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Lapping Plate
- Thread starter ddickey
- Start date
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2015
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- 8,279
I lapped valves back in the day..
I lapped on the lathe, but I have never lapped on a plate.
I lapped on the lathe, but I have never lapped on a plate.
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2014
- Messages
- 7,594
Tom Lipton, oxtoolco on YouTube, is in the middle of posting a new series on making his own precision lapping plates. We are talking about angstrom accuracy here...
This is part 1. The series is now up to part 4 posted, with more to come.
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It's possible but highly unlikely of achieving it under normal conditions.
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2015
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- 8,279
You make a lapping sleeve or rod if inner, you size it just about the same size not exactly the same size. you spread your lapping compound, and run the lathe; running the sleeve back and forth. The sleeve is softer and holds the charged lap, and laps (polishes) the thing you are lapping. Very easy, very quick. your finished piece will look like a dowel pin, or polished whatever. It will also if done right make it consistent in size if you move it back and forth like you should. Hold it in one spot and you will have a step.
You can use aluminum, wood, brass, bronze.. anything softer than the piece you are trying to lap. Hard to soft.. never hard to hard
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2017
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I have a cast iron Lapping Plate and no it can't replace the surfice grinder .
But they are very good for matching two mating parts.
Such as two mold halfs . I have used them years ago
To lap the two halfs of worm molds . You can't bet it.
Castings lap good
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- Jul 2, 2014
- Messages
- 7,594
Tom is using an optical flat and a single frequency light source to calibrate the lapping plates. That shows the individual wavelengths on the workpiece, and visually shows any discrepancies. Like scraping, lapping is a fascinating way of making things incredibly flat while using imprecise methods that gradually achieve highly accurate results by averaging. There is a method to the madness and a madness to the method! Humans are clever animals, sometimes...