Member postings for Robin teslar

Other people do it, but notice that he is using a grinder with a fixed switch rather than a thumb pressure swithc. I dont recommend that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=-AxCe410N0E&feature=fvwp

Notcie the mistakes being made here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvpLkneuDbM&feature=related

two mistakes

a) he let the cutter run back on itself ie cutting in the climb cut mode - this is potentially unstable

b) he let the axis of the cutter go below the work piece, also potentially unstable, just like a chain saw, it can kick back, dont do it.

Its really not rocket science

dont ever do a climb cut.

Robin

Yes indeed, I wouldnt ever try this with a 9in grinder, a wholly different ball of wax

Hi Guys

you have to put www. in front of the ebay url cos the board doesnt allow direct links from me yet

I admit the set up does look a bit hairy at first, but you take a firm grip on the handle and the body and move the saw along the workpiece ALWAYS going against the direction of the blade ie so that the blade is tending to pull away from you and you are cutting towards yourself. Any jamming tendency will pull away from you. The small blade is a lot less brutal than a 10" heavy circular saw. Ive used this without any runaway problems for many years, I can even use it one handed, but not recommended. And of course you have to keep your hand on the button to keep it going. I wouldnt ever recommend using it with the type of grinder where you can switch on and leave running without thumb pressure on the switch.

Ive had far more dangerous kick backs and blade jamming from a circular saw - I hate using them

Just dont cut through the cable, make sure on a long cut that the cable wont become caught

and of course, as with a circular saw, never place any part of your body in line with the saw blade

Well thats my take

Robin

In the spirit of generous tips given on this board I would like to make a modest contribution

In my travels I came across this little gizmo. Its a tct saw blade which you can fit on a 4in angle grinder. IMHO its an incredibly useful tool, so easy to hold for simple wood sawing jobs, much easier than a dangerous heavy circular saw but of course it only cuts to a depth of 2in. I use mine often.

I only got a selection of blades out in the far east for 5quid each but see they are available on ebay now for about 7quid

Once youve had one you wonder how you managed before, My neighbour's always borrowing mine - Ill give him one for xmas

ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_nkw=tct+saw+blade+115mm&_sacat=0&_odkw=tct+saw+blade&_osacat=0&_from=R40

Important thing to note is the od is 115mm, the bore is usuall 20mm but you angle grinder normally uses 22,5mm so a little work on your ML7 to cut a little should on the clamp ring is need.

The blades need sharpening after a while especially if cutting chipboard so I got a small diamond sharpening blade which I will try out

See my gallery for pix

Cheers

Robin

Hi all

Thanx for the tips

So HSS is still ok. Talking of thread cutting, I remember seeing one of these super tool tips doing a 1/2 ins thread on steel bar in one pass. The tool was upside down and cut away from the chuck going in reverse. High speed and mirror finish - scary - but nothing for an auto.

Does anyone try rolling threads?

Robin

Sorry pardon I should have mentioned Myford ML7 (too small to maul)

Its coming back to me now, You have to take a decent cut at high speed or they don't work properly, is that right?

No skimming then?

Cheers

Robin

Ive been looking to up grade my selection of tools bit which are largely old HSS stock and carbide index bits seems the way to go. So do you go for Sandvik Coro? - expensive or cheap chinese?

Whats your preference?

Many years ago at an Machinery exhibition I saw a demo of a ceramic tool tip, cutting 1/4 in from a 2 in bar. What struck me was the speed (around twice normal I think), a single blue swarf curled off it, and the operator invited us to put fing on the tip after he finished adn it was cool, no cutting fluid used and the surface finish was almost mirror

Was I dreaming?

Whats it called?

Cheers

Robin

Smart work CB. Im amazed it works at such a distance from the strip. I thought it would have to be really close, 5 thou say

Robin

High Joel

sorry to show my ignorance, did follow up the Renshaw link. Looks like the magnetic strip is self adhesive? to stick on an oily mill table? Can't be right, how is it done

These look like serious industrial kit. Is this magnetic strip likely to be affected/corrupted by magnets? such as a DTI

This technology is all new to me, Im afraid Never thought it was possible for a home workshop to have such advanced stuff available at an affordable price

Mind boggling

Cheers

Robin

Hi All

This is great stuff, much appreciated, will follow links. Actually while I was looking at PWM motor controllers, I noticed it said "suitable for mini drills etc", then I had another Meldrew moment, ive got all these defucnt nicad drill drivers where the battery has died (and its cheaper to buy a new drill than a new battery pack), So these use 14.4vdc and have speed control in the trigger, lots of torque, variable speed, readymade chuck

Got to try this out on otherwise junk kit

too good to be true?

Robin

Hi Andy

Do you mean this one

technobotsonline.com/re-385-metal-gearbox-148-1.html

Am I right the stall torque is 62kg-cms? Surely that would twist the shaft off? Mybe it needs a break away clutch to limit damage?

technobotsonline.com/panel-mounted-bi-directional-variable-speed-regulator.html

Is this the regulator?

It all looks very neat

So you get slow and fast traverse by a switch applying full voltage (and reverse), bypassing the speed control knob so you don't change the cutting speed - is that right?

Cheers for the tips

Robin

Why was angular measurement never decimated?

(but you do have grads with 100 deg to a rt angle and a 100 secs in a grad. Its used by land surveyors cos they have to do a lot of triangulation and it made it easier on their fiddlesticks

The Septics still stick to inches and feet and yards, funny how their gallon is 10% smaller than ours, what does that tell you about the land of carpetbaggers

I can say this cos I worked for Americorps for 25 years. I once asked my boss why he had hired me. He thought for a moment and said

"So I can blame you, you are cheaper, and you don't make so much noise on the job". We got on well

Robin

Hi Guys

I had a TOWIE moment and lashed out £23 on Ebay (The only way is ....) and have received a used Mitotoyo dail guage model 543-180 IDC. It looked a little battered but the Seller assured me that it was fully working, no jitters or rough spots and recent new battery. Sure enough it does and resolves to 0.00001 in (what!!!). Its a classy piece of kit costing nearly 100quid new (which I would never have afforded. So I am a bit chuffed. I intend to try it out on the cross slide of my Myford and use it as a digital scale (which had excited al lot of comment recently about the difficulties of budget calipers etc.

As the whole gauge is well sealed against outside, it should perform well, I think, worth a gamble

I noticed that there was a 6pin socket for a lead. I ebayed and found the lead would cost more than my gauge, so I don't think I need an external readout

Way to go

Robin

I recently acquired a treasured Dore Westbury mk 1 universal Mill. I felt that I would like to fit some power feed to the table as per Mk 2. Not much information available. Can anyone shed a light on the reduction ratio needed. DW recommends a 2800 rpm 50W motor for their kit and hints at a double worm reduction gearbox. It has a 3 step pulley shown on the motor as well

Any suggestions pls

Also I am considering stepper motor approach as I would like to digitise my mill, which seems a popular thing to do

Looking at Ebay, not much product info on show so I am a bit bewildered

I suppose I could knock up a gear train given time, but I don't want to be one of those machinists that spends all his time making gadgets for his machine. I want to do some real work - if you get my meaning

Any pointers or links much appreciated

Cheers

Robin

Ive got one of these motors for my ML7 and I wanted to ft a reversing switch. I found it useful but as you say, beware of the chuck unscrewing. Im going to fit a locking screw to be safe,

I often used reverse to cut thread away from the chuck. I didnt trust the feed screw knock out travelling towards the chuck, its not very accurate. Cutting away you can go much faster with confidence, and of course the form tool must be upside down.

I did this on a production job making 1000 special 1/2 unf bolts, worked a treat and finished in half the time to the amazment of my forman who had never seen such a trick, but then I was a cheeky apprentice

I will follow your guidelines but must order a Dewhurst (looks like /Chinese copy) on ebay 30 quid ouch

Robin

I loathe these self service check outs. They always go wrong and a lady has to be standing by to fix it. How smart is that?

Imagine we have a BnQ diy superstore on a trading estate nearby and I hate the place. They make you enter at one end and exit wya down the other end so you will walk past their precious aisles .Its the size of an aircraft hangar for two jumbo jets. Yet the store only has 2 lady check outs and 4 auto checkouts. They try hard to coerce you into using their autos, saying they will help you use the mc.

No way, I walked on to the Lady check out (with no lady as they were all busy fixing the autos that froze trying to read bar codes in amateur hands. After an unacceptable waits, I left a baskets of goods there and went away empty handed (havent been back since). But think what does that tell you about the economy? So few customers - warning sign there I think as builders merchants are regarded as a barometer of the economy..

Maddeningly, there are some who seem to have taken to the system in my local ASDA, but can they control their kids and stop them pressing all the buttons and running throught the shoplifting gates setting off the alrms, what a great game

Thats when I have a Meldrew Moment

**LINK**

Robin

Hi JS

I used to use a fax and have still got it on a shelf. Its the best way to get a CEO's attention. Emails are simply trashed. However I can't leave it plugged in cos when the computer dialers find a P tone, you get swamped with junk mail that eats up your fax roll overnight and overloads your memory and rejecting calls, so its not reliable as a receiver, I found. Pity it used to be a good system.

I too have dumped on line billing and banking. They all have different log in protocal and its a pain. I get snail mail bills and statements which I can check and file in a heartbeat, no pain

Its not that easy to talk to people without hanging on telephone menus wasting your time

But if you want to buy something they are with you in 2 shakes of a lamb's tale

The natives are revolting however

Cheers

Robin

(just cos Im paranoid, doesn't make me wrong)

What a good idea Sid

You might want to consider mounting it to one of the small, light-duty LCD tilt/swivel mounts that are available inexpensively these days. You can then position it for comfortable viewing wherever you are standing.

This thread has generated a lot of good info and put me on the right road, though I won't be going to 5um on my old Myford. But certainly there is a chorus of approval for the 3 axis dro kit for a mill.

Cant wait to get it fitted as Ive never had this luxury before, when you think you spent half you time measure and checking cuts, like going from 405 bnw to a new lcd hd colour screen, mind blowing

Cheers

Robin

Hi Dave

You are right, a lot of personal information probably is sore against your wishes. Data mining is a serious problem and you don't know where your details are being passed to, sold on etc.

Many e-tailers try to get you to sign up for an account by given them all your valuable personal info. I resist this as far as possible. A bad example is Screwfix, who wont tell you on line if an item is in stock at a branch till you sign up. I just ring them up instead.

I think Paypal got a bad name a few years back for foul play and being uncontactable. That was when they were based solely in the US - figures. But consider, Ebay couldn't function without Paypal as the merchant banker, Remarkably it does have a very sobering effect on buyer and seller. Paypal have got me a refund for non delivery, fairly quick, even though the seller didnt respond. So I gave him a neutral mark. I have a few hundred trades now with 99% success which is very credible really. I also have a registered account with Amazon and they run their own similar system

I am comfortable with both of them but Paypal does have its control freak quirks which I try to keep at arms length. Lets face it, if Paypal starts playing up now with more than a million trades per day, the whole world would soon know about it and their credibility would collapse overnight.

If you really want to get paranoid, I could relate my experience of identity theft and a fraudulent maxed out credit card, but I guess that kind of incident is too common for interest here

Cheers

Robin