Member postings for Ian Collett 1

Excellent, although you might not want to wear your best clothes in there, it really is a cave of delights.

I have a suspicion that such places, tools, and people who can operate them will continue to be required for years to come. As in the case you spoke about where gear shafts require machining to take replacement bearings, quite a simple matter really, but impossible without the sort of kit shown in your video. Since manufacturers don't consider long term servicing of parts as cost effective (which, to be fair, it isn't) then there's going to continue to be a need, I sincerely hope, for niche jobs such as that to continue to be done by workshops like Dennis's.

Best of luck finding a new home for your gear, and thanks for a good look round an interesting commercial workshop.

From the comments above, and speaking as a total newbie, it would appear that some of the technical data contained in the textbooks in question perhaps don't apply too well to the modern equipment and materials now available?

However, I think for an absolute beginner my first thoughts on looking at a book on a new subject, particularly one involving fast rotating bits of heavy metal, are:

1. Safe operation, good habits to develop and which to avoid - I take it those haven't changed significantly over the decades?
2. Everyday terminology, a language primer if you will. I won't call it jargon, it isn't that, but these are tools that have specific names for parts, configurations and operations; and those names need to be learnt if I'm to communicate successfully when I have a problem or need guidance from those with more experience than I am ever likely to have
3. Capabilities and limitations concerning the tasks I intend to complete - primarily but not exclusively 7mm/ft locomotive and rolling stock construction in brass, nickel silver and steel

Many thanks everyone for the heads-up

**LINK**

Excellent, £2.10 for all three parts! As is often the case the postage is more than the book, but as all three are available from the same vendor the postage cost could reduce significantly. All are post '71 (thanks Georgineer) so they are in SI units.

I'll put these on my 'to get' list, even at these prices the missus will have something to say about the house filling up with dog-eared old library books, of which I already have quite a few.

Many thanks for the recommend, my order has just been placed with AbeBooks although the price has gone up, now it's £2.69 for the 1969 edition (cover price 8/6), condition Used/Good (AbeBooks are amazing!). Fortunately this copy is from a different vendor than the four books I ordered the other day, so I haven't missed out on bundling my postage costs -
I'm awaiting delivery of:
Stan Bray, Introducing the Lathe
Tubal Cain, Model Engineers Handbook
Stan Bray, Introducing Bench Work (Model Engineering Guide)
R Sandham and FR Willmore, Metalwork

I'm 'armchair engineering' at the moment as I'm finishing off (hopefully) quite a large house modernisation with the separate 16'x8' garage earmarked as my workshop. I am also looking for texts that can help me understand the terminology that is completely mystifying to a beginner who hasn't touched a metal working machine since 'O' Level Workshop Theory and Practice, 1976.