What did you do today? 2023

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

I'd asked on here about verifying a small anvil as being for jewellery work. That done I passed it to a friend who does some silver-smithing as a hobby, and started making a box for it, using oddments of plywood.

Completed that today (varnishing).

Continued another task for him – refacing his bench-block. This is chunk of 4.5 inch square mild-steel about an inch and a half thick; that had been sawn and heavily stamped "18" – possibly a batch number, but someone had faced the opposite face for use.

This was all now very rusty.

Refaced the original working face on the Harrison lathe, but I was unable to obtain a really good finish: no tearing or chatter but rings as if the tool had dug in very slightly in places.

I put it on the Drummond manual shaper – it just fits the vice with the moving jaw replaced by a piece of plastic bar – put the radio on and commenced wearing my arm out flattening the sawn side. So he'll have a choice of which face to use!

The first attempt produced a vavy surface I credited to slack in the table and knee gibs, and slightly poor tool-grinding. I've now reground the tool, nipped the gibs up a bit and lock them for the cutting. I've still another layer to scrape off to remove the worst of the "18 " but now seem to be obtaining a decent, flat surface with a reasonable finish.

Why not mill it?

A couple of weekends ago my friend had artlessly asked me, "Do you have a milling-machine"

I replied, "Y- yes" , very guardedly, his wife and our companions grinning as they twigged immediately he wanted something doing (this block).

I collected the block, examined it, was not confident I'd obtain any better results by milling, and a manual shaper doesn't use electricity… except that necessary for the operator's fuel (tea).

.

The exercise, using the shaper to almost full capacity, is proving useful in showing where it needs some fettling. Adjusting the ram gibs to remove slight twisting and possibly up-lift make the ram stick on its outer travel, showing the upper surfaces of its slideways have worn slightly concave or wedge-shaped along their lengths. I will have to measure it to establish what needs facing down where.

I've already replaced some of the plain, very short grub-screws for the gibs with new square-head ones fitted with lock-nuts (the photos on lathes. co do show some samples so fitted), so it will appreciate the remaining ones treating similarly.

Here it is:

The centre mark on the turned surface is a shallow centre-drilling to prevent creating a pip, and to give a starting edge for outwards feed. Spindle speed about 70rpm with the motor at nearly 1000rpm, fine feed change-wheel train. HSS tool. The worst ring is faintly visible just within the outline square, but the spandrels are all to a very good finish despite the interrupted cut! Odd.

On the shaper, the steel looks still rusty but that's a lighting effect. It's actually posed: I'd already shaped the worst roughness off but had gained a torn surface, before turning it. The tissue to protect the turned face is visible. Note though hard to see, the near-proper shaper-tool form (it's probably a lathe spring-tool, in high carbon steel). Also the bread-bag tie on the vice handle, to stop it dangling in the way of the advancing table hand-wheel. Leather glove (to the left), to avoid blisters.

Reputedly there is a bench under all that clutter!

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

Nigel , have you tried a skiving tool on the shaper I find it gives a good finish on steel.

[Clock polisherParticipant @clockpolisher]

I'm in the final stages of adding a stepper motor drive long travel to my Unimat SL.

Got all the electronic bits and pieces fitted to the lathe base board, just needed to wire it all up. That, and tidying up the led lights and associated control gear.

All arranged for this afternoon, after grocery shopping.

Arrived home and after putting the car away was greeted by the unmistakable stench of a blocked drain.

Ah well, best laid plans and all that.

3 hours, 16m of drain rods, two manholes, 2 showers and a change of clothes, plus copious quantities of Anglo Saxon profanities. Topped off with a handful of painkillers.

Just finishing the second bottle of merlot and remembering how much I hate sewage.

There's always tomorrow.

regards,

David

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Bernard –

Sorry – I'm not familiar with the term "skiving tool". It rings a vague bell but I forget in what context, and I don't know its form.

I have looked in my copy of Ian Bradley's book (a MAP publication) on lathe and shaper tools, and he doesn't mention it there. He does though give advice on tool-setting on the shaper, and the drawings for an adjustable tool-holder designed to fit the Drummond manual shaper, taking small bits ground from HSS bar stock. (Or indeed from such sources as broken centre-drills etc!)

Today –

I delivered the machined plate (the "customer" and his wife are among my Saturday caving pals), plus the plywood box I'd made for the silver-smith's anvil I'd given him from among my umpteen years'-worth of accumulated, assorted tools I'll never use. As a finishing touch I had cleaned the plate's sides and given them a couple of coats of light-grey spray primer.

He's delighted! Said the surfaces were better than it had been when new to him. It had had only one surface machined and the other was rough-sawn; but I cleaned both faces.

Paid me in honey from their hives.

I've promised him a box for that plate, which I think he uses as a sort of surface-plate-cum-anvil.

''''''''

David –

That brings back 'orrible memories…. I'd arrived home late on Friday night to the delightful sight and smell of a small back yard more or less submerged in cess. Had to buy a set of drain-rods, 5l drum of Jeyes' Fluid and heavy-duty rubber gloves. I forgot the medicinal Merlot though.

[mgnbukParticipant @mgnbuk]

I managed to get my 3D printed Dremel holder on to the lathe & succesfully reground the 3 jaw SC chuck jaws.

My initial design of Dremel holder fit the Dickson toolpost securely, but I hadn't got to grips with the "Thread design workbench" in Freecad to accurately model the thread for the Dremel nose – variously described as M19x2 or 3/4"-12. M19x2 taps are rare and expensive & the only standard 3/4"-12 thread seems to be 3/4" BSF. Zoro put up a new 3/4" BSF tap for less than most used ones were being listed at on Ebay & the M18x2 hole I had modelled opened out easily with the new tap held in the chuck & the holder mounted on the toolpost. The Dremel screwed into the resultant hole nicely. Turns out I should have allowed a couple of millimetres more for the Dremel body to clear the toolpost as it interferes slightly, but it does just fit.

I didn't make up a grinding jig a-la-Hopper, but chose the "centrifugal force" method of running the lathe spindle at maximum speed (2200 rpm on the Super 7 IIRC) to hold the jaws against the scroll. Top slide set at round 10 degrees to give fine outfeed capability & I proceeded slowly to lightly touch the clamping face of the jaws, which had been marked up with a marker pen to judge progress. I had treated the chuck to a strip down & clean last week before starting the regrind.

It was apparent straight away that only 2 jaws were being ground initially, but after several light passes all were cleaned up. The small marks visible in the "light" jaw show the remains of the original surface.

This has made an improvement to runout. Checks carried out on a length of 25mm silver steel using a 0.1mm resolution dial gauge showed 0.08mm TIR close to the jaws and 0.13mm around 100 mm out before the grind improved to 0.03 mm TIR and 0.08mm respectively afterwards – a worthwhile improvement, I think & not bad for a 60-ish year old chuck.

I'll have another try at the 3D printed mount, both to give a bit more clearance to the Dremel & get to grips with the thread before moving on to the main reason I wanted a toolpost grinder in the first place – sorting out a Soba brand (short for "SO BAd" ? ) direct spindle nose mounting ER25 collet chuck that I made the mistake of buying at an ME Ex. It was sometime after the purchase that I found it wouldn't screw onto the spindle nose, which took at lot of lapping using a 2MT Myford nose adapter to get it to fit the spindle only to find that the ER taper runout was so far out as to make the item useless. A regrind of the collet seating taper with the chuck mounted on the spindle should (hopefully) make the thing useful.

Nigel B.

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Inspired by Mike Cox's article on using a hacksaw blade to make a grooving tool, I've made this to do internal grooving…

the slot through was made by putting a grove in the end of the bar and then soldering the cap on (with the M3 threaded hole already in place.

Iain

[HncladParticipant @hnclad]

Hi. I have some copies of The Model Engineer from the 1950's listed below.

Copy of Exhibition Souvenir Handbook and Guide.

49 copies – Early 1950's mixed dates, 1953-1955.

1956 binder complete 6 months, Jan. to June.

1958 binder complete 6 months, Jan. to June.

1951 binder complete 4 months, July to Oct.

Anyone who is interested can pick them up. I live in Canada, Province of Ontario. in the Peterborough/Lindsay area.

For more information contact me @:-

Email:- hnclad64@gmail.com

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, I took delivery of a set of deep 1/4" drive sockets ranging from 0 – 8BA, which I ordered on Tuesday 28th Feb' early afternoon. Impressed with the speed of their service, with a total cost of £16.73, which was the lowest price I found without any extensive searching.

Regards Nick.

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, yesterday I had a fiddly little job, a couple of weeks ago, one of younger granddaughters who is almost six, bought herself a ring from a car boot stall, which is adjustable to fit ones finger.

Apparently my granddaughter keep fiddling about with the adjustment and one half broke off, and so I was given the challenge to mean it. While silver soldering was out of the question, my only option was soft solder, so I used some lead free solder, which wasn't the easiest stuff to use with a soldering iron, but the hardest thing was holding the ring and the broken off piece together in the right place, but after much adjustment to my helping hands, I managed to get in the right place.

The finished result was successful, although I don't now if it will be strong enough to last.

Regards Nick.

[Chris GillParticipant @chrisgill22114]

I had an odd early morning request today.

My 7-year old granddaughter wants me to make a DNA helix from K'nex so that she can go to school as Rosalind Franklin. There are lots of examples online and even a dedicated kit (£60).

I did suggest that, since Franklin's expertise was in X-ray crystallography, my graddaughter should take an X-ray image and have a Fourier transform in her pocket for people who can't see what it's supposed to be.

[JellyParticipant @jelly]

Managed to get out and do something this evening after an inordinate amount of time tied up doing other things.

So I quickly knocked out a little job I kept putting off:

A BSP ⅛ F×M adapter sized to be a force fit into a solid jerry can nozzle (the green thing on the left).

Once I get an additional olive for the pictured ¼" compression fitting (I seem to have mislaid them) I will install a copper dip-tube which extends to slightly less than full depth in a standard jerry can and press it in.

The end result is that I can hook it up to the diesel heater's bulkhead fitting on the outside of my workshop via a flexible hose (with crimped ⅛ BSP female swivels) allowing me to change out 25lt jerry-cans of fuel as and when required with a single clip.

I should get the sign-writing brushes out and add "Gas-Oil – not for road use" to the Jerry Cans too, lest I forget which is which and get myself in trouble with HMRC at some point in the future.

 

I also got to fully test-drive the smart controls for the heater which arrived the other week, an Internet of Things enabled "RF Blaster" which allows my smart home system to replicate the Remote Control and operate the heater in response to the workshop temperature sensors, smartphone or voice control.

It's not necessary at all, but being able to set it going whilst eating tea so by the time I go out it's up to a good working temperature (say 12-13°C) is a nice touch.

Putting the heater outlets directly above the operator position for the mill and lathe was also clearly the right move, I can run it on a far lower setting than required to heat the entire workshop up to a comfortable room temperature and still be toasty warm whilst stationary operating a machine, meaning if I go to do something physical immediately after making a part, I don't melt.

Edited By Jelly on 06/03/2023 22:33:45

[JellyParticipant @jelly]

Finally managed to get the 3D printer kindly gifted to me by Steve Bright working, no thanks to the manufacturer whose lax approach to model numbers and version control leads to their website suggesting you should install entirely the wrong firmware.

(For reference to anyone facing issues with a Wanhao D9 in the future, there's a Mk1, an Mk1 upgrade, an MK2, an MK2 BLtouch, an early MK3 which was sold as the MK2 BLtouch for a while but needs MK3 firmware, and an MK3 proper).

This said, once the maintenance and updates are done, it's very simple to use, runs well and the print quality was pretty good for a first run set up with generic settings by a relative newbie…

On the point of being a relative newbie, as the picture demonstrates I may have been a tad overenthusiastic in scaling the model down to reduce print time.

[JellyParticipant @jelly]

And the bits arrived to finish the Jerry-Can Adapter.

Seated quite easily with a couple of firm blows with the big Thor hammer, at which point I noticed a joke from the friend who gave me the spare nozzle…

Oh Dear, I won't be following that instruction.

[Sonic EscapeParticipant @sonicescape38234]

Today it was a busy morning. Four 1200x20mm stainless steel bars, four 20x20x160 HSS bars and a five-liter can of way oil ISO 68 arrived.

[Clive FarrarParticipant @clivefarrar90441]

Restoring a friends 1961 tractor and i want the valves out to inspect and de carbon.

Normal valve compressor will not touch it so i have turned and milled up a "C" section mandrel for my 3T arbour press.

i can then use that to compress the springs and extract the collets through the C opening with a magnetised screw driver.

Test day is next Friday , i hope it works.

[Craig BrownParticipant @craigbrown60096]

Made a couple of new hinges, for an antique wardrobe, to replace a well worn and broken one

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

Craig,I had a mate who used to do that it must be very satisfying to bring things like back to life.

[Clock polisherParticipant @clockpolisher]

Finally got round to commissioning the stepper motor long travel on my Unimat SL.

The controller I fitted has several useful functions beyond just backwards and forwards but I am struggling with the auto-translated instructions.

Also tidied up and finished the 4-way lighting system.

regards,

David

[DalboyParticipant @dalboy]

I have been making a Farm Boy engine at the same time as a Rob Roy loco. So spent yesterday and to day shaping the front body. Still more to go before this part is complete before moving onto the rear body.

I have just started an album for this as I have already prepared some parts into plain blanks to work on. Sorry for the sidways photo

[Dave WoottonParticipant @davewootton]

Today I've mostly been feeling a bit old, firstly I caught sight of the new M.E cover with an article that the LBSCR Terrier Fenchurch is 150 years old, I helped restore it ready for it's 100th birthday when I was a 15 year old schoolboy!. Mostly menial tasks, I remember a lot of wire brushing ,red lead primer and grime, come to think of it I've rarely been ungrubby in the intervening 50 years.

To compound my ageing realisation, the forms to apply for my state pension arrived this morning, surely some administrative error the brain still thinks I'm 20.

[Phil LinghamParticipant @phillingham79132]

Interesting job for my nephew who is competing in a bicycle race in Italy this weekend. The bracket that holds the front derailleur on to his super light carbon framed bicycle has broken for the 2nd or 3rd time at twenty odd pounds a go. (At the top in the first picture). Everywhere is out of stock and he was in a panic that he wouldn't be able to take part so asked if I could help.

I tried bending one up out of some aluminium sheet of the same thickness but it was quite difficult because of the opposing bends and everything angled by 5 degrees. When we tried it out it was obviously too flexible so I machined one from solid increasing the thickness to make it stronger and more rigid.

He messaged me earlier to say that the gear shift has never been as positive! I'm not surprised because obviously with the original flimsy bracket most of the effort was wasted by flexing the bracket. Might have cost him a couple of extra grammes but I told him he'll just have to pedal a bit harder!

[John Doe 2Participant @johndoe2]

I fixed our central heating that broke down during the coldest part of the year, (of course), and which had about six separate faults – some of which masked each other – and which involved cutting out blocked pipes – (we inherited a system that had not been maintained and was iin a terrible state) – so all good; except…… ….as I was clearing up; the sheet I had put down to protect the carpet next to the airing cupboard where all the gubbins was located turned out to be porous, so there are now black splodges all over the light coloured carpet. Bugger!!!

[JellyParticipant @jelly]

Popped over to see Ian (of this parish) in my lunch break and then sorted out my lathe topside this evening with the dovetail bolts he kindly made for me.

 

Followed up by going to turn down some socket headed cap screws to replace the existing wallered out ones on the lathe, and immediately breaking my last insert of the type I wanted… I went rooting around in my drawer of HSS toolbits and couldn't find anything with a suitable grind, so decided to quit whilst I was ahead for the evening before inviting a third disaster over on the grinder.

 

At which point I narrowly dodged the third disaster again, after deciding to give the lathe a birthday with new oil in the headstock, but realising just in time it would be a supremely messy task done as I initially envisaged…

The position of the sump plug is such that the extremely thin (ISO2) bearing oil would go jetting out the side and splatter absolutely everywhere if I used an oil-pan, so better done using a transfer pump (or at least buying a dedicated bucket which gives me a fighting chance).

 

Tomorrow will hopefully be a more successful day.

Edited By Jelly on 15/03/2023 21:13:31

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Took 2 hours to do a 20 minute job. For reasons too complicated to go into I decided that one particular double socket in the workshop would be better if it were switched. Most of mine are, this one was re-used from a previous workshop. Easy thought I, I'll just swap 2 sockets whilst I'm waiting for the dinner to cook. It's never that easy, after I'd swapped over the wires I found the back boxes were different, so I had to swap them as well, but they are surrounded by shelving so not easy to get to. Two hours later I'm thinking it would have been easier to just buy a new switched socket, at least I'd only have had to mess with one.

Edited By duncan webster on 15/03/2023 22:58:47

[JellyParticipant @jelly]

Finally got round to doing something I've been meaning to for ages, and made a holder for all my toolholders.

Did a test fit on the floor, because mounting it is going to be a right arse, and glad I did, the studs in 4 of the positions are either marginally too close or marginally too far apart, so I will need to remove them and file the holes out slightly then refit using gorilla glue.

That might be a tomorrow job though, nothing about threading M8 studs into 6mm holes in 19mm ply thirty two times in a row was particularly fun…

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