Worth it to buy a new Machinist Handbook?

[projectnut]

The Machinery's Handbook is meant to provide current information to commercial and industrial machine shops. As such information changes as time moves on. The earlier editions have threading information and machining techniques that are now obsolete. As the machinery and standards change the obsolete information is deleted and replaced with information more current to the time the edition was printed.

The 22nd edition briefly delves into metrics, and lightly touches on CNC equipment. Later editions go much deeper into these fields but have less emphasis on imperial measurements and manual machining techniques.

I deal with machinery spanning from the early 20th century to the early 21st century. My oldest machine is from 1916 and the newest was built in 2011. To cover all the bases, I have about a dozen editions of Machinery's Handbook. The oldest is the 1st edition and the latest is the 29th edition. The most used are the 13th to 22nd editions. They aren't used on a daily basis but are a lifesaver when needed.

A few editions were purchased new during my working career. Most however were purchased used on eBay. Good quality editions can usually be had for between $20.00 and $30.00 per copy.

 

[mmcmdl]

I have a 1914 edition from my uncle's father . Colvin and Stanley " American Machinist's Handbook " . I guess they changed the title at some point in time .

 

[Bi11Hudson]

Mine is from 1947 or so (16th ed. I think), and it covers enough metric and carbide to suit my uses. It still retains all the good stuff that disappears after CNC turned machinists from venerable tradesmen into "button pushers" that couldn't find the intersection of two planes if it bit them in the face. If I need anything that's not covered, like some specific insert's data table, I can just go to the internet, which is found in my front left pocket on most days. Otherwise, the old edition works great with scratch paper and a pencil, two of my favorite shop tools.

My issue was printed in the early 40s, 15th I think. I have a reasonably current version, haven't taken it off the shelf in years. I am retired now, don't do automation any more.

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