Just a little update.
Received a small package from Micro-Mark on Friday which contaned a micro cutoff holder and some extra blades. It was my first order from them and their prices seems quite good and the overseas shipping wasn't too expensive. Now that I know they are okay to deal with I have a shortish list of goodies to get from them
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I've had a little play with the cutoff blades this morning and I have to say they work great. The one that came with the holder worked out to be 1.3 mm wide and cut a nice slot into the aluminium test bar. I only cut in a few millimeters but all seemed well with only a tiny bit of chatter, not the howling I had experienced before. The tool also left nice square shoulders and would work especially well to tidy up the angled shoulders I sometimes end up with when using the angled cutters. (I'm probably using the wrong cutters for my turnings and leaving these angled shoulders.)
I did try and thin down one of the spare blades to 0.5 mm using the green Dremel grinding disc as suggested by Colin. Once I got the blade all squared up in the holder and alined the toolpost I took tiny little cuts with the grinding disc until I got the blade thinned to 0.5 mm. I only cut into the blade a few millimeters to notch the cutting edge with the idea of using these blade to make some thin slits or fins in a turned piece. All worked well and used a diamond lap to polish up the finished edges. The modified blade will now cut 0.5 millimeter slots to about 2.5 mm deep. Plenty for what I want it to do. In grinding this blade I do see MPWR's point about getting grit everywhere. I don't think I'd try shaping a 3mm HSS blank this way with out a bigger lathe and/or covering the lathe bed to keep out the grit. But for dressing and minor shaping like this the method worked well enough and gave me quite good results.
I've got to say again a big thanks to you guys for giving me the confidence to try this stuff. As a newbie this stuff is all new and quite scary. I can see now that with a little guidance and care plus a watchful eye towards safety even a fumble futz like me can get expectable results. It's a blast turning bar stock into something useful. I'm going to purchase those micro cutters and a straight holder from Micro-Mark this afternoon and I've found a place that sells replacement fixed tool posts for the Baby C-0 lathe. I'm thinking of getting a few spares so that I can set each one up with a tool set to the correct center height and swap them out, kinda like a poor mans quick change tool post. These lathes cost more in tooling than in the original purchase but gee they are fun bits of gear.
Hmmm, that baby micro mill looks pretty interesting...
Thanks again for all your help and support. Comments and guidance always appreciated.
Dan