I recently bought a large lot of assorted reamers from the guy from whom I got my surface grinder. There are literally 50+ pounds of reamers... Got' all those reamers and about 20-30 pounds worth of end mills for $70.
That being the case, I went though them all, culled out the few that were junk, measured them all up to make sure they were marked properly, etc. About 300 reamers in the lot were "loose" and not in a tube or case of any kind. I grubbed as many reamer cases from here and there as best I could, leaving about 200 with no means of protection. Then I had an idea! The cheap heat shrink tubing assortments from HF.
OK, so using heat shrink tubing over a reamer is not a new idea. But, here's the difference in what I do...
I got lazy shrinking the tubing on reamer after reamer after a while and started shrinking only the top 1/2" or so around the shank leaving the tubing loose over the flutes. This yielded an interesting "feature": The shrink tubing becomes captive and can't slide off the flute end of the reamer because the shrunk portion bottoms on the top of the flutes. To use the reamer in most cases, all one needs to do is slide the tubing back. You don't even have to take it off! Can't lose it that way. It can completely slide off the shank end if need be...
See photos:
Closed up for Storage...
Ready to use (mode 1):
Ready to use (mode 2):
John
That being the case, I went though them all, culled out the few that were junk, measured them all up to make sure they were marked properly, etc. About 300 reamers in the lot were "loose" and not in a tube or case of any kind. I grubbed as many reamer cases from here and there as best I could, leaving about 200 with no means of protection. Then I had an idea! The cheap heat shrink tubing assortments from HF.
OK, so using heat shrink tubing over a reamer is not a new idea. But, here's the difference in what I do...
I got lazy shrinking the tubing on reamer after reamer after a while and started shrinking only the top 1/2" or so around the shank leaving the tubing loose over the flutes. This yielded an interesting "feature": The shrink tubing becomes captive and can't slide off the flute end of the reamer because the shrunk portion bottoms on the top of the flutes. To use the reamer in most cases, all one needs to do is slide the tubing back. You don't even have to take it off! Can't lose it that way. It can completely slide off the shank end if need be...
See photos:
Closed up for Storage...
Ready to use (mode 1):
Ready to use (mode 2):
John
