Are we Luddites?

[larry phelan 1Participant @larryphelan1]

Much food for thought in all these posts. I suppose I,m somewhere in the middle,like many others. I do have a calculator and ,electronic calipers,but I prefer to try to use the Mic,to try and get the feel for it,and I dont have CNC,or even a DRO,but I still get along.Perhaps that makes me a Luddite.[I should add that I still have,and use from time to time,my Father,s old hand drill and hand saws !!] I agree,filing a steel cube is a total waste of time,when would anyone ever be called upon to do so,in real life ? A skill in using a file is useful,if not required,but it is not the be all and end all of everything,just another part. Basic skills are still needed and always will be,but life is too short to get too tied up about them,life goes on, things change,and so must we.

Will I ever make it to CNC ?,I doubt it,I find it hard enough to manage a laptop !

However,let us all keep plugging away,till we run out of steam.

[FarmboyParticipant @farmboy]

I don't much care what other people get up to in the privacy of their own sheds but I do think there was a lot of merit in the old idea of learning basic hand skills before going on to machining, CNC, etc.

Sadly, I never even got to see the inside of the single metalwork room in a school of 1,100 boys but I'll be forever grateful to the brilliant woodwork teacher who taught us how to take a piece of wood, plane it square and true to size, mark out and cut it to length accurately, then mark out and cut various joints, all by hand. I seldom had a use for such skills in my working life but they certainly improved my hand-eye cordination for all manner of other jobs. And I still love a bit of joinery if I get the time.

Now trying to teach myself the same sort of things in metal . . .

Mike.

[Anonymous]

First, to reiterate some previous comments, the use of the word Luddite in the context of the original post is incorrect, and shows woeful historical knowledge.

Being idle I tend to use whatever technique is quickest, whether that be by hand, manual machining or automated. But then again I'm interested in the destination, not the journey. Machining is simply a means of producing a part, it is not a destination.

The skills needed over time change. For instance take marking out. I rarely mark out now, with a DRO on the mill it's simply not needed, and less accurate. The only exceptions are for hand formed sheetmetal work and some starter points on castings, if required. Some "skills" were just darn hard work, so for me it's no great loss if they die out.

The question of CNC raises it's head with monotonous regularity. In order to get the best from CNC milling a wide skillset is needed. For starters one really needs to be competent with 3D CAD. In addition a good understanding of speeds 'n' feeds and cutting tool performance is needed. Judging from comments on this forum many people simply don't understand this, even on manual machines. One also needs to show forethought and some skill in designing fixtures for work holding so as to not impede the cutter. While CNC is not the answer to everything it allows one to design and make parts that would be time consuming, difficult, or impossible, on manual machines. It also relieves the tedium of making multiple parts. Whether manual machining experience is needed before moving to CNC is a debate that has been raging on the professional forums for many years. I think the consensus now is that it is not needed. Remember that in the professional world the person doing the CNC fixtures and programming is not usually the same person operating the machine. The machine operator is lower skilled and hence cheaper.

While some people bemoan the loss of tradtional skills, I wonder how many of them are prepared to pay for such skills? Wasn't there a company making lathes using traditional manual machining and hand fitting skills? I wonder what happened to them?

I suspect that the disconnect between modelling and professional machining is probably getting wider. When I was looking for ideas on capstan tooling I came across several relevant articles in Model Engineer, in the 1940s I think. Can you imagine the same now?

That's enough pot stirring, I've got an aircraft to inspect and then I'm afternoon tug pilot, although at the moment even the ducks are walking, unless they're instrument rated.

Andrew

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Posted by Mike Poole on 25/05/2018 21:38:11:

I feel it is a tragedy that skills are lost but I am also sure that they can be relearned even if there is no one left to teach them.

True, that. One only has to look at the phenomenally rapid rise of China into a manufacturing superpower. They learned modern tool and die making and other mass production skills in double quick time. Much of that would have been from books on the subject, as well as shared-technology joint ventures.

I like to think that I use a lot of esoteric skills and "dodges" learned on the shop floor from old boys who learned them as lads from even older boys who had been around when the industrial revolution was still revolutionary. But really, in today's world, all those skills and dodges are out there somewhere in any number of books and websites. From the likes of Sparey, GH Thomas, ET Westbury etc through to today's MEW contributors and Youtube channels, there are not many stones left unturned.

And really, modern technology and thinking probably would come up with better solutions than many of the old dodges. Just think if for some reason we had to go back to using horses and carts again today. Would we go back to handcarving wooden wheels like they did in 1890? Hell no. We'd be 3D printing them. And so on. 21st century horse carts would bear little resemblance to and use few of the same manufacturing skills that 19th C ones did. (They'd have USB port chargers built in for starters .)

Edited By Hopper on 26/05/2018 10:52:45

Edited By Hopper on 26/05/2018 10:54:39

[FarmboyParticipant @farmboy]

I imagine 3D printers will eventually be working at the molecular level to create everything we need . . . probably already happening somewhere

Even then I expect there will still be people ( definitely not luddites ) building steam engines in their sheds, or making fine wooden furniture, or baking cakes, or gardening, etc. The human race evolved over thousands of years to have opposed thumbs so that we could do all those things, so I don't suppose we'll lose the ability for a few more thousand years . . . of course there have always been those humans who have all thumbs

[robjon44Participant @robjon44]

Hi all, I would like to add my four pennorth about Luddites, these were men facing the imminent destruction of their livelihood in a short timescale in times far harder than our own, I can fully understand their anger & in similar circumstances could be tempted to turn right nasty! I would offer the wholesale destruction of the car industry & the vendetta that brought about a similar fate to the coal industry both in the 1980s as modern examples.

However, to return to shed dwellers as Luddites, no, as the editor rightly points out, it is a hobby & what goes on in your man cave is your choice & yours alone, please do not mistake this for carte blanche to believe as I think some do that you are the last bastion of keeping "the old craft skills alive" because its just not going to happen. Examples, shimming up lathe tools to centre height, guess what, after the first time you know everything there is to know on the subject, do not stick packing to tool, by all means fasten it on with a rubber band & even keep tools for multi tool set ups such as face & part off for washers & spacers together in a plastic bag in the top of your toolbox as I was advised to do over 50 years at the start of my apprenticeship. Next, quick change toolposts, bah! modern nancy boy nonsense, but hold on Mr.Dave Lammas fine triangular toolposts are such a good idea that I made 2 in right & left hand versions to be spaced one tee slot apart for repetition work on small parts on a small lathe that I had, not a lot of work to make either. If you wish to travel further back in time, early Drummond lathes around 1918 had a central pillar on the topslide fitted with a square toolblock fastened by a split clamp & height adjustable with a vertical screw, 100 year old technology you say, my preferred roughing out tool is a 55 degree v-point indexable , shaped down to fit the toolpost of the shaper & also a holder as described above on the bigger lathe, the change over between shaper & lathe takes a maximum of 5 seconds. So you pays your money & takes your choice of these old technologies. Finally I have laid hands on various ancient machinery particularly woodworking, lathes, circular saws, some in a heritage wood mill powered by water where you have to direct the water onto the turbine to strike it up, a matter of seconds! Do not forget that it was Leonardo da Vinci who invented the 4 jaw chuck not Harold Hall & also pointed out that a conrod introduced into the driveline of rotating machinery created monodirectional rotation a major boost to productivity. The boy was an Italian, anything could happen! Regards, Bob H

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Posted by Ady1 on 25/05/2018 23:49:42:

You should always be prepared for a zombie apocalypse

I think the horror fantasies we're building for ourselves are a threat to civilised values through the narrow-minded self-interest such survivalisms promote.

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Posted by robjon44 on 30/05/2018 11:15:05:

….

Do not forget that it was Leonardo da Vinci who invented the 4 jaw chuck not Harold Hall & also pointed out that a conrod introduced into the driveline of rotating machinery created monodirectional rotation a major boost to productivity. The boy was an Italian, anything could happen! Regards, Bob H

 

He is grotesquely overrated. Hardly any of his "inventions" had the technology behind them to have them built, or make any valid use of them if they were. His "tank" was such an amateur effort that its wheels would have tried to rotate in opposite directions – it couldn't even move. The 4-jaw chuck was really invented by whoever made it possible to actually grip real work with it in a real machine tool. The conrod was probably already in use on the treadle spinning wheel. Leonardo was an artist, not an engineer.

Edited By Mick B1 on 30/05/2018 11:49:56

[MWParticipant @mw27036]

Posted by Mick B1 on 30/05/2018 11:37:44:

He is grotesquely overrated. Hardly any of his "inventions" had the technology behind them to have them built, or make any valid use of them if they were. His "tank" was such an amateur effort that its wheels would have tried to rotate in opposite directions – it couldn't even move. The 4-jaw chuck was really invented by whoever made it possible to actually grip real work with it in a real machine tool. The conrod was probably already in use on the treadle spinning wheel. Leonardo was an artist, not an engineer.

There's also the problem of the historical accuracy of the inventions that people have attributed to Leonardo Davinci. You will find on research that a lot of the things people think he made are actually just "he might've done that drawing". That's the trouble when evaluating claims made 500 years ago when documentation was scarce.

I don't believe he pulled his ideas out of the air myself and he must've based his ideas on what people had already tried.

Michael W

[Andy CarruthersParticipant @andycarruthers33275]

Fascinating read, thanks to all contributors

As a newcomer to the hobby, and with a particular interest in making lock picks and a few other parts, I have found it difficult to gain experience. I learn best hands-on, the Axminster Lathe course was brilliant and I gained much more than by tinkering around alone – confidence is the biggest issue and not wanting to make a silly mistake which breaks something. For anyone wanting to pass on their skills for beer tokens, I am open to learning, have some weekends free and willing to travel

It seems to me that CNC will become more affordable and accessible, all industries mature and ours is no exception. There are hackerspaces and MakerFaires all over the country with people developing all sorts of machinery and tooling with real community spirit encouraging and teaching others – I think "we" as hobbyists have a lot to learn and a lot to give. I'm excited by using different technologies – lathe / mill machining parts and 3D printing for example. At some point I hope to acquire a water jet cutter – Wazer deomoed their desktop machine at New York MakerFaire late last year

I see our hobby evolving into something very different as tooling advances and costs fall, probably evolving quicker than at any time in the past, and hopefully staving off the armchair as making things becomes easier over time

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

I have read an 1835 revision of an 1802 updating of a 1796 revision of a 1721 translation of Leonardo's treatise on painting. What can I say? He was a didactic dilettante. If he was an artist, his work leaves little room for artistry, the book imagines he covers everything worth knowing about painting in 365 chapters (modern definition would call them paragraphs). To give a flavour of Leonardo's actual words (in translation) this is the whole of Chapter 5:

'Chap V, Division of the Figure: The form of bodies is divided into two parts; that is, the proportion of the members to each other, which must correspond with the whole; and the motion, expressive of what passes in the mind of the living figure.'

Vague, unhelpful & didactic. When you look at what he touched and compare it with what he achieved, you can see he actually fiddled with a huge amount of stuff, came up with interesting ideas and showed very little effort in the follow through. Could think of him as an ideas fountain; Someone who comes up with lots of ideas but has no idea of the value of them, whether good or bad. In the way he circled the rich and famous of the day, and the way he addressed letters and notes to them, it is hard to avoid the term 'sycophancy'. I know he came from a different time with different ideas, but he strikes me as someone who has been seriously over-praised.

Regards,

Richard.

[Martin KyteParticipant @martinkyte99762]

I abhor the loss of Britains flint knapping industry.

Seriously though as Niels says the point is to have fun. If that is exploring old techniques for their own sake, learning something new or your focus is on the end product rather than the journey like Andrew all well and good.

Generally engineering and engineers have embraced the latest meathods as soon as they became available wherever possible, you go out of buisness otherwise. Weavers objected to machine looms because it threatened their livelyhood but welcomed machine spinning because it made them more money by lifting the scarecity of spun yarn enabling them to increse production. Robot car production has removed a lot of the production workforce from the manufacture side but we don't have millions of unemployed so they must have upskilled or moved on to other jobs. When all else is said if you increase production you then need more people to sell the things or do repairs.

There are certainly times when it would be more appropriate to use old techniques rather than new. If you are producing period furniture there is a real argument for hand cut dovetails rather than machine cut ones.

But as I say whatever floats your boat.

regards Martin

[Martin KyteParticipant @martinkyte99762]

Oh and shouldn't the 'purists' eschew the use of HSS tooling and only use High Carbon Steel.

;0)

Martin

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

My thoughts are that CNC is a very useful production machine that can spit out parts by the thousand, in production facilities they are operated by button pushers and serviced by tool setters, the computer programmer designs the component and feeds the programme to the machine, for one offs a CNC machine is both expensive and impractical for the likes of us as we would need a lot of wasted time to produce the odd item. Our skills in the use of hand operated machines can and is put to more practical use in the manufacture of our models.

Martin P

[Ron ColvinParticipant @roncolvin83430]

Looking at the original article by Peter King that initiated this topic, it appears that those he labelled "Luddites" threw the first stone. Being told by fellow club members that-of CNC- "It is not Model Engineering" tending to be didactic and confrontational.

[Mike PooleParticipant @mikepoole82104]

For those who have taken on board CNC they may find that their active years in the workshop can be extended. As some of the programming can be done in comfort or generated from CAD then they do not need to spend hours stood at the machine. Setting up is often more interesting than just turning the feed handles. Listening to a number of commentators on this forum indicates that they have to scale back their activities due to health problems that make running a manual machine uncomfortable or impossible, CNC may be a good friend when your own faculties begin to fail

Mike

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

Posted by martin perman on 30/05/2018 12:40:35:

My thoughts are that CNC is a very useful production machine that can spit out parts by the thousand, in production facilities they are operated by button pushers and serviced by tool setters, the computer programmer designs the component and feeds the programme to the machine, ….

There are those – like me – who do not have the manual skills to be able to do the sorts of things they want to do on a lathe. I want to make – amongst other things – pens with graceful curves, ones with multi faceted engraving on the outside, multi start threads etc etc. These are things that are possible, but fiendishly difficult with a conventional non cnc setup. That's why I want to do cnc and why I feel it has a place in my workshop. It will be used for one-offs as well as several-offs. If I can write the correct software tools, it will take me much less time, many fewer errors and a lot more accurately than if I were to do it without cnc, even for one-off's. Cnc will help me work around my limitations to create what I want while using to the skills I have, rather than wasting time because of the skills I don't have.

Regards,

Richard

[SamsarandaParticipant @samsaranda]

Martin, your quote we don’t have millions of unemployed so they must have up skilled or moved on to other jobs will seem rather hollow to those living in the former coalfields where unemployment is a serious issue with its accompanying poverty.

Dave W

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Posted by Samsaranda on 30/05/2018 14:55:13:

Martin, your quote we don’t have millions of unemployed so they must have up skilled or moved on to other jobs will seem rather hollow to those living in the former coalfields where unemployment is a serious issue with its accompanying poverty.

Dave W

According to a display board in a mining museum I visited recently they had to give up when they couldn't meet a target of 50 cwt per man shift. That seems pathetically low to me, it can't make sense to pay people to scrabble about in the depths of the earth in a dangerous occupation when you can buy the coal a lot cheaper elsewhere, even from opencast mines in this country. Where the government of the day went wrong was to keep it going too long, and then close it all in a rush without retraining people so they could work elsewhere in a more productive environment.

[Barnaby WildeParticipant @barnabywilde70941]

Posted by Samsaranda on 30/05/2018 14:55:13:

Martin, your quote we don’t have millions of unemployed so they must have up skilled or moved on to other jobs will seem rather hollow to those living in the former coalfields where unemployment is a serious issue with its accompanying poverty.

Dave W

I live deep inside one of those coalfields & the main thing that was lost with the shutdown of the whole industry was hope.

I wasn't allowed down the mine but most of my senior male family & a fair few of my friends are now ex-miners.

There's one or two folk who I'd like to hold hands with & take a walk around my village one summers eve'. There is still a distinct seperation between those who fought & those who didn't.

Those that have the words 'upskilled' & 'moved on' imprinted in their heads are those that believe the BS, believe the political spin & believe that they themselves are doing alright.

[Martin KyteParticipant @martinkyte99762]

Hi Samsaranda

2 points.

1 The miners strike was 30 something years ago so your 'will seem rather hollow' comment is probably a little out of date. That said I do think that the whole thing was very badly handled and much more should have been done at the time to create other industries. Given that today the UK is moving competely away from coal for power generation it was always going to happen at some stage.

2. The population is higher now than in the 80's and there is less unemployment so logically there must be more jobs in total now than then. On a large timescale job growth and advancement in technology can and have gone in the same direction. It's the transitions that hurt which to my mind is the task of government to ensure new growth, retraining and recocation.

So I stand by what I said which was industry need to keep up with the times in order osurvive let alone thrive.

regards Martin

[Barnaby WildeParticipant @barnabywilde70941]

Posted by duncan webster on 30/05/2018 15:09:37:

According to a display board in a mining museum I visited recently they had to give up when they couldn't meet a target of 50 cwt per man shift. That seems pathetically low to me, it can't make sense to pay people to scrabble about in the depths of the earth in a dangerous occupation when you can buy the coal a lot cheaper elsewhere, even from opencast mines in this country. Where the government of the day went wrong was to keep it going too long, and then close it all in a rush without retraining people so they could work elsewhere in a more productive environment.

Whatever your chosen industry, have a think about how it would react to one government that uses it to employ countless thousands of excess workers to bring down the unemployment figures, followed by another government that daren't trim back the excess workers, so it starves it of investment capital instead.

What actually happened runs a LOT deeper than simply Arthur v Maggie.

[Andy CarruthersParticipant @andycarruthers33275]

I know this is off-topic but in my defence I am following the thread…

I *think* it was Adam Smith who (and I paraphrase) it is madness to produce something that can be bought cheaper elsewhere

I do think Norman Tebbit had a point about moving to where the work is, but I also accept there may be reasons why not everyone can do so

Which kinda gets me back on-topic – skills can be developed and people can retrain sometimes in short timeframes, as an example, I am hiring window fitters but there is a dearth of appropriately skilled people with the right attitude about, and the current construction boom is causing rates to sky rocket

[Martin KyteParticipant @martinkyte99762]

Just read Micks post.

I agree with you in general. It was a truly shamefull affair.

I do think that essentially what the miners were fighting for was the survival of their communities and not the survival of mining but thats all they had. I doubt if there were any miners who wished to see their children down the pit and would want to see new industries created locally. Labour shut more pits than Margaret Thatcher the difference was she was looking for a fight rather than trying to re-invigorate mining communities.

You are right that in order to re-skill and move on you need opportunities and that can only really be done by state investment.

regards Martin

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

People have been moving to where the work is.

That is why so many EU nationals have moved to the UK. The work is here, in spades (and pipes, and plumbing and fruit picking and farming and.. millions of jobs). The Poles, Hungarians, Slovaks, Bulgarians & Romanians I have met work at an effort level and rate that puts the UK born to shame. They do the jobs that many of our own unemployed will not do, and do not do. As I sit here typing I am facing a social housing estate where there is 90% unemployment and 90% UK birth. In the town there is 4% unemployment, but there has been about 15% immigration from Europe in the last 10 years, and virtually none of the immigrants are unemployed. The unemployed seem – from the 90 household sink estate in front of me – to be unwilling to get up to take their kids to school, unwilling to get dressed, and unwilling to do anything other than procreate. They may have problems, medical or otherwise, but little of it is evident from the outside. After commuting on foot through the estate for 5 years, I can identify 50% of the adults and a majority could work if they could be bothered to get up, wash, dress, take some exercise and behave like a human being with some pretensions to civilisation.

The issues in mining communities are different, but 30 years is quite a time for someone with get-up-and-go to get-up-and-be-gone.

Regards,

Richard.

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