DICKEYBIRD

I just downloaded the individual sections I wanted (lathe & mill) and printed them out on the front & back of the paper and put them in my (rapidly expanding) "Machining Stuff" 3-ring binder. Lately, it's been getting stained with spittle as I fall asleep hunched over it. It's my own unique method of subliminal education.

BMatthews

That Broomhilda cartoon is SO funny.... and perhaps just a LEEEEEEEEEETLE bit true...

Dickey, your catch 22 situation with the angle plate will be repeated many a time during your machining intrests. Get used to it. And in a way it's often half the fun.

But of course it brings us right back to that comic.......

Looking at the lathe section of the Fundementals link I see lots of good stuff but I have to add that the Amature's Lathe centers (bad pun? ) around SMALL lathe operations in much more detail. In addition it covers much of the "budget fixes" that you can't get from the "high prices spreads" like the Fundementals link. Things like milling in the lathe, dealing with small machine flex and many others. It truly is the Old Testament of the basement machinist. I'd have to consider which of the other books is the New Testament but "Milling Operations In The Small Lathe" and "The Myford Lathe Manual" are both up there.

It's just SOOOO different when you're working with a lump of metal that you can actually lift. I know that sounds silly but it's the truth. Rigidity and mass are the two key elements of a successful metal working machine. And it IS possbible to have one without the other but the machine then will suffer compared to it's more solid bretheren.

ajcoholic

My Feedback: (10)

Glad you boys liked the toon... I show it to many people, and only the ones that own a lathe actually get it

The Amateurs' Lathe is published by Nexus books. Here in Canada, it is available through tool shops like Busy Bee tools and House of Tools. Places that sell machine shop equipment seem to have it or access to it.

Hope that helps!

AJC

Tom @ Buzzard Bluff

Thanks AJ. I checked ENCO without luck, I'll try some of the others. If all else fails I'll go to Amazon. Tom

BMatthews

You could also order through Busy Bee here in Canada. There's no duty on books going either way over the border. It just show's up in your mailbox.

www.busybee.com

AJ, I have no doubt at all that only other hobby machinists would get that. Either Russel My*&% (who wrote these any way?) is a fellow chip maker or he is close to one.

The funny thing is that when asked what I've made with the machines I have I often say "oh a few things for my motorcycles and bicycles and model airplanes but mostly stuff for the lathe and mill" at which point they look at me like I'm insane....

I thnk I need to print that cartoon REALLY big for above my lathe...

Tom @ Buzzard Bluff

Thanks Bruce, but I must report that the URL you sent connected me to a realty firm site in California. I'll bet I can Google it tho. Thought it was funny.

>>edit to fix html coding. wr.

ajcoholic

My Feedback: (10)

www.busybeetools.com

AJC

Tom @ Buzzard Bluff

Thanks AJ! Tom

DICKEYBIRD

Well, a week of vacation brings out the procrastination juices! I put off finishing the new ukie plane to finish the milling adapter project. Here's a few pics. #1 is the tapholder device I cobbled to help keep threaded holes straight in the lathe. You start by hand with the lathe in "granny" low, just let go the handle when it grabs; shut off the lathe; hit reverse, back out & clean the tap....repeat until it gets too hard to hold then finish with the tommy bar as shown. So far it works great! The pic also shows my 1st 4 jaw chuck attempt. I dial-indicated in the 1/2" square rear vise-holder brackets then drilled, tapped 1/4-28 and faced the ends square. You can also see the little tee-slotted mill table that I bolted down to the cross side for the milling operations I needed to do while building the milling attachment

Pic #2 shows the finished milling attachment with a test piece of round stock having a flat milled on it.

Pic #3 is 'nudder view showing the Enco angle bracket that holds the compound slide at 90 deg.

Pic #4 shows the 1/2" square steel parts that had to be fabricated to hold the precision screwless vice to the compound. I had to use the 8mm tapped holes in the vise to help hold it down. Medium CYA worked great to hold the pieces to the compound while I drilled, tapped & counterbored for the 10-24 mounting screws.

DICKEYBIRD

More....
Pic #5 shows the little extensions I had to make to help hold down the angle bracket to the cross-slide tee-slot. The slot didn't line up on one side so I had to make do. Seems plenty rigid. Also you can see the where I had to cobble up a milling cut to level up the back side of the cast iron bracket.

Pic #6 shows one the clamping blocks I had to fabricate to help hold the vise down. Had to cobble up a jig to clamp them down to the cross-slide & mill out the rabbet....it worked great!

All in all, a very rewarding project. After a few milling jobs, it'll probably do a great job of proving how much I REALLY need to get a proper mill/drill. At least I didn't spend much money doing it.

BMatthews

When I start the tap in the lathe like that I prefer to unlink the spindle from the pulleys and just turn the chuck by hand for the first half dozen turns. By that time the tap is well started and I remove the item from the lathe and finish by hand. Even with the smaller ones it's easy to feel the torque so you can avoid a possible broken tap.

ajcoholic

My Feedback: (10)

Thats exactly how I do it too Bruce.

AJC

DICKEYBIRD

I ain't building any new airplanes but at least I'm doing SUMTHIN'! The Machining annex at DickeyBird Aviation moved slowly forward this weekend. The changeover from lathe to milling operations was taking far too long since the compound slide/toolholder had to be stripped all the way down, reassembled and readjusted every time the change was made. I decided to semi-permanently use the little slotted table I had previously adapted onto the cross-slide assy. Thanks to BMatthews' kindness in sending me a toolholder project he had started , I can now do almost everything I need with a lot less hassle.

I drilled & tapped Bruce's toolholder blank to suit the tools I use and drilled it in the center to fit the 3/8"stud & T-slot nuts I had on hand. Then I had to machine up a .260" thick steel disc to go under it to bring the tools right up on center. It's very easy to slide the holder around to suit whatever I'm cutting and lock it down with the nut. Seems to be more rigid and smooth cutting than the compound slide was. The switch back to milling configuration now takes only a couple minutes. Now I can just throw it up onto the slotted table, install the 4 t-slot studs, a quick line-up with a machinist's square, tighten up the nuts and it's ready to go.

DICKEYBIRD

To give back the the depth control & accuracy I lost by doing away with the compound slide in the lathe mode, I cobbled up a crank handle to put on the end of the leadscrew and use it to move the carriage more precisely by engaging the carriage half-nuts and turning the leadscrew handle by hand. The amount of travel is precisely and easily measured using a dial indicator adjusted to touch the end of the carriage. The same dial indicator rig works great in measuring tool depth in the milling mode as well.

Now that I'm getting all these gizmos & attachments working smoothly, the time to actually make something useful in the 1/2A world looms closer & closer.

ajcoholic

My Feedback: (10)

DB,
I have been putting off some lathe work I have to do, you see my problem in these precious few summer months is I cant bring myself to work indoors when I should be out flying..

Our summer however has been brutally windy, cold and wet. Not too much risk of forest fires this year, but its not good for 1/2A flying (many days gusts to 40 or 50 km/h) but I can still fly the larger planes thank god!!

So, what are you making these days?

AJC

DICKEYBIRD

Not making too much right now....a few metal chips, doing maintenance on a plane or 2, yard work, car repairs on #1 daughter's car and CAD plans for some construction articles I'm way behind on. Pretty boring stuff come to think about it. I better get onto something more exciting!

BMatthews

So much of what you are doing with the lead screw wheel and vertical milling table mirrors what the Myford clan does as well. Either you're cheating and reading up on the stuff or you're more clever than you look....

My compliments on your work so far. Obviously craftsmanship shows through whenever talented hands and minds are involved regardless of the discipline.

How's the tool post coming?

DICKEYBIRD

Thanks Bruce, I gotta be more clever than I look. If I wasn't, I wouldn't be able to pour p!$$ out of a boot with the instructions printed on the sole!

Your ex-tool holder is what I'm now using to mount the lathe toolbits when I'm in the lathe mode. See the pics above. Thanks again, it worked out great!

BMatthews

DOH!

Didn't read back far enough to see those pics.

Nice adaptation. Of course you'll still need to switch back to the compound for thread cutting but that setup will do most of your work.

But by the looks of things you're out of 1/4-28 cap screws now....

DICKEYBIRD

What better way to celebrate the 4th of July than to exercise a little of that yankee (well, southern yankee) ingenuity. If that's not a blatant rationalization to go out in the shop and play machinist, I don't know what is. So now you know what I did yesterday.

My ancestors must have been of the frugal variety 'cuz man, I LOVE to make cast-off junk into something useful. I've been scheming for a week or two about making a dedicated device to attach onto the lathe to mount a dial indicator more easily for depth measurement. I hate messing around with the rods & couplings on a magnetic stand every time I change the setup. Here's a few pics of what I came up with.

#1 I had some old 1/2" square keystock so I made up a bracket to mount a piece of .375" polished rod from an old inkjet printer. The printer rod is good stuff to keep around....fairly hard, polished nicely and STRAIGHT. I clamped both pieces of the bracket together and drilled a .375" hole centered on the join line, then milled .040" off the inside bottom edge of the outer half to allow room for the allen bolt to squeeze the clamp tight on the rod.

#2 I made a clamp gizmo (made from an old 5/8" x 18" Jaguar suspension bolt pinched from work) to attach the indicator to the rod, slit it and installed an 8-32 allen clamp bolt. This shows it in use accurately measuring the depth of cut as a flat is milled on the extension bar I made this morning to accurately place the indicator for measuring runout of a part held in the chuck.....especially useful for centering stuff in a 4-jaw chuck. Again, I hate messing around with magnetic stands.

#3 This is the finished extension bar showing it setup to measure runout. Easy to setup and very rigid. Same 5/8" bolt used to make the bar.

#4 Last pic shows the rod being used as an adjustable carriage stop for repeatable depth control.

I beginning to panic though....I'm running out of attachments to make and will have to figure out how to make something useful in the real world!

Andrew

Nice job, DB!! Great use for a recycled printer rod -- I'm always looking for alternative uses for reclaimed material -- I'll keep that in mind. Now, when is the new engine coming out??

the "other" Andrew

DICKEYBIRD

Thanks Andrew, there's definitely something innately rewarding about making useful things out of scrap, isn't there. Funny how making metal stuff will change your life completely. I found a piece of ground 1/2" x 3" plate about 10" long lying in the street a couple weeks ago. You'd a thought I'd found a $50 bill instead! I couldn't wait to get it home and mill the ends up nice & square. Is that sick or what! Now it's been used several times as a clamping fixture, a drill jig, etc.

As far as the when the "new engine" is coming out, making the little gadgets & gizmos for the lathe (ALL of which have mistakes of varying degrees in them) has been a humbling experience. I have a long, LONG way to go before I can get anywhere near the level of precision required to start an AJC-like project.[]

I'm having big fun though. Even if I never build a model engine, every minute and dollar I've spent fooling around with this stuff has been well worth it!

DualdudE

As is done to mine i guess. You can mount it flat on the firewall? I don't want to take it's breath so i guessed i needed a little offset.

Tom @ Buzzard Bluff

I've long suffered from the same sickness. I sometimes think I'd feel a greater sense of accomplishment by creating something from junk than a better version from the best materials available. I think it's akin to the same sickness of the inveterate treasure hunter. Pity them-------few succeed while we can have semi-regular success building things from someone elses' scrap.
My 'small victory of the day' came when I was able to create a windshield for an Owen Kampen 'Scampy' from a Q-Tee cowl (made from a recycled drink bottle) I had shrunk so much it had to be cut from the form. Anyone sensible would have tossed it immediately. But they wouldn't have experienced the thrill of creating something useful from it.
But all this metal working, lathe and milling machine talk has caused all sorts of troubles at the Bluff. I'm over 2 weeks into a clean-up and shop re-hab aimed at getting all of my machinery, both metal and wood working, freed up and set-up so I can use them. And the end isn't in sight. Sure has caused me to get rid a a lot of junk however. That's a good thing. Tom



Edit: I closed the quote for ya.

BMatthews

A Skampy! ! ! !

I just dug the plans out a week ago to look those over. What a cutie. Post pics or else.....