# Quarantine Projects!



## Weldo

Hey guys, as you all are probably aware many people who work in "non essential" businesses are either urged or ordered to stay home for a while in an effort to curb the spreading of the COVID-19 illness.

I work in residential construction and as such I am one of those people.  My company has stopped all field work on the order of the governor so I find myself with some free time.  My hopes are to get some things done around the shop I've been neglecting for too long.

I figured starting a thread might be a fun way to document how we can use this time off!  So if anyone is under quarantine, self or otherwise, post up some pics or descriptions of how you're using your time!


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## Weldo

I'll start!

I finally got around to re-powering my belt sander.  For years it's been running on a 3/4 HP spa pump motor, and while it did work it lacked power for heavy grinding.  Also I was not able to achieve the pulley ratio I wanted because of lack of power.

A eventually found a better motor locally on craigslist but it's been languishing for a few years.  The new motor is up to 2.3 HP! 

The old spa pump motor is on the left.  





I'm hoping it'll allow me to change the pulley ratio to get some more SFM.  I'm in the middle of this project right now!


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## DavidR8

I'm working on my mill DRO project. 
Have the x and y axis done. Need to mount the display and put the table back on.


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## Weldo

Right on!  DRO is the ticket!

I keep thinking about trying to do DRO on my lathe, but I'm not sure it's worth it for me.  If I had a mill I'd dive in for sure!  

What kind of parts are you using?


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## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> Right on!  DRO is the ticket!
> 
> I keep thinking about trying to do DRO on my lathe, but I'm not sure it's worth it for me.  If I had a mill I'd dive in for sure!
> 
> What kind of parts are you using?











						DRO install on LC-30A (RF-30 clone)
					

I started looking at how to install the DRO on my LC-30A mill. A big question I had was where to put the X-axis scale; on the operator side or the column side.  This is the DRO, the YH800 model https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1000006632582.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.59284c4ddfUQRY...




					www.hobby-machinist.com


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## T Bredehoft

Weldo said:


> I keep thinking about trying to do DRO on my lathe



I did have problems intalling  a DRO scale on my cross slide, but find that  between the radius/diameter discrepancy, and the very slight lack of repeat, I don't use the DROs. I'm glad I  didn't pay a lot for them or their installation, (Perhaps that would have made them more suitable), but don't be surprised if you don't use them.


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## Winegrower

That was my first quarantine project, to carefully examine the D80 DRO accuracy.  I have the slim-line magnetic scales, that were nice to install but I have not been convinced about overall accuracy.   To measure reliably to tenths over 5 or 6 inches turned out to be surprisingly difficult, with lots of unexpected error sources.   Eventually I got a setup that was highly repeatable (seems like this would be easy, right?) but it took some time and trys. There was clearly an inaccuracy, and eventually it took about a 0.1% linear compensation to get it where it was as accurate as any way I had to check it. 
The manual is just plain wrong and incomplete about the process, so that took awhile to figure out.

In the end, now the DRO is quite accurate.   And I know how to do a linear compensation.         The non-linear compensation process, if needed, looks like it's going to take more than a virus threat to get me to do it.


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## Janderso

Not working sounds pretty good to me right now.
We always want something we can't have.
This too will pass, sooner than later I hope.
Stay well.


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## Bamban

In support of our state juniors high power program, here is my self quarantine project - barrels from Shilen Rifles.

These should keep me tied up in the garage for awhile.


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## Rootpass

I built an adapter for my cheap tool and cutter grinder to grind square lathe tools. I don’t have a dovetail cutter so I used a 60* countersink and then got into the corners with an 1/8” end-mill. It works very well and by widening the slot and adding set screws I can grind any size I need.


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## Weldo

Bamban said:


> In support of our state juniors high power program, here is my self quarantine project - barrels from Shilen Rifles.
> 
> These should keep me tied up in the garage for awhile.



Is that 94 lbs worth of rifle barrels?!  Wow!

Hey @Rootpass that's pretty cool!  Creative with the counter sink!  I like it!


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## Janderso

Rootpass said:


> I built an adapter for my cheap tool and cutter grinder to grind square lathe tools. I don’t have a dovetail cutter so I used a 60* countersink and then got into the corners with an 1/8” end-mill. It works very well and by widening the slot and adding set screws I can grind any size I need.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 317885
> View attachment 317886
> 
> View attachment 317887


Sweet,
Cheap? Even cheap they are a lot of money. They sure would come in handy.
I like your hss adapter.


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## Weldo

Got a coat of paint on my sander's base plate.  For years it was raw metal and accumulating rust since I sometimes dip the piece I'm grinding into water for cooling.

I like Rustoleum hammer tone for shop equipment.  It has a nice look.  This is the brown I've done some other things in, like the old bench shear in the background.




I'm itching to reassemble but the paint is still soft...  Now I have a project for tomorrow!


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## Weldo

Thanks to all who have shared their work so far!  The forum and this thread in particular is helping keep me busy and motivated during my time at home.

In that vein, my sister just coined the phrase "Corona-cation"!  Wash your hands and avoid all people!  I've been training for this my entire life!  Let's keep the positivity flowing!


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## Bamban

Weldo said:


> Is that 94 lbs worth of rifle barrels?!  Wow!
> 
> Hey @Rootpass that's pretty cool!  Creative with the counter sink!  I like it!




Yup, 94 pounds worth of rifle barrels.


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## Grinderman

Not really machining but still working with metal. I made this for my daughter’s 2nd wedding anniversary coming up next week.I made these from an old piece of 1” copper pipe.


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## Rootpass

Weldo,
I like to bake painted parts in the kitchen oven for about 30 minutes at 325. Once it cools it’s rock hard and I can go ahead and use it.


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## DavidR8

Rootpass said:


> Weldo,
> I like to bake painted parts in the kitchen oven for about 30 minutes at 325. Once it cools it’s rock hard and I can go ahead and use it.



Is your experience that the finish is more durable than just air drying?

(Thinking that I’ll be crucified if I put parts in the oven!)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Weldo

@Grinderman Dude, that's incredible work!  Very nice!  Do you dabble in sculpture a lot?  Copper is so nice to work with.  A while ago I made a small oil pot thing for the shop out of copper.  I'll snap some pics sometime soon.

Thanks for the tip @Rootpass I'll keep that in mind for sure!  Really it would be nice to have a dedicated oven for the shop.

Along those lines I wonder if an old dishwasher could be converted to recirculate parts washing fluid!  Maybe disable the heater element and plug up the drain.  It would need a filter I guess, or maybe not.  Imagine putting a bunch of greasy parts in there, pushing a button and coming back in 45 minutes to nice clean parts!


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## matthewsx

Sorting, consolidating and getting rid of stuff.

But I'll start putting this back together tomorrow....


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## Grinderman

@Grinderman Dude, that's incredible work! Very nice! Do you dabble in sculpture a lot? Copper is so nice to work with. A while ago I made a small oil pot thing for the shop out of copper. I'll snap some pics sometime soon.

Thanks a lot. First time “art” project and first time working with copper. The copper isn’t bad to work with aside from having to anneal it a couple of times to keep it soft.


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## C-Bag

I've always wanted a ball turning attachment for my lathe. After watching Jere Kirkpatrick YouTube on his attachment I got some good ideas and decided it was time what with the apocalypse and all. Here's a pic of the mount plate, the rotary mount and the cutter mount. I had some carbide triangle cutters but they don't have a screw hole so I think I'm going to modify for 1/4" HSS cutter. The height of the cutter mount right now is about 3/8" too tall so I'm still ok, hopefully. It was the first time I've done this kind of angle cut for the "relief" on the mount. The plate behind the assembly was the other half of the base plate. Kinda a before and after. I surfaced the base plate with the old Atlas 7b shaper. I've also got to mount the handle arm too.


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## dlane

Cleaned this tool grinder up to get rid of on cl.


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## matthewsx

If only I had the room here....


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## MrWhoopee

Weldo said:


> Along those lines I wonder if an old dishwasher could be converted to recirculate parts washing fluid!  Maybe disable the heater element and plug up the drain.  It would need a filter I guess, or maybe not.  Imagine putting a bunch of greasy parts in there, pushing a button and coming back in 45 minutes to nice clean parts!



Works great with hot water and dishwashing detergent. Just be sure she'll be gone long enough for the cycle to finish.


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## hman

MrWhoopee-
I've often thought about going to an appliance reclaim store (like Habitat for Humanity) and picking up a cheap old dishwasher.  You could even leave the heater in place - hot water works better than cold!  One caution, though ... dishwasher detergent is pretty durn alkaline and it will frequently attack/discolor aluminum items.  So if you're cleaning aluminum, run it with plain water!


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## mmcmdl

Sunday I had the Kubota out and about . I'm still digging out a hill down at the other place . I used 6 or 7 buckets of dirt and filled in my backyard fire pit , leveled it out and then hit my rockpile and build a new pit . I'm cleaning up under the " tool tree " to get some new grass seed in . I sorted out metals , crunched about 80 lbs of beer aluminum cans which are ready for shipment , cleaned up the garage a bit , had the 4 wheeler out , and basically cleaning up as usual . No rain today , so I'll have to get out and finish things up . I'll say this , those rocks I moved 30 years ago sure are heavier today for some reason , they must be growing on their own back in the garden . Soon I have to construct a raised garden for the daughter . She wants to upscale our veggie garden to compete with our deer population . Every year it's the same thing , it goes well up to one night and the deer come and have a feast , eating everything down to ground level . As far as time off from work , not me . Everyone else in the house has off ( other than my one son who is an OT ) . Hopefully I'll get a chance for pics today and get some basement time tonight .


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## Weldo

Lots of good projects goin'!

@matthewsx that looks like a little 6" lathe?  It's amazing what a coat of paint can do!  It's gonna look amazing!

@C-Bag That ball turner is sweet!  I like the shapered finish.  I sometimes wonder if I want to buy an Atlas shaper, it's such a cool machine.  Also if you still want to use triangle inserts I have some laying around that I can't use, Here's a link to the trading post forum.

@dlane I've never seen a grinder like that, but it's awesome!


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## C-Bag

Thanks Weldo. My problem is I'm not set up to cut the pockets as precise as they should be. I was so involved with the other aspects of the project that I just thought I'd figure that out when I got to it. But I'm stunned how deep the wabbit hole of insert nomenclature etc is and how crucial the pocket is to proper function. I'm already set up to grind and profile HSS so I think I'll stick with what I know for now. I'm thinking the same 1/4" HSS setup I use on the shaper will work fine and if not I'll make something else.


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## Rootpass

Weldo, I’m not sure about more durable but it cures in and hour vs days. 
I did buy a dishwasher from Craigslist one time for $25 to use as a parts washer for a Willys Jeep transmission and transfer case. I put caster wheels on it. I never got to use it. By the time I was ready I had to back to working out of town.


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## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> Thanks Weldo. My problem is I'm not set up to cut the pockets as precise as they should be. I was so involved with the other aspects of the project that I just thought I'd figure that out when I got to it. But I'm stunned how deep the wabbit hole of insert nomenclature etc is and how crucial the pocket is to proper function. I'm already set up to grind and profile HSS so I think I'll stick with what I know for now. I'm thinking the same 1/4" HSS setup I use on the shaper will work fine and if not I'll make something else.



That's cool.  Inserts are a language all their own.



Rootpass said:


> Weldo, I’m not sure about more durable but it cures in and hour vs days.
> I did buy a dishwasher from Craigslist one time for $25 to use as a parts washer for a Willys Jeep transmission and transfer case. I put caster wheels on it. I never got to use it. By the time I was ready I had to back to working out of town.



Creative solutions!  It would be a huge time saver to wash a bunch of parts at once.  It was mentioned before about dishwasher detergent being very alkaline but maybe you could just use Dawn liquid instead?


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## Weldo

Here's a pick of the copper thing I mentioned above.  It's what I use for cutting lubrication.

The old lathe manual I have says that lard oil is a great cutting oil so I figured I'd make a thing to hold some lard, except it's usually solid at room temp so I needed a way to heat it to melting.




I made most of it out of 1/4" copper tube and some sheet copper.  It holds a standard tea light and the pipe on the side hold a small brush.  For tapping and drilling I most often just dip the tap or drill in the grease and go to work.  The heat of friction melts the lard and it works quite well as a cutting fluid.




The bowl was pounded out from a piece of copper flashing.  It was my first attempt at such metal shaping but it went well.  I had to anneal several times.  After working the metal a while it starts to become harder to move but after heating red hot and cooling it moves almost as easy as lead!




I did some experiments with the annealing process by heating and air cooling and heating and quenching in water.  It seemed to make no difference.  Usually with steel you must cool slowly to anneal but with copper you can quench it.




It was a fun project!


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## Weldo

Got my belt sander back together!

First was to install the switch.  I got this thing from ebay.  It's from BOAT #6 apparantly.




Mounted in the box.  I made this enclosure from scratch a few years ago.




Got all the wiring back in.  I had to switch rotation of the motor.  The motor plate tells you to switch the black and red wires on the inside.




Mounted the sander to the plate.  I got this part from ebay as well from an industrial reseller.  I got a deal because the guard was bent in shipping.  It was easily fixed in a few minutes but after living with it for a few weeks I canned it anyway.  I like to sharpen tungstens on the top wheel.




All reinstalled.  Does anyone know if it matters how the link type belts are oriented?  There's no arrows on it and I can't remember how it was.




Here it is back home next to the drill press.  I have the table reinstalled here as well.   You can see the top wheel which was covered by the original guard.  It makes a good spot to grind tungstens.




It runs pretty well.  The rpm of the motor and the motor pulley are the same as the old motor so SFM is the same.  However it does have more power.  I used to be able to easily stall out the grinder but now it takes much more effort to bog it down.  All in all, a win!

On to the next thing!


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## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> Here's a pick of the copper thing I mentioned above.  It's what I use for cutting lubrication.
> 
> The old lathe manual I have says that lard oil is a great cutting oil so I figured I'd make a thing to hold some lard, except it's usually solid at room temp so I needed a way to heat it to melting.


By lard, do you mean Crisco? As in flaky pie crust lard?


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## pontiac428

Weldo said:


> All reinstalled.  Does anyone know if it matters how the link type belts are oriented?  There's no arrows on it and I can't remember how it was.



"The tails follow" is the recommendation for link belt rotation.


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## C-Bag

DavidR8 said:


> By lard, do you mean Crisco? As in flaky pie crust lard?


I was thinkin' more like bacon drippings........mmmmmmm the smell of bacon while lathe'n..........


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## brino

Weldo said:


> Really it would be nice to have a dedicated oven for the shop.
> 
> Along those lines I wonder if an old dishwasher could be converted to recirculate parts washing fluid! Maybe disable the heater element and plug up the drain. It would need a filter I guess, or maybe not. Imagine putting a bunch of greasy parts in there, pushing a button and coming back in 45 minutes to nice clean parts!



It's more likely that I could fit a milling machine in the kitchen than an oven or dishwasher in my cramped shop.
But then you guys would all get all my tools for pennies per pound just after my funeral.....
-brino


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## Bamban

The fun of sheltering in place is about to begin. AR15 barrels R Us. The junior shooters will have plenty to burn in the next couple of years.


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## MrWhoopee

DavidR8 said:


> By lard, do you mean Crisco? As in flaky pie crust lard?



Ah, you kids!




*Lard oil* is the clear, colourless *oil* pressed from pure *lard* after it has been crystallized, or grained, at 7° C (45° F). It is used as a lubricant, in cutting *oils*, and in soap manufacture. The solid residue, *lard* stearin, is used in shortenings…


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## FOMOGO

MrWhoopee said:


> Ah, you kids!
> 
> As my daughter in law would say, no age shaming. As all us codgers know, the proper term is whipper snapper. Mike


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## Weldo

MrWhoopee said:


> *Lard oil* is the clear, colourless *oil* pressed from pure *lard* after it has been crystallized, or grained, at 7° C (45° F). It is used as a lubricant, in cutting *oils*, and in soap manufacture. The solid residue, *lard* stearin, is used in shortenings…



Hey thanks for clearing that up!  I've actually never found a good explanation of what lard oil even is.  As for me, I am indeed using bacon drippings.  Actually I think my latest batch was from the New Years pork roast.  I filtered it through some paper towels.  I was kind of worried about the salt content but now I don't think it's a problem, in fact it may be why my cutting lard never seems to go rancid...



pontiac428 said:


> "The tails follow" is the recommendation for link belt rotation.



In that case I think I did it right.  The links kind of look like arrows I guess and they point WITH direction of rotation.



Bamban said:


> The fun of sheltering in place is about to begin. AR15 barrels R Us. The junior shooters will have plenty to burn in the next couple of years.



What all you gotta do to 'em?  Chamber?  Profile outside?  They look pretty chunky for AR barrels!


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## Weldo

MrWhoopee said:


> *Lard oil* is the clear, colourless *oil* pressed from pure *lard* after it has been crystallized, or grained, at 7° C (45° F). It is used as a lubricant, in cutting *oils*, and in soap manufacture. The solid residue, *lard* stearin, is used in shortenings…



If I wanted to make lard oil could I just buy the tubba lard you pictured and press the crap out of it?  Would that yield me purified lard oil?

I've only ever found one place on the net that sells it, here but now I can't find it on their site.


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## Bamban

Weldo said:


> What all you gotta do to 'em?  Chamber?  Profile outside?  They look pretty chunky for AR barrels!



They are 1.005 straight so I can chamber them through the Jet 1024 headstock which has a limited spindle bore of 1-1/16.

Chamber, cut to finish at 20 for service rifle, turn the front end for the .750 gas block, drill/ream gas port, thread muzzle for flash hider, crown.

The 12.xxx inch long section inside the handguard will remain at 1.005.

These barrels will be used in service rifle high power competitions, at distances 200, 300 and 600. The adventurous ones, with the same 80 grain ammo, might try their hands at 1000.


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## Weldo

Cool!  And this is for a school team?


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## Skierdude

DavidR8 said:


> I'm working on my mill DRO project.
> Have the x and y axis done. Need to mount the display and put the table back on.



#MeToo - DRO install I mean. Got the display mounted - the easy part. Working on the Y axis next - the trickiest part.

We’re in lock down for 4 weeks here in New Zealand so hoping to get a few projects completed. I just hope I have the right materials available.

Keep safe everyone.

David P


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## DavidR8

Skierdude said:


> #MeToo - DRO install I mean. Got the display mounted - the easy part. Working on the Y axis next - the trickiest part.
> 
> We’re in lock down for 4 weeks here in New Zealand so hoping to get a few projects completed. I just hope I have the right materials available.
> 
> Keep safe everyone.
> 
> David P


Be great to see pics as you proceed.


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## MrWhoopee

Weldo said:


> If I wanted to make lard oil could I just buy the tubba lard you pictured and press the crap out of it?  Would that yield me purified lard oil?



You would have to try it. I'm not clear on whether the commercial lard is before or after pressing. 
The stuff is cheap enough.
Let us know.


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## Rootpass

This quarantine will be responsible for more DROs being installed than anything else. I finally mounted my Z axis using scrap aluminum pieces. The taper on the side of the mill is 2 degrees so I made an angle to put it the vise.


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## Weldo

Got some more work done!

Made a bunch of rags out of an old bath towel.  We all know the home shop runs on good rags!  I had to throw out my previous collection of rags.  They were all so filthy that the stuff I attempted to clean got even dirtier!




The cutting up of the towel led to the next thing, rehabbing the scissors!  These were my grandma's scissors she used exclusively for fabric and sewing work.  They must be at least 60 years old and in need of some attention.  Although even in this state they work very well.




Some rust had accumulated.




Here they are after half an hour of wire wheeling, sandpapering and scotchbrite.







They work so beautifully!  Even the sound of them is pleasant!  They'll cleanly cut a piece of toilet paper all the way to the tip of the blade.  Sweet!
*Disclaimer*  One square of toilet paper was sacrificed for testing...

Also I organized my grinding wheels.  They used to just sit on the top shelf in a pile but look at 'em now!




Tomorrow I may finally balance my bench grinder.  I picked up the Oneway kit a few months ago.


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## Bamban

Weldo said:


> Cool!  And this is for a school team?



No, TX State Junior Rifle Team.


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## Weldo

I see.  I saw junior and my mind went to "high school".

When chambering a barrel there's a lot to consider isn't there?  How deep the chamber goes can affect how accurate the gun will shoot and could even make it unsafe.

I seem to remember reading something about the tiny bit of free space in between the projectile and the rifling of the barrel.  Like if the bullet has to travel too far before it contacts the rifling, then accuracy can be affected negatively.  Gunsmith machining is definitely a whole nother world.  Lots of intricacies.


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## matthewsx

Weldo said:


> Got some more work done!
> 
> Made a bunch of rags out of an old bath towel.  We all know the home shop runs on good rags!  I had to throw out my previous collection of rags.  They were all so filthy that the stuff I attempted to clean got even dirtier!
> 
> View attachment 318039
> 
> 
> The cutting up of the towel led to the next thing, rehabbing the scissors!  These were my grandma's scissors she used exclusively for fabric and sewing work.  They must be at least 60 years old and in need of some attention.  Although even in this state they work very well.
> 
> View attachment 318040
> 
> 
> Some rust had accumulated.
> 
> View attachment 318041
> 
> 
> Here they are after half an hour of wire wheeling, sandpapering and scotchbrite.
> 
> View attachment 318042
> 
> 
> View attachment 318043
> 
> 
> They work so beautifully!  Even the sound of them is pleasant!  They'll cleanly cut a piece of toilet paper all the way to the tip of the blade.  Sweet!
> *Disclaimer*  One square of toilet paper was sacrificed for testing...
> 
> Also I organized my grinding wheels.  They used to just sit on the top shelf in a pile but look at 'em now!
> 
> View attachment 318044
> 
> 
> Tomorrow I may finally balance my bench grinder.  I picked up the Oneway kit a few months ago.



I love the basic stuff: Rags, grandma's scissors


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## mmcmdl

For a 61 YO dude , I did a lot today . Finished the pit . cut two lawns , started parting out the Cub , put down 50 lbs of grass seed , inquired about a back hoe for the bota , put some tiles in the upstairs bathroom , have all my cans ready to go the scrapper ( which is closed do to crono ) . Tomorrow I break out the chain saws and load the pit once again , Sun night was the first trial run which went great . Once Im assurd the chain saws are up to snuff , I'll get bck on the shop stuff .


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## mmcmdl

Todays adventures .


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## DavidR8

mmcmdl said:


> Todays adventures .



You’re rocking the 21st century phone! 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## mmcmdl

Once again I lose 3/4 s of the pictures . I will find them cuz their going onto CL .


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## mmcmdl

Tonight , I will be counting the change jar . I hope to come out with 3-4 Gs . I've scoped out a 28 ft trailer that would solve my problems short hand .


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## Bamban

Weldo said:


> I see.  I saw junior and my mind went to "high school".
> 
> When chambering a barrel there's a lot to consider isn't there?  How deep the chamber goes can affect how accurate the gun will shoot and could even make it unsafe.
> 
> I seem to remember reading something about the tiny bit of free space in between the projectile and the rifling of the barrel.  Like if the bullet has to travel too far before it contacts the rifling, then accuracy can be affected negatively.  Gunsmith machining is definitely a whole nother world.  Lots of intricacies.



Not any more intricate than other machining. It still boils down to Machining 101 - cutting to a dimension while maintaining set up and workholding integrity.


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## westerner

brino said:


> But then you guys would all get all my tools for pennies per pound just after my funeral.....


It seems every idea I come up with for a Q project ends up with the above as the final step....


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## westerner

And I do not mean to say THE BUG is what will get me


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## C-Bag

westerner said:


> It seems every idea I come up with for a Q project ends up with the above as the final step....


?????? 'cause your head will explode?


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## mmcmdl

The wife and kids are home .I am behaving , busting arse  . This is tractor time so this is the busy time for me . The dogs got off the leashes and damn near got run over . There is only so much you can do , cronos or not . I do what I do every year , this year is no different . 
Stay safe .


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## mikey

mmcmdl said:


> For a 61 YO dude , I did a lot today . Finished the pit . cut two lawns , started parting out the Cub , put down 50 lbs of grass seed , inquired about a back hoe for the bota , put some tiles in the upstairs bathroom , have all my cans ready to go the scrapper ( which is closed do to crono ) . Tomorrow I break out the chain saws and load the pit once again , Sun night was the first trial run which went great . Once Im assurd the chain saws are up to snuff , I'll get bck on the shop stuff .



I got tired just reading this, Dave! I think I remember that I had enough energy to do something like this once but I'm pretty sure it was farther back than 61 years old. You are an official badass old fart, I have to say!


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## Aukai

There are more important money making opportunities in the barn Dave...


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## C-Bag

mikey said:


> I got tired just reading this, Dave! I think I remember that I had enough energy to do something like this once but I'm pretty sure it was farther back than 61 years old. You are an official badass old fart, I have to say!


I used to work with a guy who's response to Dave's hyper productivity and their description was "are you bragging or complaining? " I feel like a total slug reading Dave's work list.


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## Downunder Bob

My current project is not actually in the shop, but I'm still using tools. My project is to fit a new lithium battery into my caravan. The battery is 120Ah. and has its own charging manager built in. I'm also fitting a 2000W sine wave inverter. Plus 320 W solar panels. 

I already have a 4Kva genset with electric start, which is built into an almost soundproof box. So when its all done I'll be pretty independent and can stop and camp almost anywhere. I also have 180 l of fresh water and 90l of grey water. I would like to have more water, but it's heavy and I'm getting close to max legal weight

Yes I know, pictures, I'll try to remember the camera next time I'm working on it. The trouble is I don't store the van at home, so if I forget anything when I go to work on it, it's a pain to have to come back to get it.


----------



## Weldo

@Downunder Bob that sounds like an awesome vehicle!

This morning I spent 2 hours cleaning and organizing the shop space.  Got a bunch more table space now!  Also I finally did my local taxes.  Then watched an hour long tutorial on Fusion 360.

Is this what retirement is like?  I freakin' love it!


----------



## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> @Downunder Bob that sounds like an awesome vehicle!
> 
> This morning I spent 2 hours cleaning and organizing the shop space. Got a bunch more table space now! Also I finally did my local taxes. Then watched an hour long tutorial on Fusion 360.
> 
> Is this what retirement is like? I freakin' love it!



Hah! 
Were you watching the video by Lars?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## Weldo

Yea that’s the one!  It was very good.

Did you notice he didn’t add the stops at the bottom of the female couplers on the box?  I’ll forgive it tho since it was just an intro lesson!


----------



## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> Yea that’s the one!  It was very good.
> 
> Did you notice he didn’t add the stops at the bottom of the female couplers on the box?  I’ll forgive it tho since it was just an intro lesson!


I did. I'm actually going to try and reproduce the drawing and see if I can get the same result.


----------



## Weldo

One thing that really made sense was how he described that you can add sketches to a plane or surface.  When I was crashing around on my own I figured out how to make a simple box but couldn't figure out how to add features to it.  Now I know you must select the face of the body you want to add features to, then create a sketch on that face to add features.

It really is a great tutorial!


----------



## Weldo

MrWhoopee said:


> You would have to try it. I'm not clear on whether the commercial lard is before or after pressing.
> The stuff is cheap enough.
> Let us know.



Just got done trying an experiment with lard.

I was attempting to obtain lard oil from lard.  I did a bunch of reading last night and the process by which you separate the waxy solid components from the liquid oil components of a fat is called winterizing or destearinating.  Here's an excerpt from Britannica Online...

"It is often desirable to remove the traces of waxes (_e.g.,_ cuticle wax from seed coats) and the higher-melting glycerides from fats. Waxes can generally be removed by rapid chilling and filtering. Separation of high-melting glycerides, or stearine, usually requires very slow cooling in order to form crystals that are large enough to be removed by filtration or centrifuging. Thus linseed oil may be winterized to remove traces of waxes that otherwise interfere with its use in paints and varnishes. Stearine may be removed from fish oils in order to separate the solid glycerides that would detract from its use in paints and alkyd resins. At the same time, fish stearine is more suitable than whole oil for edible purposes. Cottonseed and peanut oils may be destearinated to produce salad oils that remain liquid at low temperatures. Tallows and other animal fats may be destearinated for simultaneous production of hard fats (high in stearic acid content for special uses such as in making candles) and of liquid oil called oleo oil." (Britannica Online)

I also found some information and research papers about the formation of crystals in lard at various temperatures and the process by which they can be separated.  In case anyone is interested in the chemistry of lard...

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/34617334.pdf

As much as I could read before my eyes started crossing tells me that fat crystals form in certain sizes and at certain temperatures in lard.  To get lard oil you must separate out those crystals from the surrounding oil in which they are suspended.  If I interpreted the information correctly (up for debate) I figured I'd melt some lard, let it sit awhile til it cooled to about 18 degrees C then try to filter it through a coffee filter.

So I melted some, a few spoons, and set a thermometer in the melted lard for a while.  Of course I left it sit and forgot about it...

I remembered in time to catch it at 25 C.  It had already begun crystallizing and was the consistency of, maybe latex paint or a tiny bit thicker.  Maybe pudding.  Anyway it was still very soft, yet not liquid.  I tried to put some through a coffee filter but it would not pass through under gravity.

The bottom side of the filter did get coated with a very clear film of oil.  This may be what I'm looking for.  But as I tried to gently force the soft lard through the filter, some of the crystals were coming through.

Ultimately I think you'd need a much finer filter than the paper coffee variety and you'd have to force the soft lard through the filter with some kind of press.

All in all it was a bust but I learned more about lard than I ever wanted to know!

Oh!  I also tried dissolving some lard in acetone (about equal parts) and then filtering that through a coffee filter.  All it did was catch the lard in the filter and allow the acetone to seep through.  Not sure what I was expecting with that one.  Maybe the filtered acetone has a small amount of lard oil dissolved in it.  Then I suppose you could allow the acetone to evaporate off and be left with pure lard oil with no waxy solids?

That might be worth another try...


----------



## MrWhoopee

Weldo said:


> Just got done trying an experiment with lard....
> 
> That might be worth another try...



You are truly a man after my own heart. This sounds exactly like the sort of rabbit hole I would wander down just to see what's at the bottom.
I spent several days last summer exploring the possibilities for removing the sulfation from lead-acid battery plates. I was, of course, unsuccessful, but it was fun and quite educational. Currently playing with black oxide methods.


----------



## Weldo

Thanks!  Gotta keep busy somehow, right?!


----------



## MrWhoopee

Weldo said:


> Thanks!  Gotta keep busy somehow, right?!



Yes. My wife came home last night (she's still working). I thought I had cleaned up for the black oxiding so she wouldn't know. Yea, right. She wiped a clean rag across the kitchen counter and it came up black. She said I'm just like a kid, trying to get away with stuff while she's gone. I said thanks.


----------



## DavidR8

MrWhoopee said:


> Yes. My wife came home last night (she's still working). I thought I had cleaned up for the black oxiding so she wouldn't know. Yea, right. She wiped a clean rag across the kitchen counter and it came up black. She said I'm just like a kid, trying to get away with stuff while she's gone. I said thanks.


And this is why I'll never get away with using the oven to cure painted parts!


----------



## Weldo

Haha you just have to allow time for clean up!  Estimate the time you need to hide any evidence, then double it!  Safety factor!


----------



## Weldo

I’m still trying something with my lard experiment.  

I’ve got some lard in a jar with acetone and one with mineral spirits.  The acetone one dissolved easily but the mineral spirit one didn’t really react at all.

Gonna let it sit overnight and see what happens.


----------



## hman

I start with bacon grease.  Boil it and an equal volume of water for a while, stirring occasionally, to extract the salt.  Discard the water.  Then dissolve the lard in kerosene.  My cutting fluid of choice for aluminum.  A bit of the lard will separate out during colder days, but it still works well.


----------



## Weldo

Got some updates from the lard experiment.

Here's what they look like after and overnight soak.

Acetone is on the left and mineral spirits on the right.




In this short vid you can see the mineral spirit sample.  It still has some chunks undissolved.

View attachment Mineral Spirits Overnight.mp4


















I drew off the top clear layer of solvent and dumped the rest into a jar with two layers of coffee filter.




Next, the acetone.

Here's a quick video of the top layer consistency.  It's like a foam.

View attachment Acetone Top Layer.mp4


















I dumped the top layer into the same type of doubled up coffee filter.

View attachment Acetone Top Layer Filter.mp4


















Here's what was left on the bottom of the acetone sample.




I stirred it up to re-dissolve it.  This is what it was like yesterday just a few minutes after the lard was combined with the acetone.

View attachment Acetone Bottom Layer.mp4


















Here's all three samples I have.

Left is the top foamy layer of acetone, middle is the bottom soupy acetone and right is the mineral spirit sample.




A view of what's in the filters.  




I'll let them drip for a while and check them out later.  I'm starting to come to the conclusion that the manufacture of lard oil is outside the scope of the home shop.  At least with my limited knowledge...


----------



## Weldo

hman said:


> I start with bacon grease.  Boil it and an equal volume of water for a while, stirring occasionally, to extract the salt.  Discard the water.  Then dissolve the lard in kerosene.  My cutting fluid of choice for aluminum.  A bit of the lard will separate out during colder days, but it still works well.



That sounds like a good method.  It stays in liquid form because of the kerosene, I assume.  Kerosene and lard are both supposed to be good cutting fluids so combining them is kind of a win win.


----------



## devils4ever

Not to sideline this thread, but I just received a bunch of 1018 steel to keep me busy over the next few weeks. I've read that COVID-19 can live on hard surfaces for days. Is this safe to handle? Should I wait a few days? Should I spray them with something?

To stay with this thread, I just finished my mill stop that attaches to the mill table. Now, I'll start working on my vise version.


----------



## Weldo

Might not hurt to wash it all down with soap and water.  Wash your hands after moving them around.  Seems like the most likely place for the virus to live is on stuff that the general public touches a lot, like door handles, ATM machines, grab bars on the bus, stuff like that.  But you never know.  Maybe the guy at the steel yard had it, didn't know, and sneezed on your steel.  

Just to be safe wash it down and let it dry in the sun awhile.  Seems like the two things that kill it readily are soap and UV rays.


----------



## devils4ever

I'm a little afraid of rust using soap and water. Are there alternatives?


----------



## Weldo

As long as it dries quickly in the sun rust will be minimal.  You will probably get some very light flash rust.  You could wipe it all down with alcohol maybe.


----------



## Suzuki4evr

Rootpass said:


> I built an adapter for my cheap tool and cutter grinder to grind square lathe tools. I don’t have a dovetail cutter so I used a 60* countersink and then got into the corners with an 1/8” end-mill. It works very well and by widening the slot and adding set screws I can grind any size I need.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 317885
> View attachment 317886
> 
> View attachment 317887


Nice job. Any plans you would like to share? South Africa is also under lockdown from 24:00 tonight for 21 days. PLAYTIME in the shop.


----------



## devils4ever

I wonder if hydrogen peroxide would work and be better than soap and water?


----------



## Weldo

I think hydrogen peroxide is a very strong oxidizer of ferrous metals.  Maybe not at drug store concentrations though.  Not sure.


----------



## Low tech

devils4ever said:


> I'm a little afraid of rust using soap and water. Are there alternatives?


From the reports I’ve heard , the virus can live on hard or shiny surfaces for up to three days . Maybe just let the steel sit for three days .


----------



## FOMOGO

Living up to your handle Low tech, but that's what I've been doing here at home with delivery's. Everybody be safe out there. Mike


----------



## Weldo

Update on the lard experiment...  Total bust.

The solvent strained out and left the solid lard in the filters in all three cases.  The mineral spirit sample was the softest solid.

The solid lard left from the acetone was just like normal lard, solid at room temp, but smelled of acetone.  Some tiny particles remained floating in the filtered acetone but it's unclear if these were solid lard crystals or oil droplets.

So I think I'm done with chemistry for a while!  On to other stuff.


----------



## hman

You can pretty safely wipe down just about any surface with isopropyl alcohol.  I read an article recently about how to sanitize inside a car.  The article said that automakers use isopropyl for cleanup, so it's safe for surfaces inside the car


----------



## Winegrower

I am finding that an apocalypse really cuts down on interruptions in the shop.   It was an opportunity to knock out this simple aluminum box, it’s a single cell calorimeter for a science program I’m doing.   I drilled and bored out a 1.75” cavity with a flat bottom, with a milled channel underneath as a wire feed path.   It’s tapped at 5/16-18, and I used stainless thread inserts (not shown in this picture) for #8 screws.   This has to run at 350 degrees C, where the aluminum tends to stick to the screws without inserts.


----------



## Weldo

Here's a fun project!  Build a pop pop boat!

Here's a great website with very detailed instructions.






						Build a pop-pop boat.
					






					www.nmia.com
				




I built one a few years ago so it's not strictly a quarantine project but it did inspire me to play with it again!

Some pics.

I built mine with a diaphragm type boiler.  I forget where I got the idea but there's pretty much two types of boilers you can make with one of these.  The diaphragm type or the coil type.




The tubes are just some common 1/4" copper.




Here you can see the shape of the boiler.  It's a very shallow dish that was pounded out from some copper sheeting.  Two holes are drilled and the tubes are inserted and soldered such that they do not touch the diaphragm on top.




The diaphragm is made from a thinner piece of copper.  Think soda can thickness.  People have used soda can but I wasn't having luck soldering it.  I was lucky enough to find some really thin copper flashing tape at work.




It runs off of a tealight candle, though to get enough heat output I had to melt a few down and harvest the wicks to make a three wicked super candle!




To make it work you must first fill the boiler with water.  It's easiest to just take some water in your mouth and transfer it to one of the exhaust pipes.  When water comes out the other pipe hold your fingers over both pipes as you place it in the water.  Once the two outlets are below the water's surface the water will remain in the boiler.  Now you place the lit candle under the boiler.




Here's a quick video of it underway in the old laundry tub.  I need a bigger pool!

View attachment Pop Pop Boat.mp4


----------



## Weldo

Hey @Winegrower, how did you finish the bottom of the box?  Since you said you drilled it then bored it out, did you have to take some kind of final facing pass on the bottom surface?

Looks super cool by the way!  Custom made scientific instrument!


----------



## Winegrower

Weldo, thanks.  The process was to first drill a pilot drill, to a depth less than the finished cavity.   Say, a 1/2” drill.  Then, I used a center cutting 3/4” end mill, down to the final depth, leaving so far a flat bottom but still too small.   Then I have a 1.25” end mill, so I enlarged the hole to 1.25”, and milled down to the final depth.   This still maintained a flat bottom, now at 1.25” diameter.  Finally I used a boring head, boring out to 1.75”, and the boring bar leaves a flat bottom, presto it’s done.

Yes, it would have been easy with a 1.75” center cutting end mill, but no.  I could have skipped the drilling, but I did not have a center cutting end mill with deep enough cut, so I had to drill out the center.   The bottom is flat, but there is a small shallow depression in the center from the pilot drill.   Not important in this application.

The length of this answer reflects the ponderous thinking, trying to find tools and sequences that would work.   You guys who have every tool and know exactly where they are, are probably unfamiliar with this.


----------



## devils4ever

Low tech said:


> From the reports I’ve heard , the virus can live on hard or shiny surfaces for up to three days . Maybe just let the steel sit for three days .



Yeah, I think I'll let it be for a while before using it.


----------



## Weldo

Winegrower said:


> The length of this answer reflects the ponderous thinking, trying to find tools and sequences that would work.



Figuring out the set ups and especially the order of operations is definitely one of the hardest parts.


----------



## Weldo

Got my bench grinder all balanced up!  I used the kit from Oneway Manufacturing.  It's very well designed and easy to use.

Oneway Balancing Kits

The grinder has never run this smoothly and quietly.  First I balanced the wheels but then they were still running slightly eccentrically.  So I mounted each one on the lathe with a piece of 1/2" all thread in a collet chuck and faced them off with a dresser held in a tool holder on the carriage.  It trued them up very well.  Then I re-balanced and mounted the wheels.

Here's a few pictures of the tool rests I made a few months ago.  I don't really like the design, it's kind of hard to adjust.















I also took a quick video of the grinder running!  It used to walk all over the place if not clamped down.  I plan to use this for grinding HSS bits only and I don't really have space in the shop to mount it permanently so not having to clamp it down every time I bring it out to use it is wonderful.

View attachment Balanced Grinder.mp4


----------



## devils4ever

Well, I decided not to wait because I wanted to use the steel stock today. 

So, I washed, rinsed, dried, and WD-40'ed all my steel stock. I have to say that the stock was filthy. I knew it was dirty, but I never guessed how bad it was. In any case, I guess it okay to use now and hopefully the WD-40 will prevent any rust. It was a lot of work!


----------



## Weldo

You should be fine with that.  Was it square tubes?  They are notoriously filthy with some heavy black oil.


----------



## Weldo

Well here's a prime example of what happens when you have too much time on your hands...

You spend over an hour making tiny parts that you could easily purchase for pennies from almost any store in the country.

I needed some snap swivels for model rocket parachutes.  I had a few swivels but no snaps so I got to work!

Here was my inspiration, mostly the big silver one.




The three on the left are made from 0.030" stainless MIG wire. The two on the right are made from an old DIY fishing spinner kit. The idea is that you'd take a swivel wire like on the far right there and add some beads, spoons and a treble hook at the end to make your own lures. The wire is brass. 




Close up of the stainless ones. The left was the first one I did and the right is the last.  The middle one is like that cousin you have that "Ain't quite right."  I've named it Cletus.  The last one is pretty good.




Overall they came out well. Ultimate strength is quite strong.  Easily strong enough for a small model rocket.  They don't spring open very well though since the wire is not a hardened spring steel.

These are the brass wire ones from the spinner kit. They seem strong enough but are even less springy than the stainless ones. 




This was an exercise in patience I'll tell ya! All I used were two pairs of small needle nose pliers and some side cutters.


----------



## Weldo

Knocked out another small one!

I've been working on a straight edge for my old Whitney bench shear for a while.  I made a bar, drilled and tapped the shear and picked up some shoulder bolts.  Unfortunately between inaccuracies from the hole drilling, when the bar was bolted on it was well out of square. 

It was maybe 3/16" out of square over 6 inches.  I didn't feel like grinding it so I used the milling attachment on the lathe.  I just worked to a scribed line, no indication at all.

As far as milling set ups go this is probably in the "Do not do" section of the machinist handbook.  Because i had such limited cross slide travel I had to let over half the part float out in space with no support.  It actually went very well though.  I took very light cuts.




This is what I was aiming for.  Straight edge guide for the shear.




The bar has a tiny bit of play when bolted on.  Even though I used shoulder bolts and reamed the holes to 0.375".  After it snugged it onto the shear I started making test cuts in some 16ga scrap, making micro adjustments with a dead blow hammer.




It came in pretty darned close to perfect!




Youtuber This Old Tony made a similar modification to a bench shear where he milled the shear body down and made a nice perfectly flat table to hold the stock you're cutting.  I like the idea but I don't have the equipment to make that cut.  In my case the shear body tapers downward slightly to the left as you stand in front of it.  It'd be nice if it were flat though.


----------



## C-Bag

You are really keepin' busy Weldo! Good job. I have 3 grinders. A 6" carbide grinder copy of a Baldor and a Jet 6" with a wire wheel and MultiTool. Those are mounted to my work station toolbox. My 8" bench grinder that I did the Oneway balance on doesn't have a permanent place and the tool rests on it are horrible. But it's great for roughing in tool bits. I'm thinking of a base plate with one of the Harold Hall type tool rest like this one and doing like you and clamping to a bench when needed but in storage otherwise.


----------



## Weldo

Thanks man!  These are all things I've been wanting to do for a while.  When this quarantine is over my little workshop is gonna be standin' tall!

I'd actually like to have another bench grinder too.  I want one set up with a wire on one side and a cloth buffing wheel on the other.  It would come in handy a lot I think.

That rest design looks cool.  Kind of complicated but very easily adjustable.  I never considered a rest that doesn't bolt to the grinder itself.  That frees up many design constraints!


----------



## C-Bag

I agree, I don't think I'd need the micro adjusters that rest has. 

I'd never done any buffing/polishing before so was not sure I'd need it until I decided to modify my cheap HF body hammers. I happened upon a kit MultiTool sells that includes something I'd never heard of, a felt polishing belt. It has several different grits of belts and disk's along with different rouge sticks for the belt. That MultiTool has turned out to be a very handy and versatile unit. I took the cheap body hammer and radiused the face and sides of the face with the grit belts then used the felt belt to polish it. I was shocked how good it came out. It's super quick and easy to change belts on the MultiTool. A before and after.


----------



## Weldo

Cool!  Got any pics or info on that thing?  I mainly wanted access to a buffer of some sort for sharpening stuff like chisels and knives.  A polished edge is about the finest edge you can get.


----------



## C-Bag

I assume you mean the kit? The MultiTool is just a bolt on belt sander with a disk as seen on the box. Pricey now but not when I bought it originally.


----------



## C-Bag

I took off the tool rest/table off the disk sander part because it was not very easy to adjust and was not all that useful.


----------



## Weldo

I see.  Thanks.


----------



## Weldo

I just found their website.  I don't think I have need of the machine part since I have a belt sander, but their site is a great source of belts!

My sander takes 2" x 48" belts and most places want to sell you a pack of 10 belts all the same grit.  On Multi-Tool's site you can buy individuals and mix and match.  Not to mention that polishing belt, I'm eyeing that up now!


----------



## C-Bag

When I bumbled on to mine it was a floor model in the welding shop I used to frequent and they were closing it out. My old HF grinder had given up the ghost so why not? I was thinking I'd stand it up the belt but as I used it I realized it was more useful like it was. Having access to the platen, the radius of the rubber drum and the unsupported belt underneath was not what I was used to but I wouldn't change it now. The drawback is the 2x36 belt is not a popular size so it's a little proprietary but with this kit it's expanded its usefulness. I use the wire brush and sanding disk more than the belt but it literally takes 2sec to change and track the belt so I don't even leave the belts on it and just install one as needed.


----------



## eugene13

I got this mag base cheap because the rod was missing.  I made a socket that is bolted to the base and the 3/8 rod is held in place with two 8-32 set screws.  The material I used was the last piece of some free machining steel that I picked up st the drop shop.


----------



## Weldo

Nice!  It’s always great to get a deal.  When you can make your own parts and components you can search for “as is” stuff!


----------



## C-Bag

I finally got all the details caused by inexperience and making do with what I have worked out. And finally got to do a test cut on my radius cutter/ball turner. I decided to rounding the end of a 1" shaft would be the easiest to try it out. I still have to tweek the cutter profile a bit, but it seems to work good.


----------



## Weldo

Lookin good, man!  Did you do a thread about your build by chance?


----------



## C-Bag

Thanks.

Nope, the only pics are what I'vegot are in this thread. I guess I was embarrassed how long it took me, not to mention I wasn't sure I'd not massively miscalculated and just made a bunch of shiny scrap.


----------



## Weldo

Yea sometimes it goes that way.  Looks great now though!


----------



## C-Bag

I have two ways of doing projects,down and dirty and as nice as possible. With things so quiet and time on my hands I decided to do as nice a job as possible with all I've learned here and YouTube. What Jere Kirkpatrick's BT had that I really like was the pivot offset closer to the work. It solved the insetting of the pivot bolt and made for a clean install on the crosslide. I'd bought the 1/2x4x12 base plate over a year ago. So I cut it in half so thats why I had the kinda before and after shot of it and the finished plate. 

The big takeaway from Jere's design and sage words indeed, was you figure the dia stock you want to do and make everything clear. I wanted to be able to make die's for my beader and they are around 2.25. He also had a long handle on his and I used one of my drill press handles for that since I've taken them off my mill/drill. I've used one for the tailstock quick clamp I adapted on my 9x20 getting rid of the bolt clamp. The other novel idea I took was how to measure accurately the radius. He used a little aluminum angle he bolts in place that's on center with the pivot and measures to the cutter. I went simple and made a score across the centerline and use a small square to measure. I realized he must have a "real lathe" probably atleast 12x36 because mine looks bigger than the ones I've seen on 9x20's. The one piece I copied size wise was the pivot and his was 3" which I happened to have a big chunk of. Works and doesn't chatter which was a major concern along with clearance.


----------



## Diecutter

Does the offset towards the spindle  also give you extra turning capacity? I'm just finishing a bt derived from Steve Bedair's  plans which does not have an offset.  This is the first one I have seen with an offset and I like it. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## C-Bag

I'm not sure it makes it have more turning capacity than the Bedair BT. I know I looked at it years ago when I was trying to get ideas but can only find one by another guy. I like the offset because it made sense to me. Check out Jere Kirkpatrick's you tube channel, that's where I got the idea.

 Even though I'd never done any ball turning and on the 9x20 it sets it to the front of the carriage where the support is. Mine is way beefier than the one I saw on the Bedair page and because the pivot is so big it can support the cutter out to almost 4" radius so I guess in that respect it has more capacity. But it can't swing 4" over the pivot in convex/ball mode but in concave mode might. Dunno, this is all new to me.


----------



## cascao

Well, that my first COVID project










Not know the name in english. It's for keeping door from closing with wind


----------



## Tio Loco

Showing my age to quote Red Skelton: '_Busier than a setting hen in a doorknob factory_'

My humble take on a ball turner:  https://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/radius-turner-from-boring-bar.83317/

Whipped up a grinding station to get all of the grit away from the lathe. The casters allow it to be swiveled 180° for access to the Tormek and the Proxxon miter saw.




Dug out the 3D printer, installed a new nozzle and throat, re-routed wiring into a cable chain, and re-calibrated everything.




Then printed an AXA indicator mount.




Personally, I'm extremely thankful for my little hobby shop. I cannot imagine quarantining in an apartment.


----------



## C-Bag

Like all your projects. I looked at the boring head BT design and thought it was cool but wasn't sure about the cutter. I like your solution with the round carbide, never seen that before. Didn't know about those. I also like the workstation and everything in my cramped shop is mobile workstations including my work benches. I feel you get more use being able to access all sides. I also do the wire shelves for the mobility and that they don't accumulate schmootz on them. I'm also grateful for my cramped shop and being useful helps me keep my anxiety down.


----------



## C-Bag

cascao said:


> Well, that my first COVID project
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Not know the name in english. It's for keeping door from closing with wind


Nice! It has a very complicated name in English......door stop  I thought this was the first of a large scale chess set, never would have thought it a door stop.


----------



## Weldo

Hey @C-Bag where did you get the plans for the ball turner?  You have me curious now!  Although I confess to not knowing what you mean when you say one design has an offset and the other design does not.  To what exactly are you referring?

@cascao that thing looks awesome!  How did you do the color?



Tio Loco said:


> Personally, I'm extremely thankful for my little hobby shop. I cannot imagine quarantining in an apartment.



This.  For sure.  We are all blessed with some work space no matter how small and the tools/skills to keep busy.

Also to @Tio Loco, how does the indicator holder fare against the wedge of the toolpost?  Do you have to be ginger with it?


----------



## Weldo

I changed the oil in my truck this morning.  Greased the U joints and cleaned the windshield.  New wipers even!

With the truck squared away it was time to hit the shop!  I had this broken bicycle pump since last summer.  A friend was tossing it and said it still worked.  I can work with that!

You can see the broken base.  I removed the gauge and hose for ease of working.




I was considering welding a plate to the bottom but it turned out to be pot metal.  So I had to use fasteners somehow.




I cut out a piece of aluminum bar with a 10" chop saw and sanded to shape.  Then I clamped the pump base to the plate and drilled pilot holes through both at once so the locations should be exact.

After pilots I opened up the holes in the base to 11/32" and drilled the plate to 0.257" for 5/16-18 threads.




It worked out pretty well!  I also figured out that the pump body was threaded to the base.  I removed it to drill the holes on the drill press.  Also lately I've been starting taps in the drill press.  Not under power, but I'll chuck up the tap and turn the chuck by hand, holding down pressure lightly with my other hand. Once the tap slips in the chuck I un-chuck and finish by hand.




Seems to work!


----------



## C-Bag

I don't generally use plans. I gather ideas looking at others builds or commercial samples. I don't know if there is a name for what I call the pivot. It's the round thing the cutter and handle mount to that rotates the cutter in order to cut the radii. All the similar type of BT I've seen the pivot when mounted would be in the center of carriage.


----------



## Tio Loco

@Weldo, seems pretty solid. I didn't crank down on it full bore as that's not necessary, it just needs enough pressure to hold it stable. I printed this with 20% infill, based on Blondihacks notes in her version. This is a different version which seems a bit more flexible as to what indicator can be used.

If you wanted to make it super strong, you could up the infill. I think at 100%, Cura was projecting a 19hr. print vs 4hr. at 20%. Here's an aborted print (forgot to add supports) at 20%


----------



## Logan 400

My wife has a yard art fan that had a 7/16 shaft rod to support it. Every time the wind blew more than 10 mph she would have to stand it up again. This is the new stand and wife is happy.
Jay


----------



## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> I don't generally use plans. I gather ideas looking at others builds or commercial samples. I don't know if there is a name for what I call the pivot. It's the round thing the cutter and handle mount to that rotates the cutter in order to cut the radii. All the similar type of BT I've seen the pivot when mounted would be in the center of carriage.



Oh I see what you're sayin'.  You design hangs the cutter out over the carriage to get a bit closer to the spindle, right?  As long as your mounting plate is pretty thick and rigid you should be fine with a little cantilever.  What's the benefit of the offset?

Thanks for that pic @Tio Loco!  I always assumed 3D printed parts are solid plastic but it makes a lot of sense to use internal ribbing like that.  I've never dabbled in that world yet so I'm very uninformed about it.


----------



## C-Bag

The main reason I went with the offset was I wanted to use 3/8" shoulder bolt for the pivot so it would be precise and heavy duty. The head on a shoulder bolt is thick and huge so if I was going to counter sink it would have totally messed up the shoulder bolt idea as I would have needed a thicker base plate and would have had to make the pivot and cutter mount shorter to maintain clearance and who knows what else. I think that's why Jere did it. Simple fixes for a simple guy.


----------



## cascao

It was painted black.


----------



## Weldo

cascao said:


> It was painted black.



I see.  In the picture it looks kind of like blue anodizing.  Nice work either way, that piece looks cool!


----------



## plunger

Today because S Africa is in lock down I did some plumbing from home. Another plumber put four shower mixers to deep in the wall and cant get the covers on. It means he has to chop all four showers out and repipe and retile. 
I came up with an easier solution. I extended the diverters for him by making extensions to the spindle.It involved making some adapters which I single pointed and then it involved some broaching to make splines. I had to make an female and male broach.
It can only be fitted once the lockdown is over. Hopefully there will be an economy left.


----------



## plunger

This is what the broaches look like.


----------



## plunger

The final product will look like this . This is not the actual job but gives you an idea what I did .


----------



## Weldo

Nice job, brother!  That type of thinking outside the box can save big money for someone.  Just make sure you charge for your shop time!  Figure out what it would cost to demo, re plumb, and re tile, then charge a few dollars less than that.


----------



## Weldo

Fixed the limp handle on my screen door today!

The spring inside broke and the handle went floppy a few days ago.  Since I've got time...

Here it is extracted from the aluminum screen door.




See the broken spring?  It's supposed to be a coil or two longer than this.




I don't have any compression type springs, only tension ones.  So I found one with a similar diameter and stretched it out some.




The spring threads through the opening and toward the handle.




Introduce a bit of preload and nip off the excess.  You may notice some grinding marks on the stamped metal part.  Probably 18 years ago one of the ears broke off and I welded it back on.




Back home.




Screwed onto the door, before the escutcheons go on.




It was a little weaker than the old spring.  I could use a heavier gauge probably.

View attachment door handle.mp4



















It actually tightened up a little with the escutcheon plates on.  Introduces a little more preload I guess.

View attachment door handle 02.mp4


















Job done!


----------



## Weldo

Did a little lathe maintenance today as well.

I've been unhappy with the gear mesh for the power feeds on my old Atlas.  The selector has an adjustable plate such that when I adjust it to a good mesh for the left carriage feed the right carriage feed just barely meshes at all.  This has led me to rarely use the "right traveling" power feed.  This isn't really a big deal but unfortunately the right carriage feed is also the cross slide "in" feed so I rarely used that either.

What I had to do was make a new plate with new holes so that I had good mesh in both settings.  The old plate is on the bottom
and my newly made one is on top.  Mine has no adjustment possible but since I drilled the holes to allow for good mesh I don't think it will matter.




Here's the old one mounted.  The screws are not in but you get the idea.  Notice on the above pic how my new holes are spread farther apart from center.  I'm guessing this is because of wear in the gears.  I'm sure when it was new the old plate was just fine.




I couldn't really get a good pic of the gear mesh but the way I set them both was to bottom out the teeth using the selector then back off a bit so they had some little bit of backlash.

It seem to run well.  All the feeds work and now I can use all the feeds without worrying about gears slipping or striping out.

What do you guys like for lubing gears?  I heard automotive gear lube is good, the 90W to 140W variety.  I didn't have any so I smeared some heavy grease on 'em.


----------



## eugene13

this is some good stuff, keep it coming.


----------



## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> Did a little lathe maintenance today as well.
> 
> I've been unhappy with the gear mesh for the power feeds on my old Atlas.  The selector has an adjustable plate such that when I adjust it to a good mesh for the left carriage feed the right carriage feed just barely meshes at all.  This has led me to rarely use the "right traveling" power feed.  This isn't really a big deal but unfortunately the right carriage feed is also the cross slide "in" feed so I rarely used that either.
> 
> What I had to do was make a new plate with new holes so that I had good mesh in both settings.  The old plate is on the bottom
> and my newly made one is on top.  Mine has no adjustment possible but since I drilled the holes to allow for good mesh I don't think it will matter.
> 
> View attachment 318973
> 
> 
> Here's the old one mounted.  The screws are not in but you get the idea.  Notice on the above pic how my new holes are spread farther apart from center.  I'm guessing this is because of wear in the gears.  I'm sure when it was new the old plate was just fine.
> 
> View attachment 318972
> 
> 
> I couldn't really get a good pic of the gear mesh but the way I set them both was to bottom out the teeth using the selector then back off a bit so they had some little bit of backlash.
> 
> It seem to run well.  All the feeds work and now I can use all the feeds without worrying about gears slipping or striping out.
> 
> What do you guys like for lubing gears?  I heard automotive gear lube is good, the 90W to 140W variety.  I didn't have any so I smeared some heavy grease on 'em.


Just say no to grease! It attracts and worse, retains chips which can lead to premature wear. I use 75wt gear lube on my SB. Seems to be fine. And I have several quarts of it due to my moto having a shaft drive.


----------



## Weldo

In the past I've just squirted on some motor oil but I think the gears demand more protection than that.  I'll have to search for some heavy gear oil.


----------



## dlane

A while back someone gave me this mag drill with a dead mag , doing a little cleaning I found a electromagnet that was a little bigger magnet than the original. Called the manufacturer and it is a 300 watt with a 2000 lb breakaway, made a 1/2” adapter plate mounted it to the drill ,  turned it on on the welding table and it moved the table around without the mag moving at all , it’s a heavy table.   Popped a 1 1/2” hole in some 1/2” plate like it was butter. Things a beast. The pics 
Are the old mag, the new one is 2” wider and 3” longer , I think it’ll work out.


----------



## Weldo

Nice drill!  I used to work for a weldshop that had an old Milwaukee mag drill, boy did it come in handy.  I dare say that you can do things with it that might be impossible otherwise.  Cutting an 1-1/2" hole in 1/2" plate with a hand drill and hole saw would probably take twice as long and require ten times the effort.  Not to mention the safety issue.  Many a guy has gotten a tweaked wrist from a 1/2" electric hand drill.  And broken bits too!

Good score!


----------



## C-Bag

I live for fixing and using old tools. Not a restoration guy because once I get in the weeds trying to restore I usually lose steam and it becomes a basket case. One of my better hand tool fixes was somebody gave my FIL an old Rockwell hand held bandsaw with a broken blade guide rest. It was my first project on a mill at the place I was working at. Still have the old bandsaw and it's not something I use everyday but when I need it, it's saved the day too many times.


----------



## macardoso

Custom MT2 Arbor for a big boy 28mm Kennametal drill. Took about 8 hours over a week. Back to my steam engine next


----------



## Weldo

That drill is bonkers!  Definitely a nice tool.  And the holder is beautiful!  How'd you get such a fine finish?

I even like the drawing!  I've been delving into CAD learning lately, what program did you use for that drawing?  It looks great!


----------



## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> I live for fixing and using old tools.



Cleaning up and fixing old tools is pretty cool.  I spent a few months restoring my lathe years ago.  Did an old Whitney No.38 bench shear that came out nicely.  I've been eyeing up a manual notcher too lately.  Something like this would be cool to have.




I really like the old manual metalworking machines.


----------



## Weldo

I just added a fence to my belt sander.   Should help with squaring up small parts.




It looks off in the pic but it's just a shadow, I swear!


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> I really like the old manual metalworking machines


Me too. I picked up a Beverly BT2 throatless shear off CL. Always wanted one after using one in aircraft school. It was in good shape but just got around to sharpening the blades and adjusting them. Cuts scary good now. The only bad thing about a throatless is there isn't really a way to mount a fence on it like yours. I also have looked at a corner shear but the ones like in your pic ate too much $$$ for me. There was one that was a Whitney corner portable one that was $80 and I decided I couldn't justify it. My goto is my HF 3in1. I know it's not revered but I find mine useful.


----------



## Weldo

The cool thing about the throatless is that you can cut pretty much any compound curve.  S curves or inside corners, outside corners, it's a really versatile shear, and the Beverly is the best out there.

I like the manual machines since they are so compact for the work they do.  An electric/hydraulic machine would take up significant space in my tiny workshop, but on the flip side it would likely be able to cut more than 16ga.

I was wondering how the manual machines are rated.  For example little finger brakes like this are usually rated no more than 16ga...




But I assume that's a full width piece.  Would a machine like this be able to do 1/8" sheet if it were only say 3" wide?  Or maybe even 1/4" if it were only a 1" flat bar?  I've always wondered about that.  The light duty of some hand machines limit their usefulness, but what are they _really _capable of?


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> That drill is bonkers! Definitely a nice tool. And the holder is beautiful! How'd you get such a fine finish?
> 
> I even like the drawing! I've been delving into CAD learning lately, what program did you use for that drawing? It looks great!



It certainly is. Need to find some large diameter scrap steel and let her rip!

I finished all the surfaces with a VCGX insert tool and a very fine feed. That is a ground insert and gives excellent surface finish, even in normally crummy materials like 1018. I hit it with a quick wipe of an ultra-fine scotch brite pad (grey) and some WD40 to bring up the luster. I wouldn't even call it polishing.

I use Autodesk Inventor. It is free to anyone using it for non-commercial education purposes (including self-education) in 3 year renewable licenses. I drew the holder in 3D (took maybe 20 min) and then used the drawing feature in the program to create the projections and sections, and add the annotations. Took maybe an hour total including tweaking the dimensions. The entire drawing is adaptive so if I go change the length of a part of the holder, the whole model and associated drawing update automatically.

I use the program at work too, although my drawings there are much more polished. This drawing was just a quick sheet with notes for myself.


----------



## Weldo

Cool thanks for the info!  I recently downloaded Fusion 360 and had fun playing around with it but my laptop can barely run it properly.  How does Inventor compare to Fusion 360?


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> The cool thing about the throatless is that you can cut pretty much any compound curve.  S curves or inside corners, outside corners, it's a really versatile shear, and the Beverly is the best out there.
> 
> I like the manual machines since they are so compact for the work they do.  An electric/hydraulic machine would take up significant space in my tiny workshop, but on the flip side it would likely be able to cut more than 16ga.
> 
> I was wondering how the manual machines are rated.  For example little finger brakes like this are usually rated no more than 16ga...
> 
> View attachment 319060
> 
> 
> But I assume that's a full width piece.  Would a machine like this be able to do 1/8" sheet if it were only say 3" wide?  Or maybe even 1/4" if it were only a 1" flat bar?  I've always wondered about that.  The light duty of some hand machines limit their usefulness, but what are they _really _capable of?


I agree, 16ga whole width but way more in short pieces. Even that 3n1 can do some heavy pieces in short widths. For heavy stuff I use my plasma and cut the bend lines with uncut tabs then it's easy to bend. If I'm worried about the little gaps between the tabs I can mig them closed but most times when hit with a sanding disk and cleaned up they look just fine to my eye. Did a lot of really fancy fabricating when doing specialized delivery shutes when I was fabricating machinery in the orange processing houses.


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> Cool thanks for the info!  I recently downloaded Fusion 360 and had fun playing around with it but my laptop can barely run it properly.  How does Inventor compare to Fusion 360?



Inventor is the big brother of Fusion. It has more features and is a direct tier competitor to Solidworks. I've used them both professionally and each has pros over the other. I did not like Fusion after my first foray into it, however I think I could get used to it with time. Inventor is much more powerful when it comes to taking your models and turning them into drawings or presentations (which is 90% of what I do at work) and has quite a few modeling and simulation features that fusion doesn't.

Fusion does seem to have a bigger hobby following with tutorials and such, however there is a lot of inventor content out there, and the modeling process is more or less the same between the two packages. 

If you do hobby work then I would recommend Inventor under an education license, but it is expensive to license as a professional.


----------



## Weldo

Ah the slotting of the bend line is a great trick!  Especially if you have access to a plasma.  

Have you seen magnetic bending brakes?  That's some cool stuff there!  I don't have a good way to bend metal right now so every now and then I lok around at options.


----------



## Weldo

macardoso said:


> If you do hobby work then I would recommend Inventor under an education license,



Right on, thanks again.  I'll look into it.  I'm probably gonna have to replace my laptop before the year is up, it's getting slower and slower.  I'd like to get a laptop that can hang with Fusion or Inventor.  It takes the wind out of my sails when it takes 10 minutes to load the program and every action I try to do has lag.


----------



## macardoso

I have an older verison of this laptop. It has an i7 and 32Gb of RAM. It has absolutely no issue with even large Inventor assemblies with thousands of parts.

Actually that's another good point. Inventor is really good for creating large assemblies (I have one of my CNC G0704 with every screw shown).


----------



## Weldo

I was actually looking at HP Omens a few days ago.  You can get them way souped up but they get pricey!

Most likely Fusion would be adequate for what I would get into.  I'll still check out Inventor but I'm unlikely to need/understand 99% of what it can do!


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> Ah the slotting of the bend line is a great trick!  Especially if you have access to a plasma.
> 
> Have you seen magnetic bending brakes?  That's some cool stuff there!  I don't have a good way to bend metal right now so every now and then I lok around at options.


Not even heard of magnetic brakes but I'm not in the fab world anymore and 80% of what I did was in the field during an install. 

I'm not sure of where I got the tab cut idea but it was certainly out of necessity. I don't think you could do those kinds of tab cuts without a plasma. We had a small plasma and mig that I did all my field fab with and I loved that setup so much I copied it for my small home shop. All my stuff is geared for the lighter end so my little Hypertherm 350 and Lincoln 175T work perfectly and can do heavier work but fit on one old small HF cart. The only example of that kind of tab cut is the front cover I replaced the old plastic cover on the front of my RF30 when I put a DRO on it.


----------



## Weldo

Magnetic brakes are pretty neat.   In the pic below the red bar on top gets magnetized to the body underneath and that's the hold down for your work piece.  Pretty small form factor but lots of creative ways to use it.




In this pic you can see the little blue piece is used as a small hold down and a small closed shape can be bent.  There's even demos out there on Youtube of using a piece of steel pipe or round bar as a hold down and bending nice radii.  In thinner stuff of course.






C-Bag said:


> All my stuff is geared for the lighter end so my little Hypertherm 350 and Lincoln 175T work perfectly and can do heavier work but fit on one old small HF cart.



The Lincoln 175 is a nice size.  I only have a 135 and I question it's ability to make a solid weld in anything over 1/8" steel.  Maybe 3/16" with flux core.  I've done welds in 1/4" with the flux core but I don't think I'd trust it with anything super critical.  Plasma is a nice thing to have as well.  I only have an oxy-acetylene setup but it's versatile with the ability to weld, cut and heat.

Your part in the picture looks very nice.  Good tight bends.

Another good trick for getting tight bends in thinner sheet is to score along your bend line with a cut-off wheel.  I've done that in 16ga with great results.  Score about halfway through the thickness of the sheet and bend towards the score so you can't see it on the outside corner.  It works in thicker stock as well but you end up having to grind a V groove because the thicker material will have to meet up like a miter if you bend into the score.  You can bend away from the score but then you'd have to weld it for a good appearance.


----------



## tjb

mmcmdl said:


> Todays adventures .


You call that a 'burn pit'?  Here's a burn pit.  This one was easily 50 feet long/15 feet tall.  Burned 3 days.  Just buried the remnants this morning.  Did the first one about a week ago - just a little smaller than this one.





Regards,
Terry


----------



## C-Bag

That mag brake certainly is nice. I would think mucho $$$, no? Have to check out the vids. The "score with cutoff wheel" was standard practice until I got around a plasma. My favorite plasma cutting jig was a long piece of 3/8" keystock and two welding magnets to hold it in place. I have a notch in the end of my cheap 6" trisquare that I keep in my apron that is the setback of the plasma nozzle. Set notch on the cutline and bump the key up to the side of the trisquare rule and dead on. I also have a small set of OA which I use to weld and braze with. I'm ok with the OA cutting head but not as good as plasma.

The 135 is a good machine. Used a 100 110v with flux core and was surprised. I actually went in to buy a 100 at Home Depot because that all the $$ I had and they had the 175T in the slot where the 100 was supposed to be. I went and got a sales person and they looked everywhere and couldn't find a 100 so they gave me the 175 for the same price! Talk about floored. Here I'd talked myself out of the 175.


----------



## pontiac428

$3300 gets you in the door.






						Box and Pan Brake for Sale with 16 Gauge Mild Steel Maximum | Baileigh Industrial
					

The BB-4816M box and pan brake at Baileigh Industrial has a maximum capacity of 16 gauge mild steel. Make enclosed boxes, triangles, and more with this machine!




					www.baileigh.com


----------



## C-Bag

pontiac428 said:


> $3300 gets you in the door.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Box and Pan Brake for Sale with 16 Gauge Mild Steel Maximum | Baileigh Industrial
> 
> 
> The BB-4816M box and pan brake at Baileigh Industrial has a maximum capacity of 16 gauge mild steel. Make enclosed boxes, triangles, and more with this machine!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.baileigh.com


Woa, oooook......pass...


----------



## hman

I decided this would be a good time to do some plumbing and electrical work in my shop.





OK, April Fool!  It's based on an image I've seen on the interwebs a few times.  Here's what the sink looked like before the "improvement."


----------



## Cooter Brown

pontiac428 said:


> $3300 gets you in the door.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Box and Pan Brake for Sale with 16 Gauge Mild Steel Maximum | Baileigh Industrial
> 
> 
> The BB-4816M box and pan brake at Baileigh Industrial has a maximum capacity of 16 gauge mild steel. Make enclosed boxes, triangles, and more with this machine!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.baileigh.com




Don't buy any thing that Baileigh makes its all cheap chinesium and breaks right in the middle of the job when you need it most....

Their mill drill is trash, the hand wheels break, the motor is crap and eats capacitors almost weekly..... New out of box about .004" spindle run out..

Their 220v slip roll is garbage it loosens up and the rollers move making all the parts wrong..... We had to weld it to stop it from moving.....

Their 110v tube bender is the worst one I have ever used.

Their 6Ft box brake exploded on us while folding 18Ga aluminum sheet metal.... lol


----------



## Weldo

Wow, quite the review!  This is one of the reasons that I like the old machines.  I think it's really awesome when a machine has "Rockford, Illinois" cast right into the iron body, versus that little silver foil sticker that says "Made in China"


----------



## Weldo

I started another small project yesterday.  I'm trying to make a strap wrench.  I got a design idea from a recent oxtoolco YouTube Video where he restores an old level.

This is his wrench.  The handle threads into the head to capture the strap.







This is my interpretation of it.  I just drew up a quick sketch on the old Auto PAD.





Cut out all the parts and cleaned them up.  This is the rough layout.





In retrospect I'm not sure why I chose to make the 1-1/4" square plate and not just weld the side plates directly to the nut.  But I began by drilling a 3/4" hole in the square bottom plate.





One of the best things I ever did was mill small slots in my drill press vise.  Super handy.





Drilling such a big hole on my small press is kinda hairy.  It only goes down to 620 rpm so I stepped up many times to make light cuts.  It's a little off center but not critical for this job.





Tacked it to the nut.





Here I began welding up the main body.







Now I tacked the nut to the body.  The aluminum bar is just a test thread I made a few months ago.  My first lathe thread actually!  I didn't make it to any specs, just kinda winging it to get a feel for the process.  It is the same thread as the nut but it's not formed properly so it's really tight going in.  This would be my undoing...




Part two coming up!


----------



## Weldo

As mentioned before, the aluminum thread is pretty snug going in.  I wanted test out the concept before I welded everything together so I figured if I force the thread into the nut it'll grind in its own clearance.  Brilliant, right?  We all know what happens to tight fitting aluminum parts in steel, it galled severely.  Now the damned thing is stuck super super tight so I had no recourse but to cut it off and bore it out on the lathe...  Man, everything was going so smoothly up until now!

Luckily I have a 4 jaw to hold the part.





Drill size for the 3/4-10 thread is 21/32"  So I stepped up to that.  I drilled about halfway into the nut and checked it out.  The drill was peeling out the aluminum from the threads pretty well but it was also cutting into the nut threads.  So I stepped down to 5/8" to finish the hole.





Here's the little chunks that I had to beat out.





Now the threads are compromised but I want to continue on.  I don't have any other nuts of this size and I'm not confident enough to try internal threading.  What a pain in the ass.  This is supposed to be relaxing!





Anyway, soldier on.  I can always cut the nut off and weld on a new one once the world goes back to normal.

I trimmed up the body to a closer shape and mocked up the last piece.  Some edges were beveled for weld penetration since I want to grind it smooth later.





All welded up.





Getting inside here was tough.  I had to increase tungsten stick out to dangerous levels!  When gas shielding becomes less focused the arc tends to be less focused as well.





That's where I'm at currently.  I have to now make a handle.  I have a 12" length of 3/4" round bar but it's 304 stainless.  I figure I'll try that out.  These will be my second ever lathe cut threads so we'll see...


----------



## macardoso

Now is a great time  to practice your single pointing! It isn't hard, but you do need to practice. 

For internal threading, invest in a Left Hand indexable threading bar and learn to thread away from the chuck. It is just as easy as normal threading, just backwards. Much less stressful!


----------



## Weldo

macardoso said:


> For internal threading, invest in a Left Hand indexable threading bar and learn to thread away from the chuck. It is just as easy as normal threading, just backwards. Much less stressful!



Yea I could see that being true!  I'd get nervous about that boring bar bottoming out in the hole with only a split second to stop it!

I recalled that these will be my third threads on the lathe.  The first was that aluminum thing and then I did the threads on my collet chuck.  They were metric so I had to spin the lathe by hand to back the tool up and take another cut.  What a pain!  I got inpatient and tried to take too much off at once.  The threads did work but they're not as clean as they should be.


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> Yea I could see that being true!  I'd get nervous about that boring bar bottoming out in the hole with only a split second to stop it!
> 
> I recalled that these will be my third threads on the lathe.  The first was that aluminum thing and then I did the threads on my collet chuck.  They were metric so I had to spin the lathe by hand to back the tool up and take another cut.  What a pain!  I got inpatient and tried to take too much off at once.  The threads did work but they're not as clean as they should be.



Well you get the premise then!

Seriously, just start doing some practice pieces and you'll learn it isn't as hard as many make it out to be. If the whole thing about the compound being at 29.5 degrees confuses you, just skip it and feed in directly with the cross slide. Works fine.  

Get some thread wires and a decent micrometer and practice hitting the tolerance of the threads. There are tables in Machinery's handbook for this, or you can use this website:





__





						UN imperial screw thread calculator
					






					theoreticalmachinist.com
				




Almost all your threads will be 2A/2B. 1A/1B is very loose fitting (think nuts and bolts), while 3A/3B is super tight (think aerospace or MIL SPEC fasteners). The "A" means an external thread and can be measured with wires. The "B" is an internal thread and needs a mating gauge to check it. You can buy these, but making them for a job is rewarding and great practice. I'm made about a dozen Go-No thread gauges from scrap steel to check internal threads. They have threads on both ends, one is cut to the minimum spec for your internal thread (that's the GO) and the other is cut to the maximum spec (that is the NO-GO).

Internal or external threading away from the chuck is a great skill to have. I use it whenever I have to avoid a shoulder on the part. Also lets you create a much smaller thread relief.


----------



## vtcnc

Got this lil' guy on eBay a couple of weeks ago...downloaded the grainy "before" photo from the listing. There was little rust around the corners and the centers were almost seized up.

*BEFORE*



*AFTER

*


----------



## Bamban

Not a project per se.

After running the PM1440TV for a few days now, decided to check some alignment stuff. Here is how she runs using a Pacific Tool and Gauge alignment bar that is ground round.

Instead of using a dead center in the spindle, just single point cut a center.

I did not take a picture nor a video, there is a difference in the runout at the TS side between using dead center as compared to using an el cheapo live center. Might have to upgrade to a Royal someday.


Watch "PM1440TV HS to TS Alignment Chuck Side" on YouTube





Watch "PM1440TV HS to TS Alignment TS Side" on YouTube





TS is higher.


----------



## C-Bag

Strap wrenches and chain wrenches are very handy. So far I've been able to use my oil filter wrenches for all the stuff I've needed something like a strap wrench. I think I have 5 different size filter wrenches. The beauty of their design is handles swivel so you can get into tight places. 

That is commendable to include all your punts in your wrench built. Seems like that's ALL I did in my ball turner build so I didn't want to clog the bandwidth with my constant punts. Keep up the good work.


----------



## Weldo

macardoso said:


> Internal or external threading away from the chuck is a great skill to have. I use it whenever I have to avoid a shoulder on the part. Also lets you create a much smaller thread relief.



When threading away from the chuck you have to run the lathe in reverse, is that correct?  Mine doesn't have reverse, but I'd like to try adding it by adding a switch to reverse the electric motor.

@vtcnc nice restoration!  What is that thing anyway?  I'm not familiar with such a tool.

@Bamban it's always good to check alignments.  I actually have never done mine!  I dis and re assembled my lathe before I even knew you had to align them.  I did take great care in leveling it when bolting it to the floor but I've never checked alignment!


----------



## vtcnc

Weldo said:


> @vtcnc nice restoration!  What is that thing anyway?  I'm not familiar with such a tool.


Centers. Put your round part between centers, place this on a surface plate, and check runout with an indicator.


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> When threading away from the chuck you have to run the lathe in reverse, is that correct?  Mine doesn't have reverse, but I'd like to try adding it by adding a switch to reverse the electric motor.



That is correct. If it is a 4 wire single phase motor (+ ground) then you should be able to reverse it. I find being able to reverse mine to be a useful, albeit seldom used feature. Very helpful for metric threading when you need to reverse out of the thread.


----------



## Weldo

Strap wrench update.

The threads went pretty OK.  I ended up having to make an unthreaded portion on the end because there's still some aluminum in the threads of the nut.  With this, I miss that galling.





Pardon my surface finish.  I tried to dish out the end a little to grab the strap more securely.





Scratch pass.  Looks good.





The thread cut just fine.  I never checked with thread wires, though I do have them.  I just kept trying the nut.  I ended up having to knock down the peaks a good bit to get it to thread in.  The final OD is around 0.714"!  Ugh...





I sanded up the head part.








I tried it out with some smooth seatbelt style nylon I had.  This was a take off from my kayak when I changed seats.





I doubled it up so I could put a pin in the loop.  If you really pull on it, the strap pulls free form the threaded handle.




Well that's about it.  I guess I'd call it done though it doesn't work as well as I'd like.  The grip isn't all that tight.  When I loop the strap around and feed it back through, it doesn't pinch to the head very strongly and slips.  I rounded the head over pretty good because I didn't want the strap to cut or fray over time but maybe I should have left it with more square edges.  Or maybe I need a thicker, stiffer strap material?


----------



## Weldo

vtcnc said:


> Centers. Put your round part between centers, place this on a surface plate, and check runout with an indicator.



Oh I get it.  Cool stuff!  Is there any manufacturer names or marks?



macardoso said:


> That is correct. If it is a 4 wire single phase motor (+ ground) then you should be able to reverse it. I find being able to reverse mine to be a useful, albeit seldom used feature. Very helpful for metric threading when you need to reverse out of the thread.



I've been thinking about adding a switch like this maybe...




But I wonder.  I have an old toggle switch in the basement.  It's a DPDT.  Like the one below.  Could that work for switching the motor?


----------



## pontiac428

Thicker, non-stretch strap with beeswax or rosin for grip.  The strap on my Ridgid is pretty beefy, and even that has not been up for the job on occasion.


----------



## Weldo

You know what?  Maybe an old serpentine belt?


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> Oh I get it.  Cool stuff!  Is there any manufacturer names or marks?
> 
> 
> 
> I've been thinking about adding a switch like this maybe...
> 
> View attachment 319197
> 
> 
> But I wonder.  I have an old toggle switch in the basement.  It's a DPDT.  Like the one below.  Could that work for switching the motor?
> 
> View attachment 319198



I would not use the DPDT switch shown below. It would be switching the full load of the motor plus the startup amps. These switches are not rated for that. The reversing switch is physically much larger which gives you a clue about the switch contacts inside. 

Another option is a pair of contactors in a reversing configuration. This is what I use, so I can use the start/stop/reverse lever that came stock on my lathe.


----------



## Weldo

macardoso said:


> I would not use the DPDT switch shown below. It would be switching the full load of the motor plus the startup amps. These switches are not rated for that. The reversing switch is physically much larger which gives you a clue about the switch contacts inside.




Below is a picture of the on/off switch that's currently on my lathe.  The DPDT one I have is the same size so I thought it might work.  As far as I know this is the switch that shipped with this machine from the factory.


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> Below is a picture of the on/off switch that's currently on my lathe.  The DPDT one I have is the same size so I thought it might work.  As far as I know this is the switch that shipped with this machine from the factory.
> 
> View attachment 319204



Well, you got me They must've found a switch rated for the motor load. The reversing option only works if the motor is would to be a reversible motor with 4 connections. If it is just a two wire deal, you won't be able to reverse it.


----------



## Weldo

Thanks for the advice!  I'm not sure what the ratings on either switch are, but the back up plan is to mount a reversing drum switch off to the side somewhere on the lathe.  The DPDT makes a cleaner install but it may not be rated properly. 

What's your opinion on upping the HP on a small lathe.  The current motor is an old 1/2 HP model, I think it even says "Washing Machine" right on the motor plate!  I thought about putting on a 3/4 HP motor just because I have one but I don't think the motor is the limiting factor on this machine, but rather it's the rigidity, or lack there of.


----------



## macardoso

Weldo said:


> Thanks for the advice!  I'm not sure what the ratings on either switch are, but the back up plan is to mount a reversing drum switch off to the side somewhere on the lathe.  The DPDT makes a cleaner install but it may not be rated properly.
> 
> What's your opinion on upping the HP on a small lathe.  The current motor is an old 1/2 HP model, I think it even says "Washing Machine" right on the motor plate!  I thought about putting on a 3/4 HP motor just because I have one but I don't think the motor is the limiting factor on this machine, but rather it's the rigidity, or lack there of.



Sounds good. If you do use the DPDT, just be careful you don't shock yourself.

I don't see an issue with that. The rigidity of your lathe will determine how much of that HP you can actually use. It will be less that you think. Also if you go too big of a motor, components in the drive-train could break before the motor stalls.


----------



## Weldo

Yea, I don’t think it’s worth it.  I’ve never had it bog down for lack of power but I have seen the compound deflect enough to wonder why it didn’t crack right off!


----------



## FOMOGO

Have been back home in CO now for two weeks. Had tickets to leave PR on April 7th, but decided to get back home while we still could. Have been doing honey do's, and vehicle repairs, but last week I found time to finish my Franken-vac project. Picked it up at a moving sale for $20. Its all stainless steel and cast aluminum construction, with a heavy duty motor, and a lot of sound insulation. When I went to check it out I found the on/off switch toggle was broken off. Replaced the switch and added a standoff to prevent breaking the new one when setting it upside down on the floor. On first start up the motor made a loud screaming sound. Pulled it apart, removed, disassembled, cleaned, lubed, and reassembled the upper and lower ball bearings, cleaned up the commutator, and reassembled the motor. Cleaned, and straightened up the three stage aluminum impellers.
  The vac was originally a wet only unit, no filter just a float mechanism inside. I ordered two large filters, and made up some mounting plates and hardware. Used the plastic caps that came with the filters to join them together. It didn't come with a hose, so I modified it to accept an extra shop vac hose and accessory's I had on hand. Works better than any of the large plastic ones I've had in the past, and is much quieter. All in all, a fun little project. Cheers, Mike


----------



## matthewsx

My Craftsman 101.21200

From this.




to this:




John


----------



## Weldo

@FOMOGO Nice work on the vac!  It's nice to have a vacuum with some personality.

Man I remember a few years ago we renovated this big old house that had a central vacuum system from the 1920s.  Down in the basement was a huge canister for the debris and a large air pump.  The hole thing was about the size of a 55 gallon drum and about 6 foot tall.  The motor was mounted atop the canister.

I saved it and had plans to make it into the ultimate shop vac, mounted on a drum dolly but I lost track of it over the years.  It was stored in a friend's garage and you know how that goes.

@matthewsx the lathe is looking brand new!  How about the motor and such?  Is it mounted under the table?


----------



## matthewsx

The motor will go back like it was before, just needs some paint.

John


----------



## C-Bag

I spent the last couple days doing a deep clean on the lathe and the mill from the ball turner project. Changed the oil in the old compressor. 

Then decided it was time I finished off a project from a January. I took the stand I'd gotten with my HF beader and made mount and mechanism for my shrinker/stretcher. At first it was leg powered but that not only got REALLY old it turned out it was impossible to do the big 2x4 corregated tin pieces because I couldn't get to the leg pump. So I had to totatally redesign to be air powered. I had three air foot pedals laying around so I made a mount that clamps the foot pedal to the edge of stand and can be positioned where ever needed. Got me through the project but the spool valve in the foot pedal had no way to feather it. It went from off to full on and nothing in between. After much consideration I decided to try and put a notch in the side of the bore that goes to the cylinder. I used the diamond burr that's sticking up on in the set. I've finally got smooth control now. I can ease it down gently or slam it. Of course this is a month or 2 after I was doing the project but sooner or later the other end is going to be needing to be done and better late than never.


----------



## C-Bag

While doing the deep clean I saw a box I made to hide my Allen T's at work. Even though they are cheap HF's if they were easily seen on my assembly cart and not nailed down one of the field guys would liberate them. So while the bosses had me on hold I plasma'd this out of some scrap. It had been behind the lathe since we moved here so pulled it out and cleaned it up and put on my mobile workbench. I use HF magnets to keep the good Allen sets on top of the box. BTW the cart used to be red, the sun has not been kind


----------



## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> While doing the deep clean I saw a box I made to hide my Allen T's at work.



Sneaky!  It sucks that you gotta do stuff like this when you work with a bunch of other people.


----------



## middle.road

At least some are getting things done. I'm still trying to re-organize...   
I wanna make chips!


----------



## Weldo

Getting organized is the first step to getting work done.  That's also how I spent the first few days of lock down.  Once you have a neat and clean space you can work freely!


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> Getting organized is the first step to getting work done.  That's also how I spent the first few days of lock down.  Once you have a neat and clean space you can work freely!


+1! But it's amazing how many projects getting organized generates though! I wish I'd taken the other tray organizer I made also. That was all plasma'd too.


----------



## Weldo

I'm probably taking a break from the work shop today.  I just cut the grass and turned over the potato patch in the garden.  Now I might work on some non shop hobbies.  I've got a rocket kit that's been waiting for building!  It's a small kit but I like the ones based off of real rockets and missiles.









						007247 - Nike Smoke - Estes Rockets
					

(Formerly Skill Level 2) A 1:10 scale-like model rocket kit that’s sure to be a collector’s item! High quality parts you’ve come to know with Estes kits.  Download Instructions




					estesrockets.com
				







Probably tomorrow or Sunday I'll spend some time grinding HSS tools.  I recently bought a few more AXA holders from LittleMachineShop because I want to set them up for common tasks.  I want a holder that's ready to go for facing, one for turning, one for threading, etc.  Maybe one for wood.  Currently I'm always looking for the right cutter and having to swap them out a lot.  More holders should make things better.


----------



## C-Bag

You can NEVER have too many holders or different profile cutters. I love buying used cutters from sales and seeing and trying the crazy different cutter profiles. Some of my HSS favs are not the usual profiles you see now days. Like for my shaper and one a got in a lot from some defunct machine shops. It's been a project just to sharpen, then recreate how they did them. Like this one:


----------



## derfatdutchman

No where to go week nights and weekends makes for more shop time. I had a the stock to make a tap wrench for awhile. Its based on the one in the reprinted South Bend Lathe Works book “Machine Shop Projects”, i tweaked the design some. Needs final debur, polishing and heat treating.


----------



## hman

Weldo -
Instead of the usual DPDT switch, you might want to look at a forward-reverse "hesitation" switch.  These switches require you to make the change from forward to reverse in two distinct steps.  Positively prevent attempts at "instant reversal."  Not too cheap, but not too expensive, either.  Here's one that's actually a 3 pole 2 position, rated at 15 amps:


			https://www.alliedelec.com/product/eaton-switches/7991k10/70155846/


----------



## middle.road

Silly birds. A thousand trees in the neighborhood and they try to roost in my shop - why?!
Cleaned up the tool chests Thursday night, went out this morning and a bird had been in the shop all night.
Now the lid was down so that was a 16x26" - 416 sq inches he/she could have shat on but nooooo....
Not to mention other numerous places around the shop.



	

		
			
		

		
	
...


----------



## Weldo

@derfatdutchman that's really nice work!  Post up some pics when it's done!

@hman Thanks for the suggestion.  I didn't even know about such a thing.  The data sheet says that the switch prevents you from reversing until the motor stops.  How does the switch know?

@middle.road if you were on a boat, that would be a sign of good luck!  At least good luck for your tool box!


----------



## middle.road

And then, and then,,, this morning I thought I'd take my Kobolt 3-drawer middle chest and just, you know, add it to the Craftsman pair.

Nope, the Kobolt is 3/4" wider than the Craftsman. Depth was fine though. Don't-it-figure? 

Time for a Plan 'B'.


----------



## jwmelvin

I added a few compressed-air outlets to the shop, including one dedicated for coolant misters.


----------



## C-Bag

What kind of plastic line is that? Was it a kit? 

I need to run some lines for my shop too.


----------



## matthewsx

matthewsx said:


> My Craftsman 101.21200
> 
> From this.
> 
> View attachment 319229
> 
> 
> to this:
> 
> View attachment 319230
> 
> 
> John



Chips


----------



## hman

Weldo:
@hman Thanks for the suggestion.  I didn't even know about such a thing.  The data sheet says that the switch prevents you from reversing until the motor stops.  How does the switch know?

I think you might have mis-read the description.  All the switch does is prevent you from switching all the way between forward and reverse in one motion, so there's no danger of doing so by accident.  If you're in forward, you can switch to off, but no further.  You must release the toggle and let it move back just a bit before you can switch further (into reverse).  

A machine I used many years ago had such a switch, and I bought one for a lathe rebuild a wile ago.  So I'm familiar with their "mechanics."  As you realized, the switch has NO way to get feedback from the motor.  You CAN complete the switchover before the motor has stopped ... but it takes a deliberate set of actions.


----------



## Weldo

middle.road said:


> And then, and then,,, this morning I thought I take my Kobolt 3-drawer middle chest and just, you know, add it to the Craftsman pair.
> 
> Nope, the Kobolt is 3/4" wider than the Craftsman. Depth was fine though. Don't-it-figure?
> 
> Time for a Plan 'B'.



All you gotta do is take a whizzer wheel and cut a 3/4" strip out of the middle of the box and all the drawers.  Then weld 'em back together.  Simple!


----------



## Weldo

Nice work @jwmelvin !  That's gonna be convenient as heck!  I've never seen it done with plastic like that.  All the plumbers around here love that stuff though.  The flexibility of it can really minimize joints needed.

@matthewsx looking good!  

And thanks for the explanation @hman !  Sounds like a good possibility.  I'd hate to jam it in reverse and watch my chuck bounce off the bed and land on my foot!


----------



## middle.road

@jwmelvin - Now that's a fine looking air-line installation.

I'm starting to think I should maybe give up on this 'use the new-to-me' toolboxes project
The pristine (4)-drawer Kennedy had a large sticker on the side.
Laid it down and figured a little heat some naphtha - no problemo.
Finally got all the residue of last night after a day of lawn & yard.
Went to pick it up into an upright position and it scooted on me, lost my grip and it landed back down on it's handle.
Bent the side all to h*ll, mangled the handle and hit hard enough to affect the top drawer.
Tried to pound it back into shape but now it just looks like some clod dropped it and the top drawer no longer moves smoothly...   
And, while the Wife was rocking the Toro, I thought I'd get a weed whacker running.
(4) gas whackers and I succeeded in getting -0- running.


----------



## Weldo

Man, that sucks about the box.  Crap like that has happened to me before, you get 95% done on a job/project and then something happens to ruin the whole thing.  Takes the wind out of my sails for sure.

Just a few weeks ago before the lock down we started demo on a kitchen remodel.  My two coworkers started the job without me and got pretty much all the cabinets and granite counter tops out except for one big piece.  One guy hurt his back doing something else and the other guy had to help on a different job so I showed up to continue alone.  I figured I could remove the big piece of granite (about 28" x 68") if I was careful.  I slid it off the cabinet then down to the floor so now it's leaning like a ramp on the 28" edge.  Then I lifted up the upper end, now it's standing vertically on the 28" edge.  I was walking it over to lean it against a wall and the weight of it caused me to loose the balance of the piece.  Down it went into a thousand pieces!

No one was hurt and no damage was done, but that didn't stop me from feeling like a total A-hole for the rest of the day.  I was so close to success but ended up in failure, it really sucks when that happens.

As far as the weed whackers, I too have 3 and none of them run properly!  Two of them only run on half choke, and thus only give you about half power, and the other one, despite being super clean and only 2 years old, will not start at all!  What the hell, ya know?!


----------



## Weldo

Spent some time grinding lathe tools.  I tried to set up a few common types in a few holder I have. 

From left to right I made, chamfering, turning, grooving, small boring, and threading profiles.  The grooving and boring one I found in a bundle of HSS tools and just touched them up.  The other three I ground today.





Next I took care of a nagging problem I've had with my QCTP.  Because of the shape of the Atlas compound the square body of the tool post hits in some orientations.  To remedy this I had to space the post up with a large washer but the set up is not as rigid as it could be.





Interference happens when I try to rotate the tool post.








To allow the tool post to sit properly on the compound I need to clearance a little bit.





This is the washer I had been using under the post.





Might as well disassemble and clean the rest of it.





I just did the clearance with a stone wheel in the angle grinder.  It didn't have to be machined, just relieved.  The grinded portion is actually a tiny bit below the machined surface, which should be fine.  It would've been nice to mill this perfectly with the rest of the machined surface but I lack that equipment.  I slipped one time with the grinder, damn it!  If only I had some paint left for touch ups...





Hopefully this gives me a little rigidity versus the washer under the tool post.

Just a quick project but one that's needed done for years!


----------



## C-Bag

It's funny how projects seem to have some kind of inertia. I can remember lots of things going bad at the end and that sux, but when they start going bad at the beginning its really hard to turn them around. My shop is so full of side projects or things I'd like to fix or change I'll jump off something onto something else just to halt that breaking bad thing and it ending up a loss. I particularly hate having this good idea only to have it miss by fractions of an inch. 

Weldo I had a somewhat similar problem with my QCTP mount. But the guy who owned it before me had decided to press the center bolt into the compound and didn't bother to get the press fit right. It was way too tight and warped the upper compound and bulged it out so the body of the QCTP wasn't sitting flat. i had to replace the upper compound and this time made it sit right and that got rid of my chatter problem. 

I gave up on stupid gas weedeaters 20yrs ago. I guess if you use them all the time you're ok but everybody I know has several of them in apparently good condition except the silly carbs all plugged. I'd rather deal with the cord and get the job done than spend hours fiddlin'. Just yesterday I did a couple hours of weed whacking with old electric whacker. Now I don't have a huge yard so that's another YMMV.


----------



## Weldo

I've been eyeing up a battery whacker for awhile now.  The price of admission can be pretty high for them 80V ones, but the headaches should be pretty low.


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> I've been eyeing up a battery whacker for awhile now.  The price of admission can be pretty high for them 80V ones, but the headaches should be pretty low.


Even though I drive a plug in hybrid Volt I have one battery Dewalt drill and when the remaining battery pack dies on it, it's outta here because the batteries are always dead and don't last. The little Craftsman impact driver I have always seems to have a charge and so does the backup battery. Guess I'm just too old and attached to my cords.


----------



## ttabbal

I only have one year on it, but the Ego wacker does a decent job and the battery holds up well for a 1/2 acre yard. I also got the blower, so I have two batteries for those times I let it get too long. They charge fast enough that I can also use them for the blower to clean up the concrete afterwards. 

The Echo gas powered one is doing alright still. I usually use it with the blade when the weeds in the field next to my property get tall. I started using the engineered fuel rather than mixing it up myself. It seems less likely to jam up the stupid carbs on the tiny engines.


----------



## C-Bag

What's "engineered fuel"? Not heard of that before.


----------



## ttabbal

C-Bag said:


> What's "engineered fuel"? Not heard of that before.



I hadn't either. They had it in the aisle with the wackers and mowers. I think the idea is that it doesn't go bad as fast as gas and clog things up. I've only been using it for a year or so, but the Wacker starts easier and seems to run better than the gas I mixed. I had been using ethanol free to make sure the ethanol wasn't causing any problems. This stuff just seems to work better. Perhaps it's partly that I only run it once a week or so in the summer.


----------



## C-Bag

My problem with whackers is I don't need it as often as you so they sit and the carbs clog. I have a buddy who lives in the mountains and runs his all the time because of fire danger and seems to have no problems.


----------



## matthewsx

Weldo said:


> <snip>
> 
> As far as the weed whackers, I too have 3 and none of them run properly!  Two of them only run on half choke, and thus only give you about half power, and the other one, despite being super clean and only 2 years old, will not start at all!  What the hell, ya know?!



As a guy that used to run a small engine shop I can tell you what probably happened. Everyone knows to check for compression but two-strokes need a good lower end seal to draw the fuel/air charge into the engine. More often than you would think the crank seals go bad while sitting, might be ethanol in the gas, might just be crappy seals but regardless the result is you can do whatever you like to the carb or spark plug but no amount of pulling will get them to start.

Since I had to quickly diagnose these things I developed a protocol.

1. pull the starter rope to make sure there's compression and the cylinder isn't stuck.
2. drain the old fuel
3. check for spark, install new plug since I bought them by the gross.
4. remove air cleaner and shoot a little carb cleaner in.
5. give it another pull and see if it fires.
6. if it fires put fresh mix gas in and see if it will run
7. if it only runs on choke clean the carb and maybe put a kit in
8. if none of the above works scrap it out unless it's a high end unit that is worth fixing

The problem with these things is the only way to check crank seals is pulling it apart and fitting blanks to seal off intake and exhaust ports then pressure check. Unless it's a high end unit and you already have the sealing blanks this is about two hours more labor than a replacement tool will cost. if you can get it running you can shoot a little carb cleaner at the ends of the crank to see if it makes it run better but that's really hit or miss. Honestly, if you get to step 6 and you're not trimming the chance of it ever working is pretty small. Sometimes replacing the primer bulb or fuel lines will do the trick but you can see that problem.

Reality is I've already spent more time typing this up than it takes me to troubleshoot a cheap weedwhipper 

My honest suggestion is when one of these things doesn't start you really have two options. If you have a huge yard and need to trim every week invest in a good straight shaft trimmer and only use ethanol free gas + drain it whenever you won't need it for a month. Or, if you're smart like me get an electric one. The corded units are super cheap and the battery powered ones are good enough now to replace gas powered for most homeowners. Bonus points for getting the one that takes the same batteries as your drills and impacts.

Cheers,

John


----------



## matthewsx

C-Bag said:


> My problem with whackers is I don't need it as often as you so they sit and the carbs clog. I have a buddy who lives in the mountains and runs his all the time because of fire danger and seems to have no problems.



I can't tell you how many guys brought me their trimmers to have the "carb cleaned", rarely is that the problem. Your buddy probably has a good model to begin with and like you say, runs it all the time. Yes, ethanol gas can mess up a carb in a hurry but it also eats crank seals which is where the real problem usually is. I know, super frustrating for someone with a two-year-old machine but unless you rebuild the carb yourself ~$10 for the kit, you're $75 bucks into fixing a $60 tool at most repair shops.

Cheers,

John


----------



## C-Bag

My dad had probably 5 dead whackers. They were all given to him by folks in the park he lives in and not a single one were same make or model. One was brand new looking and I tried getting it going and besides the passages in the carb being incredibly tiny the carb parts were turned to goo. The whole gas whacker thing just seems like a complete boondoggle so I bailed long ago. I appreciate your confirmation of my suspicions John.


----------



## Weldo

matthewsx said:


> Everyone knows to check for compression but two-strokes need a good lower end seal to draw the fuel/air charge into the engine. More often than you would think the crank seals go bad while sitting



You know that makes a lot of sense!  It's great to talk to someone with expertise!

I've been tinkering with an old Craftsman trimmer for a long time now, partly out of necessity and partly out of a weird combo of stubbornness and fascination.  I did get it to run, but only on half choke.  So I figure when it's not on choke it must be way too lean, right, since I block off half the air with the choke and it runs almost normal.  So I bought a kit and rebuilt the carb, which was pretty darn clean inside anyways.  The rebuild didn't make a lick of difference and it really had me stumped.  I didn't replace the plug but did take it out and clean it up.

That trimmer is configured such that the crankcase is sealed up by the plastic housing that serves as the main enclosure/heat shield around the muffler.  It did have it off at one time.  If I recall there was a paper gasket.  Maybe a bead of silicone could be applied to the mating surfaces?


----------



## Weldo

I've started another project!

I'm gonna try to finally get my old taper attachment bolted to my machine.  I need a few parts, namely the clamp and the draw bar.




The parts I need to make are circled in blue.




Big shout out to @wa5cab and Spiral_Chips for making available some dimensioned drawing of these parts!

This is the drawing as dimensioned.  I'm gonna try to weld together a composite piece like the pencil sketch near the bottom.




The original piece clamps to the flat ways of the Atlas lathe.  It has a step that acts as a depth stop.  In my case the two bolts will act as the depth stop.  I think It'll work.

For the slot in the end, I'm not sure if I'll attempt to slot it with an end mill on the lathe with the milling attachment or just drill a hole and cut the slot with an angle grinder.  It'll depend on if I can hold the piece in the milling vise, it's pretty limited in work holding ability and rigidity.


----------



## matthewsx

Weldo said:


> You know that makes a lot of sense!  It's great to talk to someone with expertise!
> 
> I've been tinkering with an old Craftsman trimmer for a long time now, partly out of necessity and partly out of a weird combo of stubbornness and fascination.  I did get it to run, but only on half choke.  So I figure when it's not on choke it must be way too lean, right, since I block off half the air with the choke and it runs almost normal.  So I bought a kit and rebuilt the carb, which was pretty darn clean inside anyways.  The rebuild didn't make a lick of difference and it really had me stumped.  I didn't replace the plug but did take it out and clean it up.
> 
> That trimmer is configured such that the crankcase is sealed up by the plastic housing that serves as the main enclosure/heat shield around the muffler.  It did have it off at one time.  If I recall there was a paper gasket.  Maybe a bead of silicone could be applied to the mating surfaces?



Have at it....






John


----------



## jwmelvin

C-Bag said:


> What kind of plastic line is that? Was it a kit?
> 
> I need to run some lines for my shop too.



I used ProPEX left over from some heating and plumbing projects. It’s Uponor’s version of PEX, which uses plastic rings on the ends and an expansion tool stretches them so you can skip in a fitting; the pipe and ring shrink down on a few seconds. I like it for plumbing and so far it seems to work well for air too. 

Today’s project was painting a wall and adding some storage bins. Then the kids started working on a mural for the wall too.


----------



## Weldo

Looks like a nice space.  You can never have too many bins!  I recently added similar bins to my workshop for all my random bolts and hardware.  It took a few days to sort it all but it was a game changer!  Now when I need a 3/8-16 bolt I don't root around through a show box full of crap, I go over to the bin labeled "3/8 bolts"!  It's amazing!

On another note I just got done with some late night ebay trolling.  I picked up some belts for my sander and a spotting drill.  I'm trying to control my spending until lock down is over but the belts were a great deal.  They're the Norton Blaze belts, been curious how they work.  

I also decided to buy just a single spotting drill instead of a set.  I figured 3/8" is a pretty good general purpose size.  I'm tired of carefully laying out and center punching holes only to have the completed hole migrate off my scribe lines.  I'm hoping a proper 120 degree spotting drill will help out with more accurate hole drilling.


----------



## DavidR8

matthewsx said:


> As a guy that used to run a small engine shop I can tell you what probably happened. Everyone knows to check for compression but two-strokes need a good lower end seal to draw the fuel/air charge into the engine. More often than you would think the crank seals go bad while sitting, might be ethanol in the gas, might just be crappy seals but regardless the result is you can do whatever you like to the carb or spark plug but no amount of pulling will get them to start.
> 
> Since I had to quickly diagnose these things I developed a protocol.
> 
> 1. pull the starter rope to make sure there's compression and the cylinder isn't stuck.
> 2. drain the old fuel
> 3. check for spark, install new plug since I bought them by the gross.
> 4. remove air cleaner and shoot a little carb cleaner in.
> 5. give it another pull and see if it fires.
> 6. if it fires put fresh mix gas in and see if it will run
> 7. if it only runs on choke clean the carb and maybe put a kit in
> 8. if none of the above works scrap it out unless it's a high end unit that is worth fixing
> 
> The problem with these things is the only way to check crank seals is pulling it apart and fitting blanks to seal off intake and exhaust ports then pressure check. Unless it's a high end unit and you already have the sealing blanks this is about two hours more labor than a replacement tool will cost. if you can get it running you can shoot a little carb cleaner at the ends of the crank to see if it makes it run better but that's really hit or miss. Honestly, if you get to step 6 and you're not trimming the chance of it ever working is pretty small. Sometimes replacing the primer bulb or fuel lines will do the trick but you can see that problem.
> 
> Reality is I've already spent more time typing this up than it takes me to troubleshoot a cheap weedwhipper
> 
> My honest suggestion is when one of these things doesn't start you really have two options. If you have a huge yard and need to trim every week invest in a good straight shaft trimmer and only use ethanol free gas + drain it whenever you won't need it for a month. Or, if you're smart like me get an electric one. The corded units are super cheap and the battery powered ones are good enough now to replace gas powered for most homeowners. Bonus points for getting the one that takes the same batteries as your drills and impacts.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> John



Thanks for that great info John, I have an old chainsaw that just decided not to start one spring even though I drained the gas, fogged the cylinder. I put in fresh gas and a new plug in the spring but no love. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## DavidR8

Weldo said:


> You can never have too many bins!



I recently scored 90 brand new 4”x5” Uline bins for $90.
I’m waiting to get my disaster of a shop sorted out before I commit to how to store them. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## C-Bag

Every place I've ever worked in has had bins and they were a mess. But with 50 knuckleheads rummaging through them and never putting anything back where they got it. And they seem to collect a lot of dirt and dust. So it just soured me on the idea of open bins. Not that closed bins are any better since you can't see into them. Now probably if it was just me using them it would have a chance. Maybe.

I have several older metal framed with plastic tray bins with some organization to them with all kinds of random but necessary hardware I've accumulated over the years like in estate sales. But my main go to is the top drawer of my old toolbox workstation that has at least 40yrs of accumulated nuts, washers, bolts and screws. The bolts and screws are divided into metric and standard with the nuts and washers in their own area. I've never had enough bins to properly sort all the tons of different hardware I have. So I have 8 ( ! never counted before ) different drawered places for different hardware. Not bragging, just kinda evolved and I'm now afraid to tamper with it. I am in awe of you guys who can be so disciplined and organized. If it wasn't so overwhelming and had a good organizer to transfer to just do that big drawer in my toolbox workstation is a huge project. Too many projects and not enough time.


----------



## jwmelvin

C-Bag said:


> ...never putting anything back where they got it. And they seem to collect a lot of dirt and dust.



I’m hoping that by putting them just outside my shop, they will at least avoid grinding dust; I imagine you are right though so it’s a bit of an experiment. And I have only myself to blame for entropy...


----------



## C-Bag

The one system of bins I'd love to find were what my FIL had some of and I was able to snag 6 of. They seem ex military and he didn't have a lot of them. But they were all different sizes and made to hang off angle iron. There were narrower ones and much wider ones. Never seen any since.


----------



## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> The one system of bins I'd love to find were what my FIL had some of and I was able to snag 6 of



Check ese out!  They're similar.

ebay


----------



## middle.road

and then....
Went to put away the whackers in the tractor shed. And the shed had acquired a sky-light. how wonderful.
A couple of shingles had blown off last storm. Shed really needs a new roof...   
Spent a couple of hours sliding in replacements.


----------



## C-Bag

LOL I was just looking at those, close but no cigar. The ones I have are different sizes which saves space ultimately which is a big deal. I have this old card unit that is very deep I picked up for $5 that would be great for commonly used bolts. It's on the extended "to get organized" list. The other is full of all kinds of random hardware that I got at the same estate sale. It was also $5. It was the same sale where I got my Atlas 7b shaper for $125. That was a once in a lifetime sale.


----------



## Weldo

Whoa!  $125 for the shaper is indeed a once in a lifetime deal!

I found these bins at Home Depot a while back.  Two stack together just right on the shelf I have.





The left one is metric and random stuff like rivets etc.





The right one is common bolts and washers in Imperial sizes.





It was a pain to sort it all out but now it's super awesome!


----------



## Weldo

Got a little bit further on my taper attachment clamp.

To ensure the holes lined up exactly I tacked the two plates together for the drilling.  I then separated them and clearance drilled one plate and tapped the other plate.

Here they are bolted together with some spacers.





The back plate.





Tacked up.  After the tacks cooled I removed the inner spacer.  I was afraid of it being super tight due to shrinkage.





Here's the first weld.  I left the rear spacer which I had removed, sit on top of the joint.  If there's one thing I learned from Jody over on weldingtipsandtricks it's that chill bars can help greatly to keep your weld from overheating.





I let the part cool completely before welding the other side.  I hope this minimizes warpage.  Below is the other side welded.  The fact that the weld is not all dark and grey tells me the chill bars helped me out!





Now I have to cut the slot in the tail piece and figure out at what height it gets welded to the clamp piece.  There's no dimension for that on the drawing.  At least as far as I can tell.  I assume it's centered but my plate is a little thicker than 0.380" like the drawing says so I think I wanna keep the offset for the extra thickness on the downward facing plane.


----------



## C-Bag

Nice looking welds!

Drawings are nice but nothing beats application confirmation. There can be so much application drift because there are so many models with minor differences. You have the major portions of the unit though!

 It's great you have all that heavy plate around. I miss sorely having access to that. Metal surplus is scarce here. It seems you have one or the other, used machines and scarce surplus, or lots of surplus and scarce used machines.


----------



## Weldo

Thanks!

The pieces of metal were just small scraps I'd refused to get rid of over the years.  The heavier plate was cut off from a cut off of 4"x4"x1/2" angle.  And the smaller plate were a piece of 1/4"x1-1/2" flat bar from Lowes.

I've worked at a few metal fab shops over the years and access to metal, even just scraps was a blessing for sure.  Back in 2007 or so I worked at a modern manufacturing whose main deal was CNC machining.  I got all kinds of cool stuff from the scrap bin!  I have a few large aluminum blocks, like 4"x4"x3" or 2"x4"x7".  I can't do much with them now but someday I know I'll have a milling machine!

My most prized score was a chunk of copper plate.  It's 1/2"x6"x11" or so.  They were making huge copper contacts for giant circuit breakers from 1/2"x6" flat bars and this was the cut off.  A friend who was running the saw cutting operation got most of those drops but I got one at least!


----------



## Weldo

Well the clamp works pretty well.





But there's a big gap between the clamp and the main body of the taper thing.  I have a post up in the Atlas section to see if this is ok or what.




Also I don't see why I can't just drill a hole to mate these two parts, instead of making a slot.


----------



## DavidR8

+1 on the nice looking welds!
(I have TIG envy! )


----------



## Weldo

DavidR8 said:


> +1 on the nice looking welds!



Thanks!

Hey I have a general machining question concerning the use of a wiggler.




I know the pointy one is used to pick up a centerpunch or scribed line, but my question is, why does it have to wiggle?  

I get the edge finding capacity requires the tool to move freely but when you are trying to position a workpiece to a centerpunch or scribed intersection, why not use a solid pointy rod?


----------



## DavidR8

No idea @Weldo, I have one but I'm missing one of the wigglers. Never tried to use it yet.


----------



## rwm

Cut a block of foam for my new whitewater playboat (that I may never get to use!)




Talk about complex geometry....
Robert


----------



## Weldo

Nice!  What the hell is it for?!


----------



## rwm

Playboat. Foot blocking.




Robert


----------



## hman

Backspacing a bit to storage ideas .. 
Here's what I put together for my shop in mid 2018 (and previously posted in detail here).  4-sided, on casters, bottom layer is Ikea drawers, middle and top are drawer units from Lowes, plus some bin drawers I found at Habitat for Humanity.  This gives me several sizes of storage for things like nuts, bolts, larger fasteners, springs, chip brushes, etc.


----------



## C-Bag

Now THAT is a storage tower! I like that it's on castors and you have access to all four sides.


----------



## hman

Thanks!  The metal drawer units are Ikea "Helmer."  https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/helmer-drawer-unit-on-casters-white-10251045/  They've been offered in different colors at different times.  At the time I built the unit, I was able to buy green, white and black.  Painted the drawer fronts of one of the white ones blue.  Made it easier to find things - for instance, metric screws are on the "green" side.


----------



## C-Bag

$40?!? Are they sturdy? It says they are powdercoated metal.


----------



## Weldo

rwm said:


> Playboat. Foot blocking.



Awesome!  I've been enjoying fishing from a much larger kayak for the past few summers.  It's a great way to get on the water without the hassle of owning a motor boat.

@hman , You definitely win the "Storage Warrior" merit badge for that thing!  Not only well organized, but well stocked too!  Nice work!


----------



## hman

Thanks!


----------



## matthewsx

C-Bag said:


> $40?!? Are they sturdy? It says they are powdercoated metal.



That looks like a nice solution for tool storage. For 40 bones it's worth checking out....

John


----------



## C-Bag

matthewsx said:


> That looks like a nice solution for tool storage. For 40 bones it's worth checking out....
> 
> John


$40 is cheap but I'm hoping hman can enlighten us as to sturdiness. My main concern was drawer slides and it's looks like bent metal with some plastic sliders? That isn't a complete deal breaker but for moderate stuff it would be fine but it might need some reinforcing to hold heavy stuff. Check out the assembly instructions on the IKEA site.


----------



## middle.road

Phase I of shop re-org completed.
Totally re-arranged the 'budget' Vidmars. They are now enclosing the Bridgeport. 

Was:


Spoiler: Graphic Shop Mess Enclosed... Viewer Discretion Advised. <CLICK> at own risk









Is Now:
Much better utilization of floor area.


	

		
			
		

		
	
...
	

		
			
		

		
	




Then I sat down with an adult beverage to view all that we had accomplished and had a thought...
I should have stopped with the thought and just enjoyed the brew...


Doesn't fit. And, d*mn when did tool chests get so heavy?


----------



## C-Bag

hman said:


> Thanks!  The metal drawer units are Ikea "Helmer."  https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/helmer-drawer-unit-on-casters-white-10251045/  They've been offered in different colors at different times.  At the time I built the unit, I was able to buy green, white and black.  Painted the drawer fronts of one of the white ones blue.  Made it easier to find things - for instance, metric screws are on the "green" side.


The most mystifying thing to me hman is how you even found that unit! IKEA search engine is all but useless to me but I never buy anything from them so it's obviously my inexperience. Without your link I would never even know that unit exists. Funny how none of the other metal drawer units that came up for me were under $175 and most were in the $250+.


----------



## Weldo

C-Bag said:


> The most mystifying thing to me hman is how you even found that unit! IKEA search engine is all but useless to me but I never buy anything from them so it's obviously my inexperience.



If you think the website's bad, wait til you go to the store!  My dad and I went there once to look at something and I felt like I was on some kind of "Lord of the Rings" style quest!

Nice work there @middle.road !  All you guys are killin' it with your hundreds of drawers.  I gotta step up my drawer game!


----------



## rwm

Those card file cabinets are nice. We got a guy around Lake Wiley that sells them on CL.
Robert


----------



## matthewsx

C-Bag said:


> $40 is cheap but I'm hoping hman can enlighten us as to sturdiness. My main concern was drawer slides and it's looks like bent metal with some plastic sliders? That isn't a complete deal breaker but for moderate stuff it would be fine but it might need some reinforcing to hold heavy stuff. Check out the assembly instructions on the IKEA site.



Yep, most modern stuff isn't anything like they used to make it. Probably those drawers would work for relatively light things like spare flap disks and hacksaw blades. Have to see them in person to know for sure.

I do have a fetish for old school desks, cabinets, stools and the like. I'll pick them up whenever I can get them free or cheap, I know the hipsters are looking out for this stuff too....

John


----------



## C-Bag

One the best scores I ran onto was off Make Something Cool YouTube. Small 3drawer file cabs. The two upper are "letter drawers" with one file drawer on the bottom. I've got 3 and thanks to mikri the last two were free. Heavy duty with great slides that can hold anything. We used to go to the Visalia School District sales and get stuff super cheap. My assembly table and the table my bead blast cab are on two heavy duty school tables. I think they were $5ea. You say hipsters are into school surplus ??


----------



## matthewsx

C-Bag said:


> One the best scores I ran onto was off Make Something Cool YouTube. Small 3drawer file cabs. The two upper are "letter drawers" with one file drawer on the bottom. I've got 3 and thanks to mikri the last two were free. Heavy duty with great slides that can hold anything. We used to go to the Visalia School District sales and get stuff super cheap. My assembly table and the table my bead blast cab are on two heavy duty school tables. I think they were $5ea. You say hipsters are into school surplus ??



Yep, check out the "tanker desk" phenom....









						Retro Peacock: How to Restore a Tanker Desk for your 1950s Retro Office
					

The most informative how-to guide on completely restoring a vintage tanker desk for your office.




					www.retropeacock.com
				




John


----------



## C-Bag

I guess it's not hit here yet as I still see tankers for free on CL.


----------



## hman

C-Bag said:


> $40?!? Are they sturdy? It says they are powdercoated metal.


OOPS!  Sorry, C-Bag.  Didn't see yur question until just now.  Regarding sturdiness - they're a pretty light gauge of sheet metal, but well designed.  The fold lines are punched, so it's easy to fold in the right places without a brake.  The drawer ends slip on, then you bend a tab to retain them.  I ran a bead of hot melt along the joint areas, to reinforce and de-rattle, as well as to prevent small objects from slipping out.  The drawer sides have inverted U channels on the top of the outside edges,  Mating U channels are assembled to the sides of the case.  They slide pretty nicely by themselves, but I used a Q-tip to apply Motor Honey inside all the Us.  Now they slip in and out very easily.  Each drawer has a pair of tabs you can bend outward, to prevent it from pulling out all the way.  But the tabs are not too easy to bend back, and I decided I'd rather be careful opening drawers than not be able to remove them.  The kit comes with four non-swivel casters for the bottom.  I left them off because of how I was using the units.  

What else to say?  The cases are NOT something I'd want to place a heavy load on top of.  And I'm sure they're pretty vulnerable to dents, etc.  As others have pointed out, the drawers are not suitable for heavy loads.  And I don't see a good way to reinforce them.  But they've served me VERY well for what I'm using them for.  I think I saw somebody (sorry, couldn't find it again in my hurry) suggest downloading the assembly instructions.  That would be a good idea if my ramblings aren't clear enough.  As you and others have pointed out, $40 ain't bad.  



Weldo said:


> If you think the website's bad, wait til you go to the store!  My dad and I went there once to look at something and I felt like I was on some kind of "Lord of the Rings" style quest!


AGREED!!!!  I really dislike the maze-like layout of the stores.  Nearly impossible to find anything specific!  They want you to take the full tour and get "ideas" and buy on impulse.  I guess their business model/ target market is hipsters looking for ideas to decorate their first apartment.  As the saying goes, Ikea stuff is good for at most two moves.  

IF you're able to figure out what you want from the website, you can save a lot of time and aggravation by going directly to the warehouse section and using one of the kiosk computers to find out where the item is stocked, then just grab a cart and pick it up.  Skip the maze!  The rub can be figgering out what it is you want.  When I was first composing my post above, I'd forgotten the Helmer name, and tried various (fruitless!) searches for "drawer unit," "metal drawers," etc.  No joy.  So I went out to the shop and found the assembly instructions I'd filed away.  About the only other Ikea item I've bought recently was a bookshelf unit that I'm using as a display case.  Got the name of the item from watching one of Adam Savage's videos on https://www.tested.com


----------



## ozzie46

Wife is making face masks. She will be 81 next month. She has made quite a few since last Friday.

Ron


----------



## Weldo

Right on!  Tell her all of us here say thank you for her service!


----------



## C-Bag

hman said:


> OOPS!  Sorry, C-Bag.  Didn't see yur question until just now.  Regarding sturdiness - they're a pretty light gauge of sheet metal, but well designed.  The fold lines are punched, so it's easy to fold in the right places without a brake.  The drawer ends slip on, then you bend a tab to retain them.  I ran a bead of hot melt along the joint areas, to reinforce and de-rattle, as well as to prevent small objects from slipping out.  The drawer sides have inverted U channels on the top of the outside edges,  Mating U channels are assembled to the sides of the case.  They slide pretty nicely by themselves, but I used a Q-tip to apply Motor Honey inside all the Us.  Now they slip in and out very easily.  Each drawer has a pair of tabs you can bend outward, to prevent it from pulling out all the way.  But the tabs are not too easy to bend back, and I decided I'd rather be careful opening drawers than not be able to remove them.  The kit comes with four non-swivel casters for the bottom.  I left them off because of how I was using the units.
> 
> What else to say?  The cases are NOT something I'd want to place a heavy load on top of.  And I'm sure they're pretty vulnerable to dents, etc.  As others have pointed out, the drawers are not suitable for heavy loads.  And I don't see a good way to reinforce them.  But they've served me VERY well for what I'm using them for.  I think I saw somebody (sorry, couldn't find it again in my hurry) suggest downloading the assembly instructions.  That would be a good idea if my ramblings aren't clear enough.  As you and others have pointed out, $40 ain't bad.
> 
> 
> AGREED!!!!  I really dislike the maze-like layout of the stores.  Nearly impossible to find anything specific!  They want you to take the full tour and get "ideas" and buy on impulse.  I guess their business model/ target market is hipsters looking for ideas to decorate their first apartment.  As the saying goes, Ikea stuff is good for at most two moves.
> 
> IF you're able to figure out what you want from the website, you can save a lot of time and aggravation by going directly to the warehouse section and using one of the kiosk computers to find out where the item is stocked, then just grab a cart and pick it up.  Skip the maze!  The rub can be figgering out what it is you want.  When I was first composing my post above, I'd forgotten the Helmer name, and tried various (fruitless!) searches for "drawer unit," "metal drawers," etc.  No joy.  So I went out to the shop and found the assembly instructions I'd filed away.  About the only other Ikea item I've bought recently was a bookshelf unit that I'm using as a display case.  Got the name of the item from watching one of Adam Savage's videos on https://www.tested.com


Well I'm glad its not just me and my Oldtimers.  Thanks for the complete rundown hman! I did go through the assembly instructions and that was very informative. Makes you wonder how in the world Adam Savage ever found that thing.

It's doubly weird Adam Savage is talking about a drawer unit as he's supposedly a hang it on the wall guy. Some stuff I'm guilty of that but my eyes are easily overwhelmed by a wall of clutter. My main goal is to have at least a couple of drawers for each machine tool if it warrants it. Some like the bandsaw and drill press I've just started putting magnets and festoon them with chip brush, adjustable wrench, and special made tools. The vertical bandsaw is getting covered.

I believe they change all the stores around just to keep me from just running through and getting exactly what I need and get out. I was already a super focused get in and out shopper so the idea of being forced to browse is infuriating.


----------



## hman

What Adam talked about was Ikea "Billy" bookshelf, https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/billy-bookcase-white-50263838/ that he uses with glass doors for display cabinets. The long row of them pretty much fill up one wall of his shop.  

I bought one, left out the shelves, got a frameless glass door, and hung the shelf sideways (door hinged on the top edge) above my workbench.  Added a 12 volt LED strip for illumination.  Keeps dust off a whole bunch of "tchotchkes."  First photo is my method of hoisting it into place "solo."  Second photo shows the door propped open and the lighting.


----------



## ozzie46

Weldo said:


> Right on!  Tell her all of us here say thank you for her service!


Will do.
Ron


----------



## middle.road

In the home stretch of getting the tool boxes all setup.
Had this middle chest stashed in the cabinet under the Logan so I decided to 'marry' it with the others.
Bending over to get into it was getting tiresome.
Now one slight 'space utilization' challenge - I can't come up with a place to fit it... Heck, can barely see into the top of it.


----------



## C-Bag

hman said:


> What Adam talked about was Ikea "Billy" bookshelf, https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/billy-bookcase-white-50263838/ that he uses with glass doors for display cabinets. The long row of them pretty much fill up one wall of his shop.
> 
> I bought one, left out the shelves, got a frameless glass door, and hung the shelf sideways (door hinged on the top edge) above my workbench.  Added a 12 volt LED strip for illumination.  Keeps dust off a whole bunch of "tchotchkes."  First photo is my method of hoisting it into place "solo."  Second photo shows the door propped open and the lighting.
> 
> View attachment 320117
> View attachment 320118


I would love to find something like that, but for all my tons of spray can and lube bottles. So a bit shorter. I love the glass and that it tilts up and not a regular door. I have a stupid cabinet that was made by the previous owner of the house for all my stuff and it's aweful. Even a double wide cab with clear sliding doors would be good.


----------



## Weldo

You can commonly find small bookcases that are 12" wide




You can make a door out of plexi with a wood or metal frame and mount it sideways like @hman has done.


----------



## Weldo

Alternatively you could make one from a sheet of plywood.


----------



## C-Bag

Having worked in different manufacturing situations and now for myself I think in parameters then solutions for any project. This might be how engineers think, dunno, because I ain't one. Most of the engineers I worked with didn't get their hands dirty and relied on me for practical user based feedback and we came up with design solutions together. I think we made a good team because programs like Fusion 360 or Inventor I just don't have the time to learn and they didn't want to work in an uninsulated metal building which during the winter was 35-40deg and summer 110+.

My floor space is beyond capacity. That's why everything is on castors with storage built in with small hobby sized machines. We live a mile from the sea and the humidity causes particleboard to literally explode and return to sawdust. And ongoing rust mitigation. So wood because of its weight and the fact I'm not a woodworker is out. So I'm to the point where all my reorganization needs to happen on the walls and mostly over the top of low machines like my compressor, tooling bench( big vise, 8" grinder and arbor press) and my lathe. Taking out the junk cabs and pegboard and going the whole span with nice metal cabs is a dream. Oh, another parameter is I'm vertically challenged too.


----------



## Tio Loco

Mostly been on a 3D printing jag... AXA tool holder storage




Micro Torx driver holder




Still working on a design for interlocking end mill trays for a tool chest drawer




The cool thing about 3D printing is that it's slow and boring, so you can work on other projects while the printer chugs along. This one was just for fun. Mill tool storage before:




After:




Be safe! Be strong!


----------



## hman

LOVE that AXA storage method!


----------



## JohnG

This Emmerts patternmakers vise with an 1891 patent date is one of the oldest tools in my shop.  It may have been around for the flu pandemic in 1918.  It's worn down over the last 100 years, but who has time for stuff like this unless you are quarantined.  





I started by milling the faces.  They are too long for the 15" travel of my Millrite, but the ends are the low points.  I took a cut that skimmed the surface at the ends and took about 0.010" off at the high spots in the middle.  It took 4 side by side passes with a fly cutter, again just within the mills range side to side.





Then I ground them.  Again, slightly too long for the 18" travel on the surface grinder.  The wheel comes off the back end and leaves me with about 1/2" at the other end to bring down with a hand file and bench stone.  The milling was very straight end to end, but the center passes were about 0.004" lower than edges.  Again, just enough side to side travel on the grinder to get the full width. 10-12 passes 0.001" deep on each jaw.




Here are the 2 faces.  I've done finer grinding; but, hey, it's a woodworking vise.  It will now hold a piece of paper firmly at either end.




Now I will spend the next few days washing my hands clean of cast iron dust.  There will not be a speck of corona virus under my nails.


----------



## middle.road

We got it figured out. And by 'We' you know who I mean.   
Moved the green/black over alongside of the bastardized walnut credenza drawers, then moved BigRed into that spot and removed the casters. 
Casters off of BigRed are going to go on the Kennedy so that I have (4) swivel casters on it.
Now to start organizing and filling up the drawers... Perhaps I'll find the top surface of a couple of workbenches in the process.
It's come together very well, I'm happy with the difference and the open space.



	

		
			
		

		
	
...


----------



## middle.road

That is a Very Fine looking vise... 


JohnG said:


> This Emmerts patternmakers vise with an 1891 patent date is one of the oldest tools in my shop.  It may have been around for the flu pandemic in 1918.  It's worn down over the last 100 years, but who has time for stuff like this unless you are quarantined.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I started by milling the faces.  They are too long for the 15" travel of my Millrite, but the ends are the low points.  I took a cut that skimmed the surface at the ends and took about 0.010" off at the high spots in the middle.  It took 4 side by side passes with a fly cutter, again just within the mills range side to side.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Then I ground them.  Again, slightly too long for the 18" travel on the surface grinder.  The wheel comes off the back end and leaves me with about 1/2" at the other end to bring down with a hand file and bench stone.  The milling was very straight end to end, but the center passes were about 0.004" lower than edges.  Again, just enough side to side travel on the grinder to get the full width. 10-12 passes 0.001" deep on each jaw.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Here are the 2 faces.  I've done finer grinding; but, hey, it's a woodworking vise.  It will now hold a piece of paper firmly at either end.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Now I will spend the next few days washing my hands clean of cast iron dust.  There will not be a speck of corona virus under my nails.


----------



## Weldo

@middle.road It always feels goo to finally get it figured out!  Lookin good!

@Tio Loco You're making great use of the 3D printer!  I also love the AXA storage.  I recently bought a few more holders but I'd like even more!  It's a great feeling to just grab the one you need when you need it.

The mill tool organizer is also very nice!  What's the wood handled thing with the strap for?

@JohnG That's a great looking vise!  Looks like you were able to get tolerances easily within the woodworking world!


----------



## Weldo

I did some little bit of organizing myself.  I transformed my sandpaper from a disheveled mess into this:










It's a small thing but it's gonna help a lot!


----------



## DavidR8

Cool idea @Weldo


----------



## Tio Loco

@Weldo it's the spindle lock pin for the mill. Not wood, black plastic handle, plastidipped  red, now the plastidip is worn off of the butt, and the rest is covered with enough grime to look like wood in the photo. Needs rehab.

The red strap is for attention so I don't start the mill with it still inserted in the spindle. It hangs down far enough that if I look at the work piece at all, I can't miss it. Kinda like the 'remove before flight' straps that you see on fighter planes.


----------



## middle.road

That's what I did with a bunch of Wet-or-Dry sheet.
The d*mn stinkbugs loved setting up home inside it. -hehe


Weldo said:


> I did some little bit of organizing myself.  I transformed my sandpaper from a disheveled mess into this:
> 
> View attachment 320301
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 320300
> 
> 
> 
> It's a small thing but it's gonna help a lot!


----------



## Weldo

middle.road said:


> The d*mn stinkbugs loved setting up home inside it.



Aw man, it's that time of the year I guess!  We used to get them real bad around here but they seem to have decreased a bit.  I'm just glad they don't bite or sting!

We need a Simpsons style solution to the stink bug problem.  Introduce some kind of lizard that eats the bugs, then birds that eat the lizards, then snakes that eat the birds, then monkeys that eat the snakes, and the monkeys die in the winter time!  Solved.


----------



## middle.road

Weldo said:


> Aw man, it's that time of the year I guess!  We used to get them real bad around here but they seem to have decreased a bit.  I'm just glad they don't bite or sting!
> 
> We need a Simpsons style solution to the stink bug problem.  Introduce some kind of lizard that eats the bugs, then birds that eat the lizards, then snakes that eat the birds, then monkeys that eat the snakes, and the monkeys die in the winter time!  Solved.


What is even worse, IMO, is when you fire up a motorized piece of machinery that's been sitting awhile and they're living in there...
That can drive you out of the shop in a hurry.


----------



## Suzuki4evr

C-Bag said:


> Thanks.
> 
> Nope, the only pics are what I'vegot are in this thread. I guess I was embarrassed how long it took me, not to mention I wasn't sure I'd not massively miscalculated and just made a bunch of shiny scrap.


Don't be embarrassed C-Bag. Do you we think our members, me included, don't make mistakes during a project? That's what the goofs and blunders section is for my friend. Remember that for your next project. Nice job by the way.


----------



## Suzuki4evr

Looks


cascao said:


> Well, that my first COVID project
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Not know the name in english. It's for keeping door from closing with wind


Looks like it was fun making. Nice job


----------



## Suzuki4evr

matthewsx said:


> My Craftsman 101.21200
> 
> From this.
> 
> View attachment 319229
> 
> 
> to this:
> 
> View attachment 319230
> 
> 
> John


Awsome makeover


----------



## middle.road

The things you find that you forgot you had, when re-organizing the shop... (and other times for that matter.)
A 2HP motor for crying out loud?!
Also found a plastic shoebox tote of parts for wood planers. Stashed in plastic zipper bags so at least they aren't all rusty.


----------



## jwmelvin

Tio Loco said:


> Mostly been on a 3D printing jag... AXA tool holder storage



Thank you for the inspiration; I did the same. Though only printed, not yet mounted. 





Edit: now that I look at yours again, I like how narrow they are. I enjoy the design-evolution process that 3D printing facilitates.


----------



## C-Bag

middle.road said:


> We got it figured out. And by 'We' you know who I mean.
> Moved the green/black over alongside of the bastardized walnut credenza drawers, then moved BigRed into that spot and removed the casters.
> Casters off of BigRed are going to go on the Kennedy so that I have (4) swivel casters on it.
> Now to start organizing and filling up the drawers... Perhaps I'll find the top surface of a couple of workbenches in the process.
> It's come together very well, I'm happy with the difference and the open space.
> 
> View attachment 320291
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 320292



LOL, you my friend are smart or brave. The couple of times I let my SO loose in the shop it was a tidy hurricane! When she has something in her hand and says "whats this and do you _really _need it?" gives me the extra umph to say toss it. The only time I regret it is when I've got something that is actually working for me organizationally. Stuff somehow always dissapears into the black hole never to be seen until maybe the next move if she goes through it.  Looking good!


----------



## Grinderman

Made an alligator for a friend down in Florida. Made him out of some old motorcycle chain and a linesman pliers.


----------



## middle.road

C-Bag said:


> LOL, you my friend are smart or brave. The couple of times I let my SO loose in the shop it was a tidy hurricane! When she has something in her hand and says "whats this and do you _really _need?" gives me the extra umph to say toss it. The only time I regret it is when I've got something that is actually working for me organizationally. Stuff somehow always dissapears into the black hole never to be seen until maybe the next move if she goes through it.  Looking good!


Oh, she most assuredly asks 'do you really need this...' quite often. But her fine organizational skills are coming in so handy.
Not to mention the extra 'muscle' I seem to be requiring lately.
Now granted I have a ton of 'useless' crap, however when you need it, it does save money.
The other day she wanted me to setup something that we hadn't used in over (5) years.
I had to inform here that we had tossed out the box that has those in it and I couldn't make it happen. She was a bit downcast but I did manage to find one piece that had escaped the trashman.
The other thing I do is a price search on the web and show her, but that only works when I do use it for fixing something.
Now when it comes to her old Cadillac, or Buick or the Riding Mowers, used is always more budget friendly than procuring new.
We have a couple of friends that come over, _only _when they need something fixed and always make fun of my 'clutter' UNTIL that need THAT piece that I happen to have in a bin.
Another buddy always says why don't you just run out to the store and buy it when you need it....
1.) Fuel Cost, & 2.) Cost of the piece or part.

That's my justification and I'm sticking to it!


----------



## middle.road

Grinderman said:


> Made an alligator for a friend down in Florida. Made him out of some old motorcycle chain and a linesman pliers.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 320351


That's cool!
You and @ulmadoc have to get together....


----------



## Weldo

Made some headway on my taper attachment project!

First of all, major shout out to @Moderatemixed for taking a whole bunch of pics and some dimensions for me!  Thanks, man!

I got the tail piece welded on.  It ended up being that the top of the tail piece needed to be about 0.276" above the lathe bed when mounted so I rigged up some spacers from random sheet metals I had around and got pretty close.  Based on the thicknesses I could find my dimension should be somewhere around 0.275".  I don't have a pic of that part.  D'oh!

Next I drilled the hole to 1/2" and cut it with the grinder to slot it.





I dared pretty close on the left side but was more cautious on the right side.





This is how I grinded the slot to size, checking frequently with a 1/2" something or other.





Here's my something or other in the slot.  It's a good slop free fit.  This one goes out to @middle.road!  I saved a few of these pins that I found in the bottom of a bucket of random crap.  They looked like old rusty HSS blanks so I soaked 'em in Evapo-Rust and saved 'em.  I wasn't sure if I would ever need any of them but they don't take up much room.  Turns out one of them is perfect for this project!  Saved me from turning a pin!








Here's a quick motion picture of it working!  There was a hole in that pin so I made a quick handle from some welding wire.

View attachment Taper Clamp.mp4


















Now I have to try and make the draw bar...  It's just a 1.125" strip of 3/16" flat but it's got a long slot milled in it.  I'll probably try to drill two holes and connect them with a cut off wheel.


----------



## Weldo

Grinderman said:


> Made an alligator for a friend down in Florida.



That thing is adorable!  Nice job!  Very cool!


----------



## C-Bag

The thing that makes me very discerning and makes me save "shineys" is a lot of stuff that was common as dirt when I was a mech or building machinery is impossible to find now. Case in point was we used these things to mount electronic eyes for traffic cops on box conveyers. We called them knuckles and they were laying in every nook and cranny of every packing house and at the plant. I ended up with a couple and found a really good use for it and tried to find more. I spent hours looking, nuthin'.  So what may seem like junk to some is gold to me and it only takes a project or two and those things are used up. I ended up buying the material to make some if I want.


----------



## Weldo

That’s a nifty little doodad!  Kinda like a weld on hinge but not quite...


----------



## Weldo

Got a little more done on my taper project.

I made most of the draw bar.  I had to cut a strip out from a 3/16" x 4" flat bar.  Why couldn't they just use a standard 1-1/4" bar?!  If for some reason this doesn't work out I might just buy a 1-1/4" cold rolled bar and file out the receptacle.





A few of the holes get tapped to 8-32, the rest are simple through holes.  The drawing says to make the hole near the end to 0.501" for a 1/2" pin but the hole in my cross slide is right at 3/8" so I'm gonna keep the hole in the draw bar a corresponding 3/8" and call it good.  That way I can use a simple 3/8" pin like the pin I used for the clamp part.

Here it is mocked up.  So far it looks like it should I think.





Now I have to connect the two 3/8" holes to make a slot about 7.5" long.

Anyone got any ideas other than cut off wheel?  Don't have no mill.


----------



## matthewsx

Sometimes you need a LFH.





John


----------



## Weldo

So tiny!


----------



## rwm

"Now I have to connect the two 3/8" holes to make a slot about 7.5" long. "
Damn that's a lot of filing...
I am very curious to hear other ideas.
Robert


----------



## matthewsx

rwm said:


> "Now I have to connect the two 3/8" holes to make a slot about 7.5" long. "
> Damn that's a lot of filing...
> I am very curious to hear other ideas.
> Robert



Drill more holes.


----------



## ttabbal

Weldo said:


> Now I have to connect the two 3/8" holes to make a slot about 7.5" long.
> 
> Anyone got any ideas other than cut off wheel?  Don't have no mill.




End mill in a drill press! 

<ducks random junk being thrown at him>

Ok, yeah, don't do that for lots of reasons. Quite unsafe. 

Best bet is probably to drill as close as you can to each other, then cutoff wheel, die grinder, and file.


----------



## C-Bag

I've clamped an angle iron guide fence to this guy to finish precision slots after roughing them in with drilling and a suicide disk.


----------



## Weldo

Thanks for the suggestions.  I know there's no "good" way to do it.  Probably why I've let this project sit for almost 10 years!

To cut the strip I used a 1/2" square tube as a straight edge for the cut off wheel.  Refined it carefully on the belt sander.  I got pretty close.  I'm around 1.118" on one end and maybe 1.124" on the other.  Not bad for a hand held grinder and belt sander, I think.  BTW the target was 1.125"

I 'll probably try the same thing again, maybe taking a little more time with the cutting.  The fit of the slot is probably not super critical since a regular threaded bolt rides in the slot.  It's not even a shoulder bolt, so some slop is to be expected.


----------



## C-Bag

As often happens I was doing a search though my big special materials drawers looking for something and found a piece that had been on my "where is it?" list. I found a vise from an abrasive saw in a yard sale several years ago with the idea of seeing if I could adapt it to my horizontal band saw as I like the quick release. It was $5, why not? The vise screw has been one of the least liked features of my vintage HF 4x6.

I pulled the vise screw out of the 4x6 and here they are with the "new" quick release screw on top. I came to the conclusion there would be a lot of machining and fabrication involved because they work radically different.

The old screw stays stationary and the vise nut moves along it by turning the wheel.

While the quick release screw moves in and out. Also as you can see its atleast 3-4" shorter.

I took a bunch of measurements and the way I have it figured I need an angle mount that would bolt to the end of the bandsaw deck for the quick realease to mount to. Then a piece of shaft to fit over the end of the screw a 1" over the threads with a setscrew to lock it to the nose that sticks out of the screw. Then a block that will replace the nut/ vise jaw mount. This will be bored 3/4" for the screw nose shaft to engage with a shoulder on the screw push side and a circlip on the other side. I'll also have to drill out the hole for the new screw as its .710 and the old hole is .500.

Of course I'll need the saw to cut up all the parts so I had to put it back together.


----------



## Weldo

Looks like a worthwhile project @C-Bag.

The weldshop I used to work at had a similar saw where you had to turn the crank for about 5 minutes to recede the moveable jaw enough to set up a miter cut.  And of course the threads were tight as heck the whole way!

I wonder if you could do some kind of half nut situation, like on a lathe carriage?  Maybe you could make a half nut out of the cast part on your existing saw screw?  Just thinking out loud, sounds like you have a plan!


----------



## Weldo

First off, Happy Easter everyone!

Got my slot cut today!  I used the old 4-1/2" angle grinder with cut off wheel.  I cut freehand close to a scribe line and filed to fit.

As cut...





I had to break out the auxiliary lighting!





The filing process.  This old file is pretty course and bites in nicely.  It takes a pretty good amount of material off pretty quickly.





This is the bolt that rides in the slot.  It's a nice fit the whole way.  A hair loose maybe in some spots, but still very close.





With that I have all the parts!  Here's the parts all mocked up.





The three screws are supposed to be like leveling feet or something.  The old instructions say they just rest on the cross slide I guess so you can keep the slotted bar level.  Also I have to do something with that pin.  I might cut it shorter and machine a head to press onto it.  Or maybe just weld a nut on it.





I've got some rust to clean up.  Currently the block does not slide freely on the rusty bar.





I'm gonna set the parts soaking in Evap-o-Rust after they're all disassembled.  If you've never used Evap-o-Rust it's very handy!

I'm in the home stretch!


----------



## matthewsx

Nice work. Once you get confident with a 4" angle grinder it's amazing how much you can do with it. Just treat it with lots of respect because they can bite pretty good.

Cheers,

John


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> Looks like a worthwhile project @C-Bag.
> 
> The weldshop I used to work at had a similar saw where you had to turn the crank for about 5 minutes to recede the moveable jaw enough to set up a miter cut.  And of course the threads were tight as heck the whole way!
> 
> I wonder if you could do some kind of half nut situation, like on a lathe carriage?  Maybe you could make a half nut out of the cast part on your existing saw screw?  Just thinking out loud, sounds like you have a plan!


It was the original mod because just like you mentioned that having to twirl away on that little handwheel is awkward and time consuming. 

Believe me I pondered that exactly halfnut conundrum for quite a while brain cells pooping all the while. I was shocked to find the cast nut and screw threads of the 40yrld saw to be in perfect condition. I do take the time to periodically lube them but that still doesn't mean it's not going to be trash. I decided against the modding of the original nut because if my new quick release doesn't work all I'd have to do is make an adapter washer for where I'm going to have to drill out the hole in the saw body to reinstall the old setup. I'll post pics after I get the pieces machined.


----------



## Weldo

matthewsx said:


> Nice work. Once you get confident with a 4" angle grinder it's amazing how much you can do with it. Just treat it with lots of respect because they can bite pretty good.



Thanks!  The grinder hasn't got me real bad yet.  Got a few knicks from errant cutting wheels but nothing major.  One time could've been major if I didn't have leather gloves on.  Also after a few times getting my eyeball drilled I always wear face protection.  I used to think my normal eyeglasses were enough but now I know better.  Now I often wear a welding helmet with no dark lens, just a clear one.  Full coverage!


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine, yeah COVID-19 is really hitting hard here, monday-friday we are only allowed to leave our homes for 10 hours, Friday from 16 o'clock till monday 6 o'clock complete lockdown, but i'm working from home and i still find time to do staff around the house, yard, machine shop, garages, cars. A week ago we had snow so most of my cars are still on snow tires but they barely get driven in fat i've never felt so many flat spotted tires before, so first project i'm doing is to change to summer tires on all the vehicles, with the 607 out of the big garage. Is easier to do them in the big garage. Wale in there i did changed brake pads on the 605, they had some material still on them but they've started cracking from the heat, very unusual for what supposed to be high performance ceramic pads. luckily i have few pairs on my shelfs.


----------



## jwmelvin

I made some racks to hold long stock:


----------



## Billh51

I recently did a total rebuild on my golf cart, can’t use it, may as well fix it up. When it came time to buff out the clear coat finish, I needed a buffer which I didn’t have. I picked up a buffing pad assembly on EBay for $10 but needed a way to mount it in a drill chuck, to use in my right angle drill. So I made a 1/2” hex to 5/8”-11 thread which I single pointed on the lathe. It worked out fine and saved me about a $100 besides.


----------



## Weldo

@GoceKU Gotta keep the cars in good shape!  Even if you can't go out much right now.

@jwmelvin Racks like that seem like a simple thing but it's actually a HUGE upgrade for a shop!  Frees up floor space, makes metal easier to find, keeps you safer from tripping hazards, looks legit.  Many benefits!

@Billh51 That adapter is awesome!  Very cool idea!  And the cart is super fancy after that paint job!


----------



## Weldo

Did some more on my taper attachment!

Das partsensoaken!





They came out pretty good.  That light surface rust that cast iron gets is where Evapo-Rust really shines.  I brushed them all with a small brass wire brush while the parts were wet.  I also threw in a few other things just for the heck of it.  The wrenches could use more soak time but I'm done waiting!





I rinsed everything with water and dish soap then popped 'em in the oven at 180* til dry.  About 30 minutes.





I experienced some light flash rust after the oven, mostly in cracks and dovetails.  No problem, everything will get buffed with scotchbrite.





The short part on the right is scotchbrited and the longer one is not.  The scotchbrite takes away the gold cast from the wire brush.





You can see the shaper lines on this part!  To think shapers were used for mass production at one time!  How far we've come!  I wonder why this wasn't fly cut?  Some other parts have fly cutter marks.





All the parts came out great!  You can see fly cutter marks in the long bottom piece.  The only real painting is on the angled bracket.  I'd like to just brush it so I don't have to mask.  The long narrow parts are machined both sides so no paint except for around the perimeter edge.  Might not be worth the trouble...





Below is a picture of the only real concern I have for this restoration.  You can only very faintly see the lines and numbers for the gauge.  The upper part has degrees and the lower part says inches, per foot I assume.   I can't really even see the zero mark on either piece.  





Any ideas on how to fix this up?  Maybe I can super carefully re-scribe the lines one at a time with a straight edge and carbide scriber?


----------



## matthewsx

Weldo said:


> Did some more on my taper attachment!
> 
> Das partsensoaken!
> 
> View attachment 320766
> 
> 
> 
> They came out pretty good.  That light surface rust that cast iron gets is where Evapo-Rust really shines.  I brushed them all with a small brass wire brush while the parts were wet.  I also threw in a few other things just for the heck of it.  The wrenches could use more soak time but I'm done waiting!
> 
> View attachment 320767
> 
> 
> 
> I rinsed everything with water and dish soap then popped 'em in the oven at 180* til dry.  About 30 minutes.
> 
> View attachment 320768
> 
> 
> 
> I experienced some light flash rust after the oven, mostly in cracks and dovetails.  No problem, everything will get buffed with scotchbrite.
> 
> View attachment 320769
> 
> 
> 
> The short part on the right is scotchbrited and the longer one is not.  The scotchbrite takes away the gold cast from the wire brush.
> 
> View attachment 320770
> 
> 
> 
> You can see the shaper lines on this part!  To think shapers were used for mass production at one time!  How far we've come!  I wonder why this wasn't fly cut?  Some other parts have fly cutter marks.
> 
> View attachment 320771
> 
> 
> 
> All the parts came out great!  You can see fly cutter marks in the long bottom piece.  The only real painting is on the angled bracket.  I'd like to just brush it so I don't have to mask.  The long narrow parts are machined both sides so no paint except for around the perimeter edge.  Might not be worth the trouble...
> 
> View attachment 320772
> 
> 
> 
> Below is a picture of the only real concern I have for this restoration.  You can only very faintly see the lines and numbers for the gauge.  The upper part has degrees and the lower part says inches, per foot I assume.   I can't really even see the zero mark on either piece.
> 
> View attachment 320773
> 
> 
> 
> Any ideas on how to fix this up?  Maybe I can super carefully re-scribe the lines one at a time with a straight edge and carbide scriber?



I think that would be a good approach but would wait until they are in place so you can verify.

Looking good

John


----------



## hman

GoceKU - Nice to hear from you!  It's been a while since I've seen one of your posts.  Good to know that you're healthy.  May you STAY that way!

Weldo - That's a fascinating restoration ... especially your noting and analyzing the tool marks.  You stay healthy, too!


----------



## Weldo

OK new plan.

I tried re-scribing the graduation lines on the taper attachment.  Some were defined enough that the scribe followed the old marks, some were not.  Here I tried to re-scribe some of the more defined ones.  Some went awry...





New plan involves this thing.  I bought this a few months ago because it was cheap and never used it once.  It had sat in a box in my sometimes damp basement and got some rust, which bugs the hell out of me!  It was pristine when I got it.  Well it still functions anyway.





I can set the angle thusly...





The above is just a mock up, no fasteners are installed.  The protractor is set at 5 degrees.  As long as the small piece with the inside radius is screwed on perfectly square this should be a relatively accurate way of setting the angle.  The protractor can resolve down to five minutes, (or single minutes with some eyeballing and guessing) which is a lot better than the hash marks on the attachment itself.

Notice the protractor rides over the one screw hole slightly.  The original screws were of the round head variety but I'm gonna have to countersink the holes and use flat head screws for this to work.  Luckily I have some 10-24 screws saved from something.  I pays to save everything you possibly can!


----------



## pontiac428

Nice work, @Weldo 
For engraving, this is the tool you need.  I only know it as a graver.  More control than a scribe.


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> Did some more on my taper attachment!
> 
> Das partsensoaken!
> 
> View attachment 320766
> 
> 
> 
> They came out pretty good.  That light surface rust that cast iron gets is where Evapo-Rust really shines.  I brushed them all with a small brass wire brush while the parts were wet.  I also threw in a few other things just for the heck of it.  The wrenches could use more soak time but I'm done waiting!
> 
> View attachment 320767
> 
> 
> 
> I rinsed everything with water and dish soap then popped 'em in the oven at 180* til dry.  About 30 minutes.
> 
> View attachment 320768
> 
> 
> 
> I experienced some light flash rust after the oven, mostly in cracks and dovetails.  No problem, everything will get buffed with scotchbrite.
> 
> View attachment 320769
> 
> 
> 
> The short part on the right is scotchbrited and the longer one is not.  The scotchbrite takes away the gold cast from the wire brush.
> 
> View attachment 320770
> 
> 
> 
> You can see the shaper lines on this part!  To think shapers were used for mass production at one time!  How far we've come!  I wonder why this wasn't fly cut?  Some other parts have fly cutter marks.
> 
> View attachment 320771
> 
> 
> 
> All the parts came out great!  You can see fly cutter marks in the long bottom piece.  The only real painting is on the angled bracket.  I'd like to just brush it so I don't have to mask.  The long narrow parts are machined both sides so no paint except for around the perimeter edge.  Might not be worth the trouble...
> 
> View attachment 320772
> 
> 
> 
> Below is a picture of the only real concern I have for this restoration.  You can only very faintly see the lines and numbers for the gauge.  The upper part has degrees and the lower part says inches, per foot I assume.   I can't really even see the zero mark on either piece.
> 
> View attachment 320773
> 
> 
> 
> Any ideas on how to fix this up?  Maybe I can super carefully re-scribe the lines one at a time with a straight edge and carbide scriber?


That's interesting and weird that part has what looks like shaper marks. I looked it up and Atlas only made a 7" stroke and that piece looks longer than that. So Atlas used machines by other companies to make their machines? Could those marks be made by a horizontal mill? Sure do look uniform like a shaper doing a rough cut.


----------



## middle.road

Weldo said:


> Did some more on my taper attachment!
> 
> (......clipped)
> Any ideas on how to fix this up?  Maybe I can super carefully re-scribe the lines one at a time with a straight edge and carbide scriber?


Along with the tool @pontiac428 suggested, check out Chris on Clickspring.
Everything you every wanted to know about engraving. The guy is amazing.








						Clickspring
					

I'm Chris from Clickspring, and I create home machine shop project videos with a focus on clock making technology. Join me as I make an authentic replica of ...




					www.youtube.com


----------



## C-Bag

middle.road said:


> Along with the tool @pontiac428 suggested, check out Chris on Clickspring.
> Everything you every wanted to know about engraving. The guy is amazing.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Clickspring
> 
> 
> I'm Chris from Clickspring, and I create home machine shop project videos with a focus on clock making technology. Join me as I make an authentic replica of ...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.youtube.com


Dan, can you help me out here, is there a specific episode where he engraves? Clickspring has a lot of vids. I get lost and detoured everytime I get near that guys site. I needed up watching vids on bluing trays!


----------



## tcarrington

A quick project today. A bob to be on the end of a plumb line. This was more of a creative type task. Started out with a generic plan which quickly changed as the available material was a little different that I thought I had. 
OK, for sure the pointer should be steel and replaceable, but since this is a 4-1/2 ounce version, that was skipped over. A proper bob does need a way to attached the string and be well centered. As you see that part is steel and the rest is brass. Not intending to fully polish it, just wanted a nice appearance. The flats are for a 3/8 wrench or a good adjustable wrench.


----------



## middle.road

C-Bag said:


> Dan, can you help me out here, is there a specific episode where he engraves? Clickspring has a lot of vids. I get lost and detoured everytime I get near that guys site. I needed up watching vids on bluing trays!


I believe he shows engraving mostly in his "The Antikythera Mechanism" series. There's (9) episodes I believe.

He also has another channel now that I forgot about. Clickspring Clips.








						Clickspring Clips
					

Old and new Clickspring material, presented in a short clip format. A satellite to the main Clickspring channel. Be sure to visit http://www.youtube.com/clic...




					www.youtube.com
				



Here's a couple from there:


----------



## Weldo

pontiac428 said:


> For engraving, this is the tool you need. I only know it as a graver. More control than a scribe.



Thanks for the suggestion!  That's not something I'd thought of.  I think I have the perfect piece of HSS to make a tool from.


----------



## C-Bag

middle.road said:


> I believe he shows engraving mostly in his "The Antikythera Mechanism" series. There's (9) episodes I believe.
> 
> He also has another channel now that I forgot about. Clickspring Clips.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Clickspring Clips
> 
> 
> Old and new Clickspring material, presented in a short clip format. A satellite to the main Clickspring channel. Be sure to visit http://www.youtube.com/clic...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.youtube.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Here's a couple from there:


Wow, thanks! Clickspring blows my mind. This whole thing with engraving has me intreagued as I have no clue. So much cool stuff, so little attention span......


----------



## macardoso

What about trying to acid etch it? The larger surface area inside the engravings would cause it to etch faster there than the base metal. Use a very dilute solution?


----------



## Weldo

Ya know I thought about that too, etching.  I even thought about sending it out to a third party for laser etching.

I saw some pretty simple vids on youtube of people etching with saltwater, a q-tip and some 9v batteries but I don't think I could make a stencil small and accurately enough for those tiny scribe lines.

Like I mentioned above, since I can set the angle with a protractor the lines on the jig itself are kinda superfluous.  I still wanna try @pontiac428 suggestion of the graver.  I try to grind a point on a lathe tool and test it out.


----------



## Weldo

Shout out to @pontiac428 for suggesting I try a new skill!

I had a long HSS lathe tool that I ground to sort of a graver shape.





I don't know if I would trust these marks for accuracy but it came out decently.  Some of them slipped...









Thanks again pontiac428!  I tried something I've never done before and I sucked at it!  But you know what they say, really sucking at something is the first step to being sort of good at something!


----------



## pontiac428

@Weldo Those are decent results!  Everything I've read about hand engraving says the skill comes with lots of practice.

There is some really interesting reading out there on the subject.  I've put some below, but I can't find the one book/page/wax phonograph drum that has it.  I remember there was  a famous engraver from the 16th century who got his right hand pulled into a belt or cogwork, and mangled it into a shape perfectly suited for holding a graver tool.  It's fascinating stuff, maybe because I'm so poorly suited to fine work like that.



			Sam Alfano's Tips & Tricks for Hand Engravers - Cutting Straight Lines
		






						Rio Grande
					

Rio Grande jewelry making supplies for the best in jewelry findings and gemstones, tools, jewelry supplies and equipment, and the packaging and display items essential to the success of your jewellery business since 1944. Rio Grande offers competitive pricing, excellent service, ordering...




					www.riogrande.com


----------



## Weldo

Cool stuff!  Thanks for sharing.  I came this close to buying a lot of old graver tools on ebay last night.  Learning from past over eagerness I withheld til I learn more about the tool types and characteristics.


----------



## C-Bag

Weldo said:


> Cool stuff!  Thanks for sharing.  I came this close to buying a lot of old graver tools on ebay last night.  Learning from past over eagerness I withheld til I learn more about the tool types and characteristics.


Yeah, kinda like with scraping. Nobody uses plain HSS anymore. I was also looking at those old graver sets on eBay too


----------



## C-Bag

pontiac428 said:


> @Weldo Those are decent results!  Everything I've read about hand engraving says the skill comes with lots of practice.
> 
> There is some really interesting reading out there on the subject.  I've put some below, but I can't find the one book/page/wax phonograph drum that has it.  I remember there was  a famous engraver from the 16th century who got his right hand pulled into a belt or cogwork, and mangled it into a shape perfectly suited for holding a graver tool.  It's fascinating stuff, maybe because I'm so poorly suited to fine work like that.
> 
> 
> 
> Sam Alfano's Tips & Tricks for Hand Engravers - Cutting Straight Lines
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Rio Grande
> 
> 
> Rio Grande jewelry making supplies for the best in jewelry findings and gemstones, tools, jewelry supplies and equipment, and the packaging and display items essential to the success of your jewellery business since 1944. Rio Grande offers competitive pricing, excellent service, ordering...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.riogrande.com


Woa p428! What a great resource thanks....I think. I need another obcession like I need another hole in my head. But I figure it will either point out I'm not going to have the chops for it and just appreciate it or down the rabbit hole.


----------



## Weldo

Got the taper attachment back together!

I didn't have any of the matching grey hammered paint I used on my lathe so I went with a little brown hammered left over from some other projects.





The paint's still a little soft so tomorrow I'll bolt it on and do a function check!  So excite!





Oh I still have to do something about a head on the pins.  Just weld on a nut I think.


----------



## Weldo

Ok, I mounted the taper jig up to the lathe and made a taper!





It worked pretty well.  At least it functioned like it should.  The taper was set at 4 degrees I think and cut into a 3/4" round aluminum bar.





The taper came out a little bit steppy but I think that's from my choice of tool.  If I recall they usually recommend a tool with little to no top rake for aluminum but I didn't feel like grinding an aluminum tool.

But overall I'm happy with it.  I didn't do any indicting or anything, just checked that it works like it should.  On the off chance that someday I need to cut a specific taper I'll have to set it up more carefully.  Maybe I'll play around with it and try to hit a specific taper just for practice, couldn't hurt.

After messing around with that I cleaned up the lathe.  Oiled all the oiler cups and wiped it all down with WD-40.


----------



## pontiac428

Looks like your work paid off!  I'd try turning some MT#2 or #3 tapers for practice (because Atlas), you may just end up finding taper stubs or adapters on hand useful for future tooling projects!

Edit:  Wow, how tight of a space do you have that lathe shoehorned into?


----------



## francist

Weldo said:


> I came this close to buying a lot of old graver tools on ebay last night.


The old gravers are nice looking for sure, but you can come up with fairly simple ones as well without getting fancy. These are a couple of mine that a friend gave me, he did a lot of NW Coast carving and such and the gravers worked well for fine detail in bone and antler. 

-frank


----------



## Weldo

francist said:


> The old gravers are nice looking for sure, but you can come up with fairly simple ones as well without getting fancy. These are a couple of mine that a friend gave me, he did a lot of NW Coast carving and such and the gravers worked well for fine detail in bone and antler.



Neat tools!  Very medieval looking!



pontiac428 said:


> Edit: Wow, how tight of a space do you have that lathe shoehorned into?



I'm working in a basement so space is tight for sure!  I've managed to carve out a decent chunk for a workshop.  Everything in my shop has to come down the stairs so I'm limited by that a good bit...


----------



## Weldo

Hey, would you guys leave that taper attachment on the lathe or remove it until it's needed?  This one bolts on pretty quick but I wonder if I could leave it in place, just remove the bed clamp.  Any possible issues you could think of?


----------



## f350ca

To make your engraving stand out, treat the part with cold blueing then polish off the top surface. The blueing stays in the lines and is quite tough. Have done it on dials, its lasted for years.
I leave my taper attachments on all time. 
Greg


----------



## Weldo

f350ca said:


> I leave my taper attachments on all time.



Right on.  It makes sense to leave it on, especially on bigger lathes, you wouldn't remove it every time.  Maybe the extra mass on the carriage will help with parting operations!


----------



## j1w2t3

finished my wife's knife she likes the Game of Thrones


----------



## Weldo

That's really cool!  How'd you make that handle?


----------



## j1w2t3

Weldo said:


> That's really cool!  How'd you make that handle?


i made those five steel rings welded them to the knife then filled the handle in with body filler and carved out the design


----------



## Weldo

I'm kinda takin a day off from the workshop.

I was going to try to make a morse taper but I don't have any appropriately sized steel.  I found a good resource of dimensions though...





Maybe next week I'll find something else to work on.  I've got an old toolpost grinder that needs a belt.  Anyone know anything about making a drive belt from a strip of leather?  It's a flat belt of course.


----------



## Weldo

Got a few more small lathe upgrades I'm working on.

First I'm going to replace this flimsy aluminum sheet metal cover on my cross slide with a thicker piece that I can actually mount an indicator on.  It only mounts with one screw though, I'll try it out but I may end up having to drill/tap another hole or two.





I've got to figure out how to make the cover in such a way that it does not interfere with the taper attachment.  I don't want to have to remove the cover whenever I use the taper thing.


Also I want to make an indicator mount/carriage stop.  I bought a Mighty Mag base awhile ago but there's no good place to stick it with how the carriage is shaped.

I want it to clamp to the way like the taper attachment clamp and hold the indicator at an angle so the lights don't glare off of it.








Here's the rough idea.  Clamps to the way and provides a flat surface on which I can stick the mag base.  Disregard the  numbers, they is wrong.





These are some small things but will be useful in lathing.


----------



## Weldo

Got a little further on my indicator holder thing.

I'm using my taper clamp as a pattern since I know it works.  I ended up wanting the clamp to be a bit smaller in width though.




I sheared off about 3/8" to try and keep the eventual indicator closer to the lathe bed.  If it hangs out too far it won't hit the carriage like i need it to.


Giving the old No.38 a workout!  This thing is so nice.  The more I work in the shop the less I like grinding and cut off wheels.  This material is 3/16" which is the max for the bench shear.  It takes a lot of force but it shears pretty cleanly.  




The main drawback to this shear is the deformation.  The drop piece is badly curled so I couldn't use this shear to cut up a long bar into short pieces for use.  In fact even the larger piece in this pic is minutely bowed.  I flattened it with a hammer before welding them together.


All clamped up.





On the taper clamp I tacked the pieces together and did the drilling through both a once.  This time I'm gonna try welding up the clamp then drilling/tapping.




I didn't clean the metal as thoroughly as on the taper clamp and the weld looks a little more messy.


The other side welded.





Next I'll drill and tap the holes for the clamping bolts then figure out where to weld on the leg that'll hold the mighty mag base.


----------



## Tio Loco

Built a grinder rest for my long suffering often abused (survived 15 years on a bench in a carport in S. Florida) Delta 6". Not fancy, but functional and sturdy enough for my needs.







Finally nailed down a design for end mill storage that I like, and got them printed up. Each row has a recess on the bottom that fits into a half round in the top of the row above forming the staggered steps.







Also printed up a couple of peg board holders for hex drivers




Still have one more design to print. Next up, running shop air to the lathe, but that involves getting up in the attic, and it's already getting hot here...    ;-(


----------



## macardoso

Tio Loco said:


> Built a grinder rest for my long suffering often abused (survived 15 years on a bench in a carport in S. Florida) Delta 6". Not fancy, but functional and sturdy enough for my needs.
> 
> View attachment 321700
> 
> 
> View attachment 321701
> 
> 
> Finally nailed down a design for end mill storage that I like, and got them printed up. Each row has a recess on the bottom that fits into a half round in the top of the row above forming the staggered steps.
> 
> View attachment 321703
> 
> 
> View attachment 321702
> 
> 
> Also printed up a couple of peg board holders for hex drivers
> 
> View attachment 321704
> 
> 
> Still have one more design to print. Next up, running shop air to the lathe, but that involves getting up in the attic, and it's already getting hot here...    ;-(



Ooohhh I really like those endmill holders!


----------



## Weldo

Tio Loco said:


> Not fancy



Not fancy?!  I think it's beautiful!  Nice job!  Looks to be highly adjustable and pretty solid.

And your endmills are standing tall!  I like the easy identification.  So much better than either rolling around in the drawer or in individual nondescript cases.  3D printing seems so cool to me.  Might have to look into a unit someday.


----------



## Weldo

Got my indicator holder done!

I couldn't for the life of me get the damn thing to line up properly.  The amount that the clamp hangs off the bed and the small profile of the carriage just were not working out.  I tried turning the lug on the back of the indicator 90 degrees and it seemed to allow a better alignment.

Here I welded on a piece of scrap which I'll eventually trim down.





Welded up as square as possible.





After a few times of holding the indicator in position and trimming the tab I arrived at this.  I just drilled and tapped a 1/4-20 hole for the indicator lug.





I'm not crazy about how the probe hits the carriage, but this was the best I could get with my set up.  I might make/buy a disc type probe end.  I think it might interface with the carriage in a more secure way.





A few shots of the finished holder.  With this design I think I can also thread a bolt into the clamp and use it as a solid carriage stop.





I could also use a slightly longer bolt...





I'd like to pick up a separate indicator for this clamp.  Right now I'm robbing the one from my magnetic adjustable arm base.  I use the adjustable arm to center up pieces in the 4 jaw, so I use it kind of a lot.


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine project No:1 for me was to do some yard work, i bought a bunch of strawberry plants, and chosen a place in between both yards. I have an ugly concrete fence on which the footings are shown, so i decided to use couple of old tires to hide it and in the same time to get rid of a bunch of old tires. I had some help and the weather was beautiful, i used 15" tires in the bottom row and 14" cut in half on the top row, i also use different width tires to cover the ugly part. I filled all the tires with dirt and used couple of screws to hold them in place. Then i made couple of rows and planted the strawberry plants, to be honest i did not do any of the planting, i'm too rough with the plants. I'll leave it alone for couple of weeks, so the tires get washed by rain and bakehed by the sun, i'll come back with some paint to make them more interesting.


----------



## Weldo

Looks good, man!  Your gonna have a lot of strawberries!  They make the best jellies and jams!


----------



## JohnG

Don't mind the quarantine so much, but the spring snow has me feeling confined.  These are desperate times, so:

I ground the teeth off some old saw blades.



There's a dish wheel mounted backwards so I can watch the progress.

I set up my saw vise, shop made from heavy angle iron with ground jaws, on a low bench.





I cut in new teeth using 10, 12, and 16 tpi spacing guides I drew in AutoCad and plotted to scale--that's 128 uniform, very little teeth 16 tpi in an 8" saw.





Then I set and sharpened them, every other tooth left and right. The double spaced guide was indispensable. 





And now I have 3 sharp saws, ready to cut.  I made a new walnut handle for the middle saw while I was at it.




This took me until the snow melted.  I'm headed out into my woods to do some pruning and thinning--anything I don't need a magnifying glass for.


----------



## jwmelvin

Tio Loco said:


> Finally nailed down a design for end mill storage that I like, and got them printed up. Each row has a recess on the bottom that fits into a half round in the top of the row above forming the staggered steps.



These look nice. Are you willing to share the files?

Nice work on the grinder rest too.


----------



## C-Bag

Tio Loco said:


> Built a grinder rest for my long suffering often abused (survived 15 years on a bench in a carport in S. Florida) Delta 6". Not fancy, but functional and sturdy enough for my needs.
> 
> View attachment 321700
> 
> 
> View attachment 321701
> 
> 
> Finally nailed down a design for end mill storage that I like, and got them printed up. Each row has a recess on the bottom that fits into a half round in the top of the row above forming the staggered steps.
> 
> View attachment 321703
> 
> 
> View attachment 321702
> 
> 
> Also printed up a couple of peg board holders for hex drivers
> 
> View attachment 321704
> 
> 
> Still have one more design to print. Next up, running shop air to the lathe, but that involves getting up in the attic, and it's already getting hot here...    ;-(


All great projects Tio Loco. I particularly like the tool rest. But I'm spoiled by my Baldor copy tool grinder with the guides. I don't seem to have the ability to repeat freehand angles like I used to when younger. So I keep trying to find a quick easy way to come up with something for my 8" bench grinder. 

Add to this my brother gave me this table off a Shopsmith tablesaw. It's wide enough to span the whole grinder, has a pretty nice built in tilt with 90deg stop and is actually cast iron. But it presents as many problems as it solves trying to adapt it. #1 being it needs to be half as deep. Then if I cut it down I'd have to redo the mounts for the tilt and most annoying of all the slots for the gauge are some proprietary width. Good thing it was free. Close but no cigar.


----------



## Tio Loco

@Weldo thanks, but compared to Harold Hall's designs, it's downright crude.

@C-Bag I'm still noodling the idea of a shallow channel across the rest that would accept guides, but I still don't know what I don't know.

@jwmelvin I'm glad to share, that's what this is all about.  End mill cutter storage trays


----------



## Weldo

@JohnG awesome work on the saws!  Man, I hand sharpened 3 saws in my life, it's a tedious process for sure, but a freshly sharpened saw cuts so nicely!  I did two similar to this one:  




I sharpened one as a rip saw and the other as a cross cut saw.  The other one was a big ol back saw from a miter box like this one:




My dad (carpenter) used to use an old miter box like this way back in the 70s.  Now that the saw is good and sharp I use it every now and then in the workshop.  It's surprisingly quick cutting and accurate.

Hand sharpening of saws is such a brilliant art.  The little bit I practiced gave me a cool feeling of connection with tradesmen of times past.  Neat stuff.  I got most of my info from one of Roy Underhill's books


----------



## Weldo

Made a tip for my dial indicator this morning.  This is the smallest thread I've ever cut!  Research says that most indicators have a 4-48 thread.  I couldn't even confirm this as my thread pitch gauge only goes up to 40!  Or is it down to 40...  Oh well, a little blind faith never hurts I guess.

Here's the blank, turned down from 1/4" steel to about 0.111".





Threading tool had to be smallened quite a bit.  I tried to keep the 60 degree point as close as I dare to the left side.  The threads are so small that I probably could have gone even closer to the left.





I elected to not make a thread run out groove because I thought it would make the part even more fragile than it already is.





After just a few passes at a very slow speed...





Tiny threads!





Originally I had planned to turn down the other end to a long narrow shaft, maybe 0.125 by 1.000", then heat/bend it into a dog leg shape so that the indicator would hit the carriage more squarely.  Then I thought, I have some old Noga deburring tool blades.  They're already a dog leg shape and hardened to boot.  So I did this, bored a 0.125" hole in the opposite end...





And slid in a deburring tool blade








The finished part!





The dog leg allows the indicator to hit the carriage a little more squarely.





In this pic it looks like there's a slight misalignment between the indicator shaft and my part.  Could the end of the indicator shaft not be square?  This is a cheap Harbor Freight indicator.





Another view.  Still looks to be very slightly not straight.





As far as keeping the deburring blade in the tip, I was considering just using a drop or two of Loctite.  Alternatively I think I can drill/tap a cross hole for a 6-32 set screw.  Any thoughts on that?


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine project No: 2 To make me a tool cart form my wrenches and other mechanics tools. And being quarantine i have to make it from what i have. So i dig around my garage and come up with those pieces of steel, shopping cart wheels, boards and 4 steel drawer slides. First i assembled the draws without the fronts, that give me the dimensions for the frame work. I cut and welded the tubing to make the bottom frame, i used 45 degree cuts to avoid any open holes, then i welded the wheels to it and then welded the up rights. At this point the tire shop called i had to go and pick up my wheels for the 607 so i'll continue tomorrow.


----------



## Downunder Bob

You are one busy man, do you actually have a proper job or do you just make and fix stuff, perhaps that is your job. I admire your enthusiasm, just watching all that you do tires me out.


----------



## GoceKU

Downunder Bob said:


> You are one busy man, do you actually have a proper job or do you just make and fix stuff, perhaps that is your job. I admire your enthusiasm, just watching all that you do tires me out.



Bob, i have one full time job and one part time job plus i take on jobs on the side, i'm averaging 1,5 hours a sleep during the week and 3 hours during the weekend, but its been like that for years now, i had to change jobs and take time to recover about a year ago when i injured my back, but thankfully i'm back to full work days no pain.


----------



## Downunder Bob

Lucky you have no pain from injured back. mine still gives me a hard time after 35 years, but I get by. I'm well and truly retired, so mostly I can take it easy when I need to.

I don't know how you survive  on 1 to 3 hours sleep. I used to have only 4-5 hrs when I worked on the ships, but after 4 mths when I went home on leave I was exhausted and slept for 3 to 4 days. Nowadays I usually have 6 to 7 hours, and sometimes a nap in the afternoon.


----------



## GoceKU

Downunder Bob said:


> Lucky you have no pain from injured back. mine still gives me a hard time after 35 years, but I get by. I'm well and truly retired, so mostly I can take it easy when I need to.



I'll give you a clue, how i manage with so little sleep. I'm 30, my full time job is more of a desk job which preserves my energy for the rest of my day, i do a lot of driving and i drive french cars with soft and comfortable ride. If i can do a job sitting down i'm grabbing a chair and working as comfortably as i can. Not that i don't have no pain from my injured back but they are so small and so far in between i don't mind them.


----------



## Downunder Bob

If only I was only 30, I remember back 46 years ago when I was. Just starting out in Marine engineering, good salary and rarely more than 60 hours work a week, regular long holidays. Life, as they say, was a beach. That was before the socialists came in and wrecked the place. We are still recovering. I admire your drive and skill. You have a good wide range of skills for only 30, and your command of English is also very good, I wouldn't be surprised if you spoke half a dozen other languages. Good luck keep up the great work.


----------



## Weldo

Just finished a small modification to my belt sander.

This motor operates in close proximity to very abrasive grinding dust.  I was starting to get nervous about the fan sucking in the dust and ruining the motor.  So I figured I'd try to make a cover for the end.

This is what the end looks like, open.





My cover is just a very thin aluminum sheet that blocks the fan end from sucking in dust.





I peeled the rear facing edge away slightly to allow at least some air flow.  This edge faces away from the belt.





I'll keep an eye on motor temperature but usually it only runs for a few minutes at a time and then at pretty light loads.  I think it'll be fine but if it starts to get hot too often I'll peel back some more of the cover.


----------



## FOMOGO

I think you will find it's going to over heat if run for any meaningful length of time. You might try putting some kind of cloth or foam filter on the inlet side, and see how that works. Leave the outlet side open. Mike


----------



## Weldo

Yea, that's a possibility I guess.  Maybe I could drill a few big holes in my aluminum cover and sandwich a piece of clothe or coffee filter between the cover and the motor.  That's a good idea, thanks @FOMOGO!


----------



## GoceKU

Part 2 on quarantine project No: 2 , i continued with the frame, cut the tubing and welded them, i used a round bar and some sheet steel on the front to make it more comfortable to work on it, i also rounded the edges and fully welded the open tubes and grounded them smooth, then come to find and fit the top and bottom i used some darker color with a bit of texture so it can take a beating and not look awful. Then came the difficult task of fixing the drows, i had to weld on extasons because the slides did not reach, i did fix them first by screws but then welded them. Last thing i did is to disassemble it and paint the frame. I used truck bed liner thinned so i can apply it with a paint gun, my thinking is should last longer. The plan going forward is to assemble it, cut and fix the draw faces and handles and wrap the entire cabinet in zinc plated sheet metal.


----------



## Weldo

That's shaping up pretty good @GoceKU.  You're gonna gain a lot of storage space with that!  Minimal footprint too.

I just finished another small upgrade on the lathe.

I made a more robust cross slide cover.  With this I can mount a mag base indicator and finally measure tool height to get on center.  Believe it or not I've never once measured my tool height!

The cover is 3/16" thick and about 3-1/4" wide by 5" long.  I had to drill/tap two additional holes in the cross slide.  The original screw is the one in  the middle but it proved insufficient to anchor the plate in a satisfactory manner.





Mag base!  The cover doesn't move or flex at all.  Very solid!





I'm not sure what else I can do to this lathe.  It's in a much better place than it was at the end of March, that's for sure!  I should probably check the alignment...


----------



## Logan 400

Now I have the space for them I decided to clean up these two cabinets and put them to good use. This one had a broken glass on one door. I removed the glass from both doors and replaced them both with plexiglass. Cabinets are 47" x 28". Here is one and the other will be installed on top.



Thanks for looking.
Jay


----------



## epanzella

Ran a new line and converted my round column mill to 220 volts. At 2500 rpm setting it spools up in half the time.


----------



## C-Bag

I got a chance yesterday to make the final push to adapt the speed vise I picked up in a yard sale years ago to my HF 5x6.
Besides machining the block and shaft I'd also decided to thread the inside of the adapter shaft to make a more positive link to the lead screw. It was 18mm X 2.5. It also has a set screw for little pilot that sticks out the end of the lead screw. Not perfect but another lessonlearned. The big challenge for me was to mount to the body of the saw because nothing is square because of draft when they cast the base. Rather than grind or machine the end of the base I went with adapting to the angle of the schwangle. It works so i guess it's ok. I'll probably have to do a project where I'm using the saw a lot to know for sure where I screwed up. One thing is the crank handle hits the saw arm if it's all the way down and the vise is all the way closed. But with my homebrew stop it never has to be all the way down now so not a problem, yet. I also included a pic of cutting the sides for the mount on my HF vertical bandsaw with the supergofaster highly modded auto sled.


----------



## pontiac428

I finally got a metal project done, since COVID-19 is keeping the building inspectors away and has left my shop project at a standstill. This is a stand for my Lagun mill. It is 1x2 CRS that supports big 3/4 thread poly mounts. Should keep the mill level.


----------



## C-Bag

pontiac428 said:


> I finally got a metal project done, since COVID-19 is keeping the building inspectors away and has left my shop project at a standstill. This is a stand for my Lagun mill. It is 1x2 CRS that supports big 3/4 thread poly mounts. Should keep the mill level.


That sux your shop is on hold. Does that mean you have nowhere to work or you are just no supposed to be in there yet? Jealous you are having a shop built.


----------



## pontiac428

My tools are in storage units, except my RF30, Atlas lathe, band saw, and tool grinder, which are shoehorned into the basement. I can't wait for moving day into the shop! It's been a long time.


----------



## GoceKU

Pontiac 428, having to wait to move in a shop is the worst, hope you find a secure dry spot to store your equipment and honda parts, any pictures of the new shop?


----------



## FOMOGO

Been working on my $500 zero turn mower. Had a new 20hp Kohler motor installed the year before I bought it and all three blade shaft and bearing assembly's replaced, so I figured it was worth a little effort to get the rest of it up to snuff. It had 5 cracks in the pressed steel frame, so time for a little welding. Stripped all the paint with a flap disc, drilled the ends of all the cracks and welded them up. Was supposed to be 11 gauge steel, but the forming process made it considerably thinner in some areas. Once I had the cracks welded up, I took some 5/16" rod, and formed it to fit the area where it flares out at the lower part of the frame and welded it in top and bottom. Now we all know how one thing leads to another, and while the welds were okay, I decided to do some build up and blend it all in like I do on motorcycle frames, but it is a lawn mower, so not quite to that degree of finish. Have a short list of other things to fix and upgrade on it, but pretty happy that this part is done. Mike


----------



## GoceKU

Part 3 of Quarantine project No: 2, Today i started with mounting the top and bottom boards, i had to cut the corners on the top one a bit more because the sliders are in the way, i used some screws and some glue to secure them, then i looked around to find something to wrap it in. I did find a thin sheet of galvanised sheet metal but it was a foot too short, so i went to the steel place, had to wait in line for half an hour because of the epidemic they are only allowing one customer at a time, bought me a sheet of galvanized sheet metal 0.8-0.9mm, also bought couple of lengths of square tubing, for a future project. Got it home and wraped the cart in it, i used pop rivits and scrows to secure it. Last thing i did is to mount the drawers, i still need to find and make the drawer faces and handles. At first i was thinking just to cut some whiteboard but with it looking this good i may invest some time in making good looking wood ones.


----------



## C-Bag

FOMOGO said:


> Been working on my $500 zero turn mower. Had a new 20hp Kohler motor installed the year before I bought it and all three blade shaft and bearing assembly's replaced, so I figured it was worth a little effort to get the rest of it up to snuff. It had 5 cracks in the pressed steel frame, so time for a little welding. Stripped all the paint with a flap disc, drilled the ends of all the cracks and welded them up. Was supposed to be 11 gauge steel, but the forming process made it considerably thinner in some areas. Once I had the cracks welded up, I took some 5/16" rod, and formed it to fit the area where it flares out at the lower part of the frame and welded it in top and bottom. Now we all know how one thing leads to another, and while the welds were okay, I decided to do some build up and blend it all in like I do on motorcycle frames, but it is a lawn mower, so not quite to that degree of finish. Have a short list of other things to fix and upgrade on it, but pretty happy that this part is done. Mike
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 322450
> View attachment 322451
> View attachment 322452
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 322466
> View attachment 322452
> View attachment 322459
> View attachment 322460
> View attachment 322463
> View attachment 322465
> View attachment 322466


Nice work Mike. What a job welding and blending that all in. I'm in awe of you restoration guys. I don't even try to go that deep down the rabbit hole because I'll go crazy with how it snowballs or I'll give up. Are you going to paint it? I loved the little Ariens I had because it was a square tube frame and all powdercoated. Killed me to get rid of it.


----------



## matthewsx

Back in January I was looking at Craigslist free stuff ads and there was a guy in Watsonville who wanted some scrap metal hauled away. In with the old washing machine and bed frames was this guy.










Well, I beat feet down there and picked up everything he wanted to get rid of including this little Italian beauty. She'd been abused and neglected but I just knew she had a heart of gold and wanted to get back to work.....

So, I stripped her down and started cleaning.




Gears turned




Motor tested good




A little elbow grease and some paint and I have a nice hobby shop sized cold saw....







She goes through steel and aluminum like butter at 50rpm, I even have a spare blade

John


----------



## hman

Fantastic save!


----------



## FOMOGO

Thanks for the kind words. Did another round of buildup and blending on the frame, and a quick squirt of paint. Also built a battery box to replace the rinky-dink setup it had from the factory, and welded it in for a little additional frame stiffening. Made the hold down from some threaded rod and part of the old battery retainer. Had a leaking axle seal on one side, so I replaced both of them. The two hydro-static drive units are supposed to be non-serviceable (no drain plugs), so I decided to yank them out. Drained them from there fill plugs, and flushed them out with some diesel. The oil in one was like new, and the other was filthy. Looks like one must one had been replaced, or repaired at some point. While I had the welder out I did a little cosmetic surgery on my 25 year old chop saw. At some point in the distant past I had a major oops moment, and cut a nice slice in the base. Also did a quick and dirty rack for my welding table to hang my grinders. Always just kept them on the shelf underneath, and every time I would pull one out, half the stuff on the shelf would come out with it. Something I should have done years ago, but just never seemed to get to. Back at it tomorrow. Cheers, Mike

Quote: Nice work Mike. What a job welding and blending that all in. I'm in awe of you restoration guys. I don't even try to go that deep down the rabbit hole because I'll go crazy with how it snowballs or I'll give up. Are you going to paint it? I loved the little Ariens I had because it was a square tube frame and all powdercoated. Killed me to get rid of it.


----------



## GoceKU

*matthewsx , A friend of my has the same saw slow turning HSS blade, when the blade gets dull it starts to snap the roll pin in the spindle, i'll advise use it for softer materials.*


----------



## jwmelvin

FOMOGO said:


> Also did a quick and dirty rack my welding table to hang my grinders.



I did the same thing the other day for my grinding bench, along with a piece of muffler tube for my heat gun.


----------



## C-Bag

matthewsx said:


> She goes through steel and aluminum like butter at 50rpm, I even have a spare blade



He shoots he scores! Wow, the stuff people toss, what were they thinking? Very handy and talk about heavy duty. You've made some really good saves.


----------



## matthewsx

GoceKU said:


> *matthewsx , A friend of my has the same saw slow turning HSS blade, when the blade gets dull it starts to snap the roll pin in the spindle, i'll advise use it for softer materials.*



Thanks, good to hear from someone who's actually seen one in the wild. Not planning on cutting hardened steel with it, mostly aluminum and mild steel tubing/angle. The blades aren't cheap but not too bad really, the guy I got it from actually gave me a spare 

John


----------



## Weldo

I've spent some time over the last few days doing some intellectual projects.  I'm trying to learn CAD.  There's enough free programs and great youtube tutorials that I have no excuse!

I made this by following a tutorial on youtube: here

Screen capture:





It's so super awesome!  CAD is so neat!  I love how easy it is to add dimension lines and dimensions.

I've also been thinking about dabbling in Arduino, but learning some CAD is probably enough for my brain right now.


----------



## GoceKU

*@matthewsx, it's been a decade since i've used the identical saw i remember cutting some thick angle iron, you must start with very light pressure on the handle so it won't grab and pull out the material out of the vice then press hard on the straight and again let off when you are at the end or if you have a sharp corner like on square tubing, the torque is incredible, the blade can stop but very rarely most often it will brake a tooth or snap the roll pin inside. The pin was standard 8mm if i remember right around 60mm long but it's been long time since i've had to deal with it.*


----------



## Weldo

Guys!  I just finished my first ever CAD drawing!  Check it out, it's the clamp piece I made for the Atlas lathe taper attachment:




For the threads I just did the simplified method.

I don't know if LibreCAD can do weld symbols so I just did something generic.

The font is weird but it's the first one on the list of many many fonts.

Anyone have any criticisms?  It might look kind of cluttered and the dimensions could probably be laid out in a neater way, but overall I'm fairly happy with it.

I've included the .dxf file if there's any need for that.


----------



## f350ca

Wanted to make a batch of sour kraut but hate cutting up the cabbage so built a shredder.
The body is 1/2 inch poly with 3/4 for the sides. The knife was an old straight edge, think its ferritic stainless, seams really tough and took a beautiful edge.




Will reduce a head of cabbage to shreds in about a minute. Way faster than a knife, but it would love to reduce a finger too.




Also made a rammer to pack it into the pail.




Should have a batch in about a month.

Greg


----------



## matthewsx

f350ca said:


> Wanted to make a batch of sour kraut but hate cutting up the cabbage so built a shredder.
> The body is 1/2 inch poly with 3/4 for the sides. The knife was an old straight edge, think its ferritic stainless, seams really tough and took a beautiful edge.
> 
> View attachment 322811
> 
> 
> Will reduce a head of cabbage to shreds in about a minute. Way faster than a knife, but it would love to reduce a finger too.
> 
> View attachment 322813
> 
> 
> Also made a rammer to pack it into the pail.
> 
> View attachment 322814
> 
> 
> Should have a batch in about a month.
> 
> Greg


What you have built is called a mandoline, yes they are quite  dangerous but you can build a pusher for it pretty easy.








						The Best Inexpensive Mandoline Slicers, According to Our Tests
					

A mandoline makes quick work of some cutting tasks, like when you need even, thin slices. We tested mandolines under $50 to find the best ones.




					www.seriouseats.com
				




John


----------



## rwm

We have a mandolin. They are as dangerous as power tools! Definitely make a pusher. 
Robert


----------



## dirty tools

Putting on a new bed on my toy hauler 
hopefully I will have it completed by Monday


----------



## FOMOGO

Back on the mower rehab. There is a gear toothed lever that engages an external shaft mounted gear on each of the hydro-static drive units that are engaged by pushing the right hand steering lever outward which acts as a brake for both drive units. The teeth on the levers had been almost completely worn away due to improperly installed linkage, and not having a return spring incorporated in the original linkage design. I looked up the part on line and they wanted $63 plus shipping for each one. $150 for two little pieces of pot metal. So another self inflicted job. Decided to build up the worn tooth area with JB Weld, and try my hand at free form tooth creation. Seems to have worked pretty well, but time will tell. May end up remaking them out of steel if these don't hold up. The floor board area originally had three sections of non-skid material glued on, but only one remained, so I sanded those areas down and applied several coats of rubberized rattle can undercoating. Looks decent, and seems pretty tough. Mike


----------



## Weldo

Did a little repair on a dial indicator yesterday.

Back when I was testing the tiny thread I made a few posts ago something broke inside the indicator.  I put too much torque on the shaft and broke the corner out of the tiny plastic channel that keeps the shaft from rotating.

The indicator has a small stub that rides in a channel (here removed) to keep it aligned with the pinion gear.





I had broken off the corner of the plastic channel thus causing the stub to hang up on occasion.  I glued the piece back on with some plastic cement and then CA glued a small strip of balsa on top for reinforcement.





Seems to work like normal.  Gotta be careful of that in the future.


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine project No: 3 I have around 5 Cars at all time on the road, and all of them have winter and summer tires with rims, storing them is becoming a real headache. So i did a bit of planning and started making a tire rack, the plan is to have space for 20 tires on one level and only easy to access sturdy wall is on the entrance, this isn't a big deal only i have to mount it pretty high on the wall. Started by marking and cutting the material for the wall mounts. Also made reinforcement braces that i welded them, ground down, drill 2 holes pre mount and painted them green. The paint is slow drying so i took the outside to get baked by the sun, i'll have some difficulties assembling them in place and mounting them on the wall. I plan to use thick wall tubing to have rigidity and not to be afraid to walk under them.


----------



## Weldo

Well, looks like my projects will be slowing down a bit.  I officially go back to work tomorrow morning!  I have mixed feelings about it.

Obviously it has to happen eventually, and I'm grateful to have a job to return to, but man, you get used to it in a hurry, staying home everyday!  Waking up late, eating a proper breakfast, tinkering in the workshop for a few hours, doing some yard work/home improvements.

It sucks that this time off came with such a negative root cause but it sure was damn productive for me!  I can look back on this thread and know that I did my best to make use of this time off from work.

I'd like to thank everyone for participating in this thread and for all the positivity you've spread amid these times of utter *******t!  All you guys were a huge part of my productivity.  Having a community of people who are interested in what I'm doing has helped me a lot!  I've enjoyed sharing all my little projects and I've enjoyed reading about all of yours!  The desire to share what I've been working on has been super motivating and I can't thank you all enough for all the kind words and advice!

So keep the projects going!  Some of us may be going back to work but we're still urged to practice social distancing and all that.  Let's continue to make the best of this time!


----------



## middle.road

You've got to be running low on welding perishables.   
Every time I check this thread I'm envious of those that can weld.

Projects done to date:
Weldo - _Numerous_, Me - _Zero_... Haven't even gotten the shop cleaned up yet.



Weldo said:


> Well, looks like my projects will be slowing down a bit.  I officially go back to work tomorrow morning!  I have mixed feelings about it.
> 
> Obviously it has to happen eventually, and I'm grateful to have a job to return to, but man, you get used to it in a hurry, staying home everyday!  Waking up late, eating a proper breakfast, tinkering in the workshop for a few hours, doing some yard work/home improvements.
> 
> It sucks that this time off came with such a negative root cause but it sure was damn productive for me!  I can look back on this thread and know that I did my best to make use of this time off from work.
> 
> I'd like to thank everyone for participating in this thread and for all the positivity you've spread amid these times of utter *******t!  All you guys were a huge part of my productivity.  Having a community of people who are interested in what I'm doing has helped me a lot!  I've enjoyed sharing all my little projects and I've enjoyed reading about all of yours!  The desire to share what I've been working on has been super motivating and I can't thank you all enough for all the kind words and advice!
> 
> So keep the projects going!  Some of us may be going back to work but we're still urged to practice social distancing and all that.  Let's continue to make the best of this time!


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine project No: 3 Part 2, Today was a long day on ladders, drilling, hammering, welding. Started the day with making and drilling holes in the concrete wall to secure the mounts to the wall, i used 14mm ankers on the top, then i used 12mm and 8mm rebar in the second hole and one on the bottom. Then i welded couple of tubes together and managed to get it bolted to the door frame and tack welded it on the other end on two of the mounts and suprase, my welder run out of wire, so i had to stop, tomorrow i'll buy a new spool of wire and continue, i hope you like seeing stuff like this.


----------



## Weldo

middle.road said:


> You've got to be running low on welding perishables.



Haha, yea, I've got only 200psi of argon left.

The first day back to work was rough!  We started right into some heavy demo work.  Man, we should be allowed to do half days for the fist week!  I don't want to alarm anyone but I may have the beginnings of a blister...


----------



## Weldo

That's awesome @GoceKU!  Putting stuff up high can make it tough to access but it's just wasted space otherwise.  Use it up!


----------



## middle.road

Weldo said:


> Haha, yea, I've got only 200psi of argon left.
> 
> The first day back to work was rough!  We started right into some heavy demo work.  Man, we should be allowed to do half days for the fist week!  I don't want to alarm anyone but I may have the beginnings of a blister...


Here ya go!


----------



## Weldo

Hahaha thanks a lot!  Why doesn't the Band-Aids package have sex appeal anymore?  Ah the good old days!

Man, working for 8 hours is harder than I remember it!


----------



## Tio Loco

Dang! You guys have all been working on big projects. I feel like I'm just piddling.

Bought one of the $12 misters off of Ebay, and printed a couple of mounts for it.




Didn't really like that one, just seems too big on my little mill, but I'll have it if I ever need it. Second version has four rare earth magnets pressed into the base....







Not terribly impressed with the mister, but it will do. You have to keep the bottle within about a foot of the same height as the nozzle. Too low, and it won't draw, too high and it dribbles even without air.

I have a set of small drivers for RC, and the ratchet handle gave up the ghost last year, so I'm printing dedicated handles for each.




My printer has a bed sensor for adjusting the nozzle height. Originally the height of the sensor was just hit or miss, tightening up two cap screws, making adjustments tedious as f***. A couple of years ago I machined an aluminum slide mount for it which used a M4 button head screw to set the height. This was light years better, but still a pain having to grab a hex driver every time I needed to dial in the height. These adjustments are often 1/8 turn to fine tune things, so still fiddly. I took a leap and turned a brass M4 x 44mm thumb screw to do the job, and surprised myself by nailing it the first time. Much better...




So dummy me had to replace one of the Igaging scales on the mill, and bought one that was too short, and had to buy another one the correct length. Not sure where, but I saw where someone had put a DRO on the tailstock quill of a lathe. Since I already had an extra scale, why not? Made a split collar for the quill (narrow enough so that I can still eject the Morse taper tools) and printed the scale mounts.














Jury is still out, not a fan of the location of the display, but it works pretty good, and if it is ever in the way, it's just two screws to pop it off.

Finally, just for fun a new adult size speed knob for the lathe.




And a couple of adult size, not sloppy-ass plastic crank handles for the mill.




Hope everyone is staying safe and sane, particularly you @Weldo it's crazy out in the world these days.


----------



## hman

That's a whole bunchalot of good things you've 3D printed and fabricated!!!


----------



## GreatOldOne

Spent the past week designing and printing this - a case to house the my smart home 'hub'. It contains two Raspberry PI single board computers and an Arduino Mega. The Mega runs custom firmware to act as an RF transceiver to all my house alarm components (Movement, door sensors, smoke detectors). A Pi 3 runs my WIFI CCTV cameras, and the other takes care of the signals received by the arduino and all the lights. The case is modular, so it could be used for anything really - you just need to design a carrier board that slots in.


















						Multiple Raspberry Pi / Arduino Case  by GreatOldOne
					

A case to hold multiple single board computers or microprocessors. Design includes mounts for PI3 & PI4 (they have the same footprint) and Arduino Mega.  Step files are included for all components. Note - if you need access to the other ports on the PIs etc, you may have to rework the carrier /...




					www.thingiverse.com


----------



## GoceKU

Quarantine project No: 3 Part 3 Today i bought me a new mig wire spool and continued with welding, this was hard work, i added a cross brace on all the mounts, did a bit grounding to smooth some of the welds, couple coats of paint and it will be done. I plan to run couple of safety cables to a higher point. I hope you like seeing staff like this.


----------



## Weldo

All great stuff here!

@Tio Loco I love the lathe dro!  I saw someone, possibly on the forum, do something similar with an old digital caliper.  It's kinda half assed but I have an old Chinese caliper layin around.  I like your mount design.

@GreatOldOne your enclosure is cool!  Looks like it took a while to draft up!  I'm guessing you have some experience with Arduino and Raspberry Pi.  I've been thinking about getting my feet wet with coding and such, got any quick recommendations for how to get started?


----------



## GunsOfNavarone

I know I should feel blessed to have stayed employed during this quarantine, but I'm pretty envious of all the time/projects that people here and in my neighborhood have done. I come home pooped, go to bed, get up early and repeat...
Great stuff here, I've got to find some time!


----------



## GreatOldOne

Weldo said:


> @GreatOldOne your enclosure is cool!  Looks like it took a while to draft up!  I'm guessing you have some experience with Arduino and Raspberry Pi.  I've been thinking about getting my feet wet with coding and such, got any quick recommendations for how to get started?



I‘d say an Arduino uno would be your gateway drug... 

they’re cheap and easy to code for with the Arduino IDE. A raspberry pi is essentially an entire PC on a single board. The Arduino is just a small relatively slow microprocessor with some additional bits to allow it to talk with the outside world.  Check out the official arduino website for some ideas:





						Arduino - Home
					

Open-source electronic prototyping platform enabling users to create interactive electronic objects.




					www.arduino.cc


----------



## AGCB97

I've gone through most of the microcontroller types but settled in on Parallax Propeller for simplicity of programming and power and usefulness of system. Also has a great forum for help and ideas (just like this forum).

Here's a little site to look at








						Meet the Parallax Propeller QuickStart Board
					

Meet the Parallax Propeller QuickStart Board:  The Propeller processor chip is the most unique micro-controller on the market today.  It's not just a single microprocessor, but EIGHT independent processors that share resources like memory and I/O pins.   And it can do some pretty…




					www.instructables.com
				




Aaron


----------



## Boswell

AGCB97 said:


> Parallax Propeller


I have built projects using several different micro processors but by goto and favorite is the Parallax Propeller. Easy to lean, easy to integrate and fast.  Did is say FAST!.  Just like I have multiple hammers in my tool box, there are times that the Arduino is the right "hammer" for the job at hand. Or the Raspberry Pi.

You will find that the forum community at Parallax is very friendly and helpful, reminds me of a certain hobby machinist forum . Also the Parallax company is very geared up for education and has great tutorials and "getting started" kits.


----------



## graham-xrf

I made the profiles for the base and foundations of future _*machine shop/man-cave/hideout*_.
I used any planks and MDF I could find.
I painted them up with the leavings of a perforated can of Dulux "Magnolia", to keep the water out.
This all required first the table saw electrics get a new E-Stop switch and stop/start electrics + new blade.

I re-worked some wood into 47mm square x 600mm cut with points, to make the the stakes protected from water by Synthaprufe for the parts that will go into the ground. Building suppliers have stopped. I got the raw materials from farmer neighbour. Planting wildflower seeds everywhere I go. Thinking about how much SWA mains power cable has to be buried to feed this folly.

Laser level in use. Laying out the site. Measuring. Digging and moving earth by hand. About the farthest thing from getting hands on real metal and doing HM-type stuff imaginable.

I suppose you might call it a "quarantine project".


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## Janderso

Goce,
I hope you didn't burn any of that galvanized coating. That stuff is really bad to breath. Never have heard of that welder?? 
Work out ok for you?


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## GoceKU

Janderso said:


> Goce,
> I hope you didn't burn any of that galvanized coating. That stuff is really bad to breath. Never have heard of that welder??
> Work out ok for you?



I used my grinder to grind back as much of the coating as i could, i know is toxic but i've done it many times before no bad effects. My welder is Varstroj varmig 160 c that is a slovenian company they are good machines at affordable prices, i've recently modified it with those big wheels and i've changed the ground cable.


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## GunsOfNavarone

GreatOldOne said:


> I‘d say an Arduino uno would be your gateway drug...
> 
> they’re cheap and easy to code for with the Arduino IDE. A raspberry pi is essentially an entire PC on a single board. The Arduino is just a small relatively slow microprocessor with some additional bits to allow it to talk with the outside world.  Check out the official arduino website for some ideas:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Arduino - Home
> 
> 
> Open-source electronic prototyping platform enabling users to create interactive electronic objects.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.arduino.cc


This seems really daunting. I'm not a computer idiot, but even basic commands...say DOS, isn't something I can do much with. I know Arduino doesn't use DOS commands, but it still seems to be alpha/numeric mumbo jumbo. How do you do it? Is there U.I. that makes this easier? Like ITTT?


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## rwm

I think you have to have an interest in learning to code to play in this sandbox.
Except for the Rasp Pi 4 which is pretty much a PC.
Robert


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## Weldo

Thanks for the guidance fellas!  If I don't get into Arduino this month I probably will some time this summer.  I've not heard of Parallax Propeller, I will check that out too!

One of the main reasons I've been inspired to learn some programming is this guy.

https://bps.space/

He's been designing/building highly engineered model rockets for a few years and one of the things he's been working on is thrust vector control at the model scale.  Below is a GIF image of how small servo motors can manipulate the rocket engine in response to external stimuli in order to keep the vehicle going straight.







He designed and built the mounts and such with a 3D printer and even designed his own flight control circuit board.

While this level of programming is likely not for the beginner, this is the type of thing that is possible with Arduino and Raspberry Pi and the like.  It has me intrigued, though to be honest I don't have an idea about what I want to do with it.


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## AGCB97

Check out this 1+ minute vid. It uses a 'drag and drop' programming method that doesn't get any easier.





						blocklyprop - Bing video
					






					www.bing.com
				




One thing I like about Propeller is that with 8 cogs, you can do 8 separate things at once (simultaneously)! Not just one after another like a single core processor.
For instance, in the program pictured, there is a RTC' real time clock' constantly keeping track of days, hours, secs etc.;
10 temperature sensors; 2 door sensors; as well as 4 other events; all being displayed on a TV screen with 4 different audible alarms. It also monitors the chimney temperature of my outside wood boiler and turns down the draft fan speed when the fire gets to the best temperature but doesn't let it get too hot.

Aaron


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## GoceKU

Quarantine Project No: 4 Making a steel planter for my yard, i used 10x30 mm tubing, marked them cut them to size, welded them, made the two sides and welded the cross braced. I plan to hang it and paint project 3 and 4 after lunch at once. This may look strange without the skin but once all together you'll see my design.


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## matthewsx

GoceKU said:


> Quarantine Project No: 4 Making a steel planter for my yard, i used 10x30 mm tubing, marked them cut them to size, welded them, made the two sides and welded the cross braced. I plan to hang it and paint project 3 and 4 after lunch at once. This may look strange without the skin but once all together you'll see my design.
> View attachment 323597
> View attachment 323598



You grow your own steel?

Johh


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## matthewsx

So a little more than a week ago I was looking on Craigslist and there was a die filer being offered for $40 not far from me. I've wondered about these tools since I first heard about them and even contemplated trying to make one from an old scroll saw I have. A quick trip and this one was mine.






Looks like I didn't get too many "before" pictures but you can see it was pretty grungy, I took it apart and drained the old oil.










Cleaned up the motor, here's just part of the swarf I got out of it.




Painted everything, replaced a few fasteners, sealed it up, new belt and oil.




It's a pretty cool machine, table can adjust to any angle and should speed up just about any filing job.


John


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## Weldo

Man, one work week down!  I was so tired after work on Monday!  Everyday I get a little stamina back.

So, this isn't _technically_ a quarantine project, but I feel like sharing.  A friend is trying to mount Harley Davidson saddlebags on his Vulcan, so he got the brackets and asked me to modify them.  The following is his design to mount up the bags to his rear fender.

This is the pair of brackets.




The plates were welded on by me.  He'll use these plates to drill/bolt the bags on.  The holes in the plate will be used to mount the bracket to the bike.




Gussets on the back side.  All this stuff was welded with 110V flux core.  My trusty old Lincoln SP135!  I bought it in 2001, it's almost 20 years old!





He also needed a backer plate made for the air cleaner.  Here's the template.




The plate fits into this grommet for an air tight fit.




I thought I'd be slick and cut this thing out with the lathe.  If I'd have known what a pain it was going to be I would have just sheared it out and sanded it down!

To get the clearance I needed I set up to cut the OD from the back side.  The metal is 1/8" 5052 aluminum.  The thickness is just right for the grommet.




Nother view.




Inverted tooling!  Craziness!!!




Holy chatter!  I had an awful time with this.  Chatter was very very bad.  A few times the tool caught and caused the piece to spin on the arbor.  I tried a few different speeds even down to back gears.  The slower the better for this.  I tried to feed in with the carriage as slowly as possible but it was extremely easy to catch the part and cause the arbor to slip.  Eventually the tool caught bad enough to break the tip off.

I finished cutting it out the old fashioned way.  I love this little shear!  It was very easy to follow the kerf made on the lathe.  It was over halfway through.




I put it back on the arbor and cleaned up the OD.  Even this chattered badly.  I tried a tool with lots of negative rake thinking it would help and it kind of did.  I again ran the lathe very slow.  Out of all the passes I did only one of them yielded a nice quiet cut with well formed strings of aluminum peeling off the part.  What I needed was a beefier arbor I think.  Trying to turn a 6.5" round disc on a 1" arbor is pretty asinine if you think about it, which I didn't until now.

All that's left is the ID.  I should be able to hold this in the 4 jaw and bore it out.  The finished size is around 1.875" so I may hole saw 1-3/4" to start.

Fun fact: you can see there's a concentric ring on the face which is where I almost cut the part too small!  I did a scratch then double checked the size with a tape measure.  Always double check!




A final view of the edge.  I filed it a lot to get this finish.  It's not great but better than the lathe cut finish.  Didn't feel like doing the sandpaper/polish bit.




Tomorrow I'll tackle the ID.  I hope it goes better!


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## GoceKU

Quarantine Projects No: 3 and 4 Got painted, i used the same green paint that i painted the mounts, now no one can say i don't like green  i also mounted rubber feet on the planter.


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## GunsOfNavarone

AGCB97 said:


> I've gone through most of the microcontroller types but settled in on Parallax Propeller for simplicity of programming and power and usefulness of system. Also has a great forum for help and ideas (just like this forum).
> 
> Here's a little site to look at
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Meet the Parallax Propeller QuickStart Board
> 
> 
> Meet the Parallax Propeller QuickStart Board:  The Propeller processor chip is the most unique micro-controller on the market today.  It's not just a single microprocessor, but EIGHT independent processors that share resources like memory and I/O pins.   And it can do some pretty…
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.instructables.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Aaron


So, say I purchased that board, what do you do with it? I'd have no idea what I could connect to it and how to program it do do whatever it was I wanted it to do. I just don't even know where to start. I mean, could you connect a simple tail stock type caliper to it and have it display on a DRO? I'd be very interested in that, but again, just because I can buy something, doesn't mean I could have the understanding how to use it.


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## AGCB97

They don't teach 1st graders trig. So first of all one needs to want to learn, either to do something specific or to put new tools in the tool box of your head. Then start simple. With computer classes they usually teach you how to get the screen to say "hello world", with a micro controller the 1st lesson is 'blink an LED'. After that there are tons of tutorials on YouTube. Some are very good and fit the skill level you are at. Others are above or below your current skill level or done by just plain poor teachers. I've learned many things on YouTube and continue to so. The other thing is a good forum to ask questions and get advice. By a good forum I mean, "are there members who are glad to teach and help you out". Are they friendly and put your interests and personality above their own? Like this forum is with machining and so much more. Many people with skills and experience and desirous to help others.

The next decision is yours. Think about it, count the cost and either jump in or pass.

Respectfully
Aaron


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## GreatOldOne

I've been doing an impression of a motor repair shop. My mill's DC motor decide to eat its brushes. 



I took the motor off, pressed out the rotor and cleaned up the commutator. 




Oh look - there's the rest of the brush... 




I also cleaned out the casing, and the brush holders. Buttoned it all back up, and waiting for the supplier to ring me back regarding replacement brushes... They're some sort of weird unobtanium size. 13.6mm high, 5 mm wide, no idea how long. Don't seem to be able to find them elsewhere on the interwebs.


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## AGCB97

You may be able to find some slightly larger and sand them down (easy) to fit. If you post a detailed picture with dimensions, I'll look through some boxes. I have quite a few.
Aaron


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## mmcmdl

The past 2 days I've been attempting to put some motors together for our chillers in at work . We'll throw one on first thing this morning and see if the rebuild was successful . We have about 25 of these old motors which cost 3 grand a pop . Not my idea of fun but the boss put me on it , and he pays my bills .


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## Aukai

Bearings, and brushes, or rewinding too.


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## GoceKU

Quarantine Projects No: 1 is doing well, all the plants made it and are blooming. I still need to get some paint and make it look a bit better. 


Quarantine Projects No: 4 i also finished, i had to bend the sheet metal in between couple pieces of tubing and i used a lot of rivets to secure the sheet metal to the frame then i had some help and planted couple of bushes.




Quarantine Projects No: 3 Got loaded, i stored 18 tires with rims, i have space maybe for one more for later, i plan to install some lights under it maybe a stereo also.


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## GreatOldOne

AGCB97 said:


> You may be able to find some slightly larger and sand them down (easy) to fit. If you post a detailed picture with dimensions, I'll look through some boxes. I have quite a few.
> Aaron



Thanks for the offer, but I’ve got some now.


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## middle.road

Well compared to the other projects here in the preceding (15) pages, this is bush league.
New ramp for the mower shed.
Despite best intentions, three lasers (for triangulation of start point), a transit (for excavation), two 4' levels and a chalk line, it came out uneven...
Still trying to figure out where I went wrong. One of the lasers must be out of calibration. 
The 8" portion shown between the new planks and the doors is the original steeply angled 2x6's.
I wanted a  'gentle' ramp that was not so severe. Too much of a 'drop-off' when coming out of the shed.
Should have demo'd out the original, but everytime we do that on this property it turns into major project, so we left it.
Besides, We still need to put a new roof on it and fix some of the trim, just like on the house...


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## GreatOldOne

Finally finished the project I was half way through when the mill died on me. It’s a hammock post, cunningly disguised as a rotary washing line / dryer.


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## GoceKU

Small update, Quarantine Projects No: 3 got an addition, i glued on a row of led lights, and got some more light over the work table, i've been inspecting the wall mounts its holding, on separation at the bolts. The Led's are 12v and i'll be installing a car stereo and a 12v power supply to power both, i don't lesson to music when i'm working, i like the quiet, but i often find myself working long in the night and getting sleepy if i'm working sitting down, music should help then.


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## GoceKU

Small update, Quarantine Projects No: 3 got an addition, i glued on a row of led lights, and got some more light over the work table, i've been inspecting the wall mounts its holding, on separation at the bolts. The Led's are 12v and i'll be installing a car stereo and a 12v power supply to power both, i don't lesson to music when i'm working, i like the quiet, but i often find myself working long in the night and getting sleepy if i'm working sitting down, music should help then.
View attachment 324357
View attachment 324358


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## Weldo

middle.road said:


> Despite best intentions, three lasers (for triangulation of start point), a transit (for excavation), two 4' levels and a chalk line, it came out uneven...



Haha, too much thinking and measuring maybe?  Looks good though!  Home Improvement!



GreatOldOne said:


> It’s a hammock post, cunningly disguised as a rotary washing line / dryer.



Man, that thing turned out beautifully!  Nice work!



GoceKU said:


> i don't lesson to music when i'm working, i like the quiet



I am also like that.  I usually prefer no music in the shop.  Sometimes it's nice on a jobsite, and sometimes it's obnoxious.  The racks look great by the way!  You're utilizing all that wasted space very well.


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## pontiac428

COVID-19 has given me the break from work to see some progress on my new shop. Finally sheeting the walls. Can't wait to move in...


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## Buffalo21

Damn!!  Look at that floor space!!


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## Weldo

Nice high ceilings too!


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## ACHiPo

pontiac428 said:


> COVID-19 has given me the break from work to see some progress on my new shop. Finally sheeting the walls. Can't wait to move in...


Nice!  What are the orange things under your mill?


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## pontiac428

ACHiPo said:


> Nice!  What are the orange things under your mill?


Those are machine skates.  They're like mover's dollies for heavy machinery.  Between the skates and the machine is just a leveling setup I copied from H&W Machine's site.  This mill is over 4000 lbs (it's definitely not a little BP Series 1), so buying skates was unavoidable.


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## ACHiPo

pontiac428 said:


> Those are machine skates.  They're like mover's dollies for heavy machinery.  Between the skates and the machine is just a leveling setup I copied from H&W Machine's site.  This mill is over 4000 lbs (it's definitely not a little BP Series 1), so buying skates was unavoidable.


Thanks, that's what I suspected they were.  Do they only roll in one direction?  I'm looking at buying a bigger lathe.  I do a lot of different things in my shop, so having machines mobile is "required".  That's tough to do and maintain level/alignment on a big lathe.  Leveling on the skates might be a good approach.


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## pontiac428

6 Ton Machinery Mover Machine Dolly Skate Machinery Roller Mover Cargo Trolley  | eBay
					

Easy and safe transport of heavy machinery and household appliances. 13,200 lbs Industrial Machinery Mover. The machinery mover of 13,200lbs load capacity is a efficient handling tool to help you move heavy objects effortlessly.



					www.ebay.com
				



That's the link for them.  Using skates in one form or another as machine feet is certainly possible.  These things are super solid.


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## hman

C-Bag said:


> $40 is cheap but I'm hoping hman can enlighten us as to sturdiness. My main concern was drawer slides and it's looks like bent metal with some plastic sliders? That isn't a complete deal breaker but for moderate stuff it would be fine but it might need some reinforcing to hold heavy stuff. Check out the assembly instructions on the IKEA site.


The drawers are relatively thin sheet metal.  Fold lines are indicated by lines of narrow slots.  The drawers have down-curled guides on both sides.  The cabinets have matching up-curled guides.  I lubed all the slides with STP. After folding the drawers, I closed the slots  and reinforced the other folded assembly points with hot-melt glue.
I Wouldn't want to store anything really heavy in the drawers, but everything has worked well since I built the carousel.


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