What Did You Buy Today?

This talk of old trucks has me thinking about another project I bought about year ago. Picked up a '37 dodge truck. Kind of a cobble together project truck, new modern rear end with disc brakes, modern front end under it. Found the 300 inline six and mating 5 speed gearbox for it now. Just need to get started on it! lol.

Weird thing about the '37, is it's actually a '35. As best I can find, it was made in late' 35, but wasn't titled until '37. Apparently not too uncommon during the great depression years. The original title is with the truck...
Motorhome even today are registered as the year they were completed rather than the year the components were built. It’s not uncommon to have a 1or 2 year old chassis under a current year body.

RV builders buy the chassis in bulk and outfit them throughout the model year. Sometimes they order more chassis than customers order motorhome. The remaining chassis are used for the next year model production.
 
Motorhome even today are registered as the year they were completed rather than the year the components were built. It’s not uncommon to have a 1or 2 year old chassis under a current year body.

RV builders buy the chassis in bulk and outfit them throughout the model year. Sometimes they order more chassis than customers order motorhome. The remaining chassis are used for the next year model production.

Pretty much any vehicles sold as an unfinished cab and chassis, snow plows, ambulances, fire trucks etc. Often times a public agency may buy the chassis and then put out bids to complete them. In theory this may save money since they can go for the best price on the chassis and then again on the building. Sometimes the contracting bids take a while, and sometimes the winner, backs out and the contracts have to go out for bid again so by the time the trucks are done the chassis may be a couple years old.

I saw this recently with a local agency. The bids went out and the trucks were purchased right as Covid was going down (process started 2019, early 2020 when trucks were still available). With the price increases and supply chain issues the winning bidder backed out as they couldn't get the supplies needed to perform the work, and prices had increased so much that they would have lost a lot of money even if they got the materials.

The contracts went out again, but at that point nobody was willing to bid because prices were increasing so fast that they couldn't even make a guess as to the actual costs. Those trucks are coming up on 5 years old and there is still no contract to finish them.
 
Is their a Lathes Anonymous, because if there is, I need to join....soon. I get a little antsy if I don't have one or two in some stage of cleaning up/fixing up.

Yesterday I was minding my own business, and a Clausing 5904 drops itself on my trailer along with a bunch of extras. :eek:

This is the 12" swing shortie with 24" between centers, has a taper attachment and came with pretty much everything but a follow rest: 3-J chuck, 4-jaw chuck, steady rest, live center, dead center, 3MT spindle adapter sleeve, drill chuck, micrometer carriage stop, threading dial, lantern tool post, 4-position tool post, two dog drivers, etc, etc. Someone made a custom splashguard for it that fits pretty nicely. I don't know why, but they bundled up a bunch of extra stuff with it like the three larger steady rests, D1-6 face plate and grinder sine table (at least that's what I think it is).

I got it home, set it on the ground, vacuumed up the chips, sorted through the box of goodies, added a bit of oil to the headstock and apron and tonight I'll try to confirm motor voltage wiring and see if she'll power up. It was plugged in and making chips until very recently, and everything seems to be lubricated and moving as it should so I've got high hopes. It seriously needs a degreasing bath though...at some point it had a flood coolant setup on it (not all a bad thing)...you can see the drain pipe hanging down and the supply hose/nozzle/valve is on the ground.

IMG_6552.JPGIMG_6554.JPG
 
I was just going to ask, what that dual center sine table thing is for...Looks almost exactly like what I need to grind small shafts between centers! LOL
Yeah, I'm not entirely certain. It appears made for a mag table as there's no provision for bolting it down to anything. It's about 100lbs, seems very solid, raises and lowers smoothly, and has casting codes on it, but I haven't found any other markings so far....still have to clean it up a bit more.
 
why a bump style over a scissor?
I think that's a cut knurler. Different beast from what we're used to.


Broke down and snagged an Albrecht chuck. Small 1/32"-1/4", stainless steel. We'll see how that works out. It's supposed to be new in the box, for A LOT less than McMaster lists them for. I had an extra arbor sitting in the box that will fit it, which was the deciding factor on this purchase.
 
It uses the square edges of the knurl (a special knurl) to cut chips, rather than just smash them into the material.

It's a machining operation that makes a chip, rather than a forming operation.


Edit: Here is a longer one.
 
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