Finding a lost part

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Finding a lost part

This topic has 14 replies, 11 voices, and was last updated 25 July 2024 at 09:38 by Howard Lewis.

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23 July 2024 at 18:10 #743107
MikeK
Participant
@mikek40713
(This could easily go in “Workshop Techniques”, since it is a workshop technique. But it’s not a machining technique.)

Anyway…

I made a part in the lathe early this morning. A pin of sorts, with two diameters, but I got the dimensions *bang* on. I then proceeded to drill and ream the plate into which the pin was going to be pressed. Could not have been more than 10 minutes doing this on the mini-mill. And then…

Where is the pin?! I have no recollection of where I put it. I didn’t dream that I made it; I actually made it. So where is it?

I had spent about 20 minutes making the pin so I spent another 20 minutes looking for it, before giving up.

The lure of the siren’s song, to continue looking for the mythical part, is strong. But after lunch I’m going to make it a second time. And, henceforth, I’ll adopt the practice of putting all parts smaller than a tennis ball into a metal bread-baking pan from the dollar store.

Mike
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23 July 2024 at 18:24 #743109
Engine Builder
Participant
@enginebuilder
The only way to find a part you have just made and lost, is to make another, then the lost part will turn up!
23 July 2024 at 18:28 #743111
MikeK
Participant
@mikek40713
After which, you should heat up the first part to a bright red and beat it into obscurity.
23 July 2024 at 18:29 #743113
Harry Wilkes
Participant
@harrywilkes58467
Mike like yourself been there got the tee shirt etc, I use an inhaler that comes in a small aluminium can for want of a better description also tops off paint spray cans always useful.

H
23 July 2024 at 19:37 #743126
JA
Participant
@ja
You have not been paying your taxes to your workshop elves, have you.

Mine are a real bunch of rouges who have known to take large items such as files.

JA
23 July 2024 at 20:02 #743128
duncan webster 1
Participant
@duncanwebster1
The way to ensure you never find it again is to put it somewhere safe
23 July 2024 at 20:25 #743157
MikeK
Participant
@mikek40713
On 23 July 2024 at 18:24 Engine Builder Said:

The only way to find a part you have just made and lost, is to make another, then the lost part will turn up!

Although I was going to mark that down as a little workshop humor (sorry, no ‘u’ for this Yank), it turned out to be humorously correct.

I spent five minutes after lunch looking while cleaning various spots free of swarf. No luck, so I proceeded to make a new part. Halfway through the new part I opened the drawer to get the mic and…”Thar she blows! The white whale!”…right next to the mic.

At least I didn’t imagine making it.*

Mike

* Since this is the Tea Room I shall tell another tale, and this is also a true one. Almost 20 years ago, and to this very day, I have a vivid memory (an actual memory, not a memory of a dream) of going to work completely in the buff. If “buff” doesn’t mean the same in the UK as it does in the US I’ll point out that I was stark ravingly devoid of clothes. Not a stitch. No joke. Vivid to the point that I still feel that it happened. And several times since then I have worried about having done such a stupid prank. Now, I’ll point out that I only know that I didn’t do it by way of deduction. I have no recollection of being thrown off the public bus. Nor had any of my coworkers ever since mentioned it (“Hey, Mike…Remember that time you came to work naked?!”). But so much of that day is a vivid memory. So what must have happened is that the imagining (dream or whatever) accidentally got put into long-term memory. Similar to what happens with a “deja-vu”, where it bypasses the normal processing route and gets compared back to make one think it has happened again.
23 July 2024 at 22:33 #743172
Nigel Graham 2
Participant
@nigelgraham2
The phrase “in the buff” to mean “nude” , is used in the UK too! 🙂

….

Oh, the times I have re-made / re-bought items…..

One evening I wanted to perform a calculation a bit too difficult manually – it probably had an awkward square-root or similar. It had a model-engineering purpose I forget now.

Could not find the calculator (before I had a PC with an installed calculator function).

Errr. slide-rule? Could not find that either.

Ah, logarithm tables… Yes I could find a book with those appended, and after a little revision completed the calculation.

I bought a new calculator next day.

Three weeks later, searching for something else…. I knew I had not put my original sum-box in that drawer.

….

I know where my calculators are now… One on this computer table, another on the book-shelf in the other room wherein also dwell not one but two slide-rules, a third calculator is in the workshop.
24 July 2024 at 00:10 #743180
MikeK
Participant
@mikek40713
I solved that by buying many calculators and putting one at every place I might need it so that, even if I move one, I know other locations where there’ll be another. I’m fond of the Casio fx-260solar and TI-36X Solar; I think I have three of each.
24 July 2024 at 07:06 #743199
John Haine
Participant
@johnhaine32865
I almost always have my phone in my pocket and use an hp calculator app on that. When I can’t find the phone I ring it up…
24 July 2024 at 12:55 #743234
clive603
Participant
@clive603
On 24 July 2024 at 07:06 John Haine Said:

I almost always have my phone in my pocket and use an hp calculator app on that. When I can’t find the phone I ring it up…

I kept my old phone after being forcibly upgraded when my official unofficial kid sister gave me a new one.

I now lives in the workshop with the HP calculator and other useful apps on.

Great for set-up and how things were before I took it apart pictures. Handy for magnified views too.

Being the old one I don’t worry so much about dirt and stuff on the screen. Remembering to keep it charged its the worst issue.

Clive
24 July 2024 at 15:41 #743286
JA
Participant
@ja
My two slide rulers, one in workshop and other in the office, don’t need charging. Also, no one can phone me on them.

Suits me.

JA

PS. I think the elves have their eyes on the workshop slide rule.
24 July 2024 at 15:52 #743295
Dalboy
Participant
@dalboy
Even though I have a place for everything, I still manage to lose things in the shop just by putting it down and less than a minute it has gone, but it is there in plain sight. So yet another hour gone.
25 July 2024 at 09:17 #743379
Charles Lamont
Participant
@charleslamont71117
I do this often enough to have established a pattern, which I still forget. With thing 1 in hand I go to look for thing 2. On finding it, I put thing 1 down and walk off with thing 2. The trick to finding thing 1 is to remember where the hell it was I picked up thing 2.
25 July 2024 at 09:38 #743382
Howard Lewis
Participant
@howardlewis46836
Ah! The best one is when disassembling some item, a sub assembly, not known to be spring loaded flies apart.

Then you are on hands and knees, searching for one or more parts, the shape of which is unknown, (Let alone which way up they should go when reassembling, IF found)

Once, I lterally had to take everything ouit of the workshop to find some minute part that had flown to the floor behind some much larger piece of equipment.

Now, where possible items are stripped undxder a tiwel or rag, and in a box or over tray to minimise the risk.

But not always sucessfully!

And, yes, the item, made a few minutes ago and put “in a safe place” miraculously moves to another location.

Even my 6″ rule does that, regularly!

I never see the elvesm but they are most certainly hiding there.

Howard

Howard
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