What Did You Do Today 2025

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

The previous 2024 thread is now closed, please use this one.

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

More of a ‘What I am Going To Do Today’ – off to the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway – start the year with the smell of oil and coal.. 😊

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

With the weather as it is it was a good day for workshop time so got down to completing the rope knurl project by making form tools making the knurling process a 2 minute affair. It seems to make the definition of the knurl a lot better. So a good start to 2025 hope its the same for all of you. And yes there are two different pitches.

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

..is the finer pitch one ‘new’? – looks good..

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

Yes the finer pitch is the newer one, I thought it would be better for smaller diameters but its all down to personal choice. Now all I need is a job for them.

[StevePParticipant @stevepye68246]

Victorian look about them, steam tap handles .

Great result.

Steve p

[Taf_PembsParticipant @taf_pembs]

They look great, excellent result!

[Jon LawesParticipant @jonlawes51698]

superb work Bernard

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, today I took delivery of a 4″ HV rotary table, which I ordered late on New Year’s Eve, from Amadeal Ltd., seems to be a nice build, and I will be able to use my index plates on it, that I use on my 6″ Vertex one.

This one will suite my mini mill better than my Vertex one.

Regards Nick.

[Bo’sunParticipant @bosun58570]

Seasons greetings to you all.

I finished the burner assembly for my Myford Boy Traction Engine.  Now I need to decide how to shoe horn it in without taking the tender apart.  That will be a right nuisance for any maintenance further down the line.

[Nicholas Farr]

On Nicholas Farr Said:

Hi, today I took delivery of a 4″ HV rotary table, which I ordered late on New Year’s Eve, from Amadeal Ltd., seems to be a nice build […]

That looks a tidy little thing, Nick

… I have no immediate need for such, but will be interested to know how well it performs.

MichaelG.

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi MichaelG, yes it is a tidy thing, but it is the same height more or less as my 6″ Vertex, it weighs 7 kg as opposed to 10 kg for the vertex, but it turns smoother than my vertex. I have a small job of putting two more holes  in a small chuck backplate, which has four holes in it for a small four slot RT, to suite the three slots in this new RT, but I need to make three T-nuts with a 5mm thread in them first.

Regards Nick.

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

The weather on this patch of Southern England has not been as nasty as further North. Though it is Winter and so far I don’t think the worst has actually been abnormal – just horrible and I know it is causing so many people so many problems.

Even so we have had heavy rain and winds and I had a shock to find a sizeable puddle in the corner of the workshop. I don’t know its source but the rear of the building is not accessible to investigate. It could be an overflowing rear gutter on a similar shed that backs onto mine from the next street’s rear gardens, but with a wriggly asbestos-cement roof on my shed, investigating is not easy.

Nevertheless, let’s get something done…

Having returned from a day away yesterday, with a scrap of 100mm grey PVC pipe and of all things, a rusty but intact camping-gas cartridge, both from a small junk pile (with permission, indeed blessing).

Quick measuring showed the cartridge the more likely candidate by size and appearance. Some careful mini-grinding and junior hacksawing produced the upper two-thirds with the neck ring removed from the domed top. Trying in-situ showed I was right to have scavenged a discarded gas cartridge that seemed to have been in the nearby incinerator, as it proved just the right length and diameter (with slight expanding), and luckily not severely corroded,….

….. for making an effective and aesthetically fair differential cover for my steam-wagon!

That’s what you catch from listening to The Wombles on the wireless over Christmas.

(The differential is on the axle rather than in the back of one wheel, as shown by a photograph that appeared long after I’d made the thing! Still, other chain-driven steam-wagons used mid-axle differentials, so it’s still contemporary practice.)

…..

Had an hour’s break, leaving the workshop door open. The weather had turned warm with a muggy, soft drizzle, and when I returned I was dismayed to find every ferrous surface, from lathe to scribing-block, covered with beaded films of condensate. Luckily a lot are protected by paint and oily grime but there are a still bare tools, machine-parts, etc. exposed.

I used up a lot of Water Dispersant-Forty and kitchen-roll everywhere, then wheeled the dehumidifier down the garden to do its thing, hopefully.

…

Then back in for tea and to draw the major part of the wagon’s cylinder-block, to a point where I can consider details like the various passages, frame fixing, drains, etc.

The placcy pipe? Material like that is good for making chip-guards, non-model gear-covers and the like.

[Nigel Graham 2]

On Nigel Graham 2 Said:..

……………The placcy pipe? Material like that is good for making chip-guards, non-model gear-covers and the like.

Its also good for putting round signal posts to stop the strimmer lunatics destroying the wiring. No matter how many times you tell them to be careful, they don’t have to mend it, so they’re not.

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Actually made some swarf! Not much swarf but still swarf….

By using my dear old EW Lathe for the first time for, well, I think about 10 years at least. My turning since having been on a Myford ML7 and Harrison L5… and the main of today’s work was for the latter’s benefit.

 

First task was to modify a bush inside the 4-way toolpost that came with the lathe, so it fits the replacement post properly: simple counter-boring to clear a shoulder.

 

Now, a year or two ago a lady called Michelle was using the For Sale column on this site to help her father reduce the volume of his workshop. Among the goodies I bought from them was a set of Harrison L5 spares, and a boring/facing head and boring-table he had almost made for said lathe, leaving a couple of details to finish.

Both are beautifully made, the table having a scraped surface, and 10 2BA grub-screw holes for the gib.

I had only to set out (very carefully with a lot of thinking!) the hole for the feed-nut, and find / make the gib-screws. The builder had assumed socket grub-screws buried deeply within the casting but I decided better would be projecting screws with lock-nuts, to facilitate adjustment and locking the cross-direction.

So unable to find 2BA X 1-1/2″ screws, grub or hex. head, it was down to parting-off 10 plus 2 spare, lengths of 2BA studding. I’d thought to slot the ends for a screwdriver but realised I could fit acorn nuts as a head, with lock-nuts behind that. 2BA acorn nuts are available but more expensive than really justified, though I don’t want to spoil the gentleman’s work.

Experimenting suggested an M5 nut with adhesive would work adequately as all the thrust in use would try to tighten them, and the force is low anyway. The only snag is adjusting would need a 2BA and 8mm spanners.

Comparing formal dimensions, 2BA, M5 and 10-32 UN are all remarkably similar, with an M5 nut a rather slack fit on a 2BA screw, but not vice-versa.

So a trip to ‘ToolStation’ in the morning; nuts, acorn, stainless-steel, M5 wanted.

 

It was not plain sailing with a very small parting tool in a rather ‘B’-class holder and very basic QCTP (commercial items), old chuck and worn headstock journals, (operator fraying round the edges too) but EW and I arrived at our destination eventually.

Very satisfying to use again what had been my 18th Birthday present from my parents… a long time ago… , with the bonus that the lathe is indoors, not shivering with its bigger companions in the unheated workshop!

 

[Nigel Graham 2]

On Nigel Graham 2 Said:

.. …Very satisfying to use again what had been my 18th Birthday present from my parents… ..

That must be a pleasing thing, and it’s indoors as well – it has been almost too cold to work in the shed this week – my new rule-of-thumb is that if 638 won’t come out, I don’t come out either..

[DalboyParticipant @dalboy]

Spent the last couple of days stripping my lathe to replace some gears, It has taken that long due to doctor appointments which we have had every day this week. Anyway, just been out and turned on the heater to bring it up to a working temperature so that I can complete the last couple of bits to bring it back to full working order.

Hopefully will be able to complete the spring winder to make the springs for the Farm Boy.

 

 

 

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi. a few days ago, I was looking for a suitable size piece of thickish cast iron, about 50mm diameter, so not having anything like it, I dug out some cast iron feet that were ripped off a 10″ David Brown reduction box, which happen the have a serious malfunction, which stopped the machine dead.

So I choose the one that had the least amount of work of cutting a piece out, with my bandsaw in its vertical position, and after a little bit more trimming today, I was able to skim the uneven side off.

I then scribed a circle on the other side, which was the side that was bolted down to the machine bed, which allowed me to set it up in my slim four jaw chuck, reasonable central, using my 6″ RT and a scriber mounted on a magnetic base. which will now allow me to skim the diameter true , to the biggest size I can get.

Regards Nick.

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

..pragmatism is the attractive younger sister of the mother of invention..

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Yes – Been there! I’ve only been caught out once when trying to turn a bit of cast-iron into a piston. It had been an architectural fitting so was of poor quality, full of tiny blowholes. It was wasn’t wasted, as I found another use where the quality was not so critical!

….

Still a bit too cold for long periods in the workshop but I did fit the boring-table to the Harrison lathe. Only to find my lovely new gib-screws would be stopped by the saddle-clamp screw-head. Ah well, socket grub-screws it is then.

Now need make a tool-post, and find a way to exchange it with the normal cross-slide without needing dismantle the hand-wheel etc. The problem is space at the back of the lathe, so I will probably need cut a recess in the workshop wall lining.

A fixed tool-post will lose the top-slide advantages, but I could make a carrier-plate for the slide borrowed for the day from the Myford.

[DalboyParticipant @dalboy]

Managed to get and make the body of a spring winder today after messing up the first when it pulled out of a new 5C collet which I discovered had a largish piece of swarf still attached to the inside. So checked the others and they seem fine.

Very pleased with the knurling, I did use a small one which I am glad to say feels great in the hand.

 

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

After some encouragement from another forum member, I’ve also decided to try and get to grips with CAD..

..making real progress with ugly hold-down fillets, on my first own ‘thing’ built from a blank space..

 

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

That is good for someone that has only had the program for a few days. You will soon be drawing engines like the one I sent you.

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

Haha, yes indeed, thank you Jason – tho’ I see I have some catching-up to do – also plenty aware that pride comes before a fall, my ‘virtual-scrap-box’ is looking pretty full.

Steepest part of the learning curve for me so far has probably been working out sequence of operations so that you don’t paint yourself into a corner later, plus I don’t fully understand all the ways of ‘back-tracking’ yet..

..but enjoyable and would recommend it as a thing to do..

 

[David JuppParticipant @davidjupp51506]

Diogenes. If you get stuck – or have specific questions, you can call on Alibre Support, your reseller, and the Alibre user forum – in addition to others here.

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