1-5 and every fifth line lettered A-C with one line being both 1 and A. With this we can do
group 3 with the numbers and group 5 with the letters. A 14 tooth gear will do for group 6 with two lines
on opposite sides and finally a similar dial with two lines and 22 teeth for 5.5 if required. This is why
metric lathes are supplied with a number of threading dials and the correct one needs to be used for the
pitch being cut. This complication is why the recommendation from many people is to leave the halfnuts
engaged when cutting metric threads even on a lathe with a metric leadscrew. These gear tooth counts
are not the only possibilities, you could have twice as many teeth on each gear to achieve the same
result. You may also find metric leadscrews with different pitches. You could in theory have a gear with
enough teeth to do all these different pitches but it would need a tooth count that was divisible by 2, 3, 5,
7 and 11 which means something that is probably ridiculously large and with complicated markings on
the dial. If we decide not to include the 5.5mm pitch you could get away with 70 teeth which is still too
large to be sensible. Multiple gears and threading dials is the preferred method as a result.

If you choose to do metric thread pitches with a metric leadscrew and leave the halfnuts engaged
throughout the process there is really no difference to doing the same thing with an inch leadscrew.
However when it comes to doing threads per inch on an inch based leadscrew it is a lot easier than doing
them on a mm based leadscrew. The obvious conclusion then is to always get a lathe with an inch based
leadscrew for the ease of using the threading dial for inch based threads and leave the halfnuts engaged
when cutting metric threads.

Martin Connelly