Member postings for Hopper

Modelling in CAD then CNCing certainly is the way to go.. Then this video shows the fascinating way it can be done manually, using a lathe with a revolving toolpost. Fascinating. I guess the revolving toolpost remains laterally stationary, and the rotation of it is controlled by the lathe's leadscrew. Now there is a project for MEW, a how to make on of those!

Edited By Hopper on 04/02/2023 07:12:20

Surprised to see in the "person specification" that neither the boiler man nor engine driver is required to have a boiler operator's license or engine driver's ticket. Surely that can't be right, even on old heritage stuff? (Or especially on old heritage stuff that is more likely to give trouble than a modern installation.)

If not, could be a good step up for a model engineer experienced at running small steam engines.

And most important: Tinkering with the CH system mid-winter and causing a major breakdown in services is NOT the way to win bonus points from the domestic authorities.

There is uranium and there is uranium ore. And in the middle there is "yellow cake", the concentrated ore that is shipped around the world in 44 gallon drums for final processing. The radiation level of the ore is not very high. Yellow cake a bit higher. The buckets in the Grand Canyon contained ore, not finished uranium.

I worked in the 1970s on the construction of a uranium ore treatment plant at the mining site in the Northern Territory (Australia) and it was just the same as any treatment plant used for iron or gold or any other mineral. All open conveyors, crushers, ball mills, settling tanks etc etc. No special precautions taken that I could see, other than the incoming operatiing staff at the end of construction all wore radiation badges that were checked weekly to make sure they had not been over-exposed that week. So I don't think the ore itself is considered particularly dangerous. (or it wasn't in 1979!).

Nonetheless, I got out of there before they started putting the ore through the machinery,

I use poly V belts on the old flat belt pulleys on my Drummond lathe with great success. No idea if they come in the size required for the grinder, but would certainly eliminate the possibility of toothed belt causing grinding problems. I run the poly V side on the flat pulleys as it grips better than the shiny flat outer side of the belt. Works perfectly, in fact better than any of the old leather and then later synthetic/leather composite flat belts used in past decades.

Belatedly, but I did not see this reply before: I forgot to mention we rubbed the plane blades on a bench oil stone after initial grinding on the bench grinder. This put a narrow, flat, finely honed face along the edge of the hollow ground area, achieving the same result as sharpening on a flat stone as you describe. We were graded on A. How well we had made the initial hollow ground surface on the bench grinder and B. How well we had oilstoned the small flat surface to form the final cutting edge. I imagine this was the way plane blades were sharpened on the job by carpenters and cabinetmakers since time immemorial as rotating flat stone machines were not something most small workshops would have had.

Greensands, can you post a link to one or two of the videos you mention showing this? Would be real interested to watch. I find the videos of lathework etc coming out of India, Pakistan and Indonesia, Vietnam etc fascinating because of little snippets like this.

It may be that on a lathe with loose headstock bearings, cutting outward from the centre reduces chatter because the cutting forces are pushing the job away from the tool, not pushing it towards the tool and causing dig-ins/chatter. I will have to try it next time in the shed. (Noting Jason's wise proviso about indexable tips and the need for a centre hole, or use HSS.)

They do seem to do some amazing stuff in some of those videos, once you get past the lack of WHS by our standards and focus on the job in hand. One thing I have noticed though is that 3 foot of pipe on the chuck key seems to be universal standard operating procedure.

Thanks Bountyboy. Now I just have to decide whether I want to make the three other indexing plates with their hundreds of holes eadh. I certainly won't be buying new ones at 95 Quid a pop!

They are now investigating how the radioactive capsule 6mm x 8mm fell out of the instrument and then fell out of the container it was in through a hole where a mounting bolt had fallen out due to vibration on the rough roads out bush. Talk about Murphy's Law, but also sounds like protocols may have not been followed. Link

Edited By Hopper on 02/02/2023 11:10:40

Dave, not familiar with those coins but judging from the copper, that must be the budget model leveller?

Good point about wear on knife edges under repeated to-ing and fro-ing of pendulums. . I wonder if using something like hardened and ground round bar such as linear slide rails, would be more durable yet still minimal friction? Or is the knife edge essential for the latter point.

Just to finish the story: got the vertical slide all done and looking good. No sign of wear on the slideways so I am very pleased with it overall. Very pleased.

The fixed steady is a must have for these types of jobs in the small lathe, making the clamping disc out of 2" round bar before oil blacking it:

So overall, for a deal I was not very keen on getting into, it has ended up spectacularly well. Very happy with that indeed.

Edited By Hopper on 02/02/2023 10:49:39

The country it was lost in looked much the same as this. Not much out there. They drove along the road at 35mph with a detector and found it about 40 miles from the starting point.

I once lost a wheel trim on a similar car drive from Adelaide on the south coast to Alice Springs in the dead centre, about 1,000 miles. Kept an eye out for it on the way home three weeks later, and sure enough there it was in the scrub just off the side of the road. Stopped and put it back on, all good! There's nobody out there to pick stuff up.

The mining guys were very lucky in this instance that it did not fall off in town etc. But it turns out the fine for improperly storing or disposing of radioactive material is a whole $1,000 so no wonder they get careless. Of course the gumment is jumping up to "get tough" on it now.

It's so flat and empty out there the word scenic takes on a definition of its own: (That's the lookout, that gravel patch on the other side of the road!)

Edited By Hopper on 01/02/2023 23:11:32

Edited By Hopper on 01/02/2023 23:38:14

The mods are only volunteer forum members, nothing to do with Mortons' financial operations. You would be best to enquire direct with Mortons' subscription department by phone or email.

If that is the case, then surely clockmakers have done this very thing many times before and have established models that could be copied?

Re screw threads, you say you want an accuracy/resolution of one thou. An ME 40TPI thread will give you the same as a micrometer, which can read down to one tenth of a thou. Making your own version would allow for larger diameter dials that would make such resolution even easier.

It's not something any expert can tell you with any certainty. It might split, or it might not, depending on many factors including grade of tube, age of tube, condition of tube, how it is squeezed, level of gunk inside the tube and so on. As you have said yourself, messing with old plumbing can be the genesis of many horrors. All you can do is either drain the system and do it properly, or try the squeezing method and be prepared to quickly drain the system if it splits, either immediately or later on at some unknown point when the weakened metal gives way.

Your choice. Personally, I would not risk it, based on having worked for some years maintaining rotten old pipework in industry and hospitals. See Murphy's Law posted above.

The other question is: Will squeezing a copper tube reduce the flow? As you squeeze the tube top to bottom, it deforms and bulges out sideways, maintaining the same cross sectional area and thus not restricting flow. Until you get to a certain point where it has reached near full width and you start to close down the elongated slot shape left. At this point the copper at the ends is being forced into a sharp bend, much more likely to split.

Edited By Hopper on 01/02/2023 11:20:02

Ah, thanks. I missed that. I like the idea of using square bar to make it easier to hold etc. Interesting project.

Nice first post. Awaiting a second with interest.

Awesome work. I have absolutely no need for one but might be tempted to make one just because.

Do you have a link to the drawings you found of the small version?

I do all my dials the way Bernard Towers shows above. In the lathe with a HSS toolbit sharpened to a V and laid on its side. Indexing is by change gears with a detent made from a bit of hacksaw blade on engaging with the gear teeth. 50 divisions is easy with the 50T gear directly on the spindle or geared 1:1 with the spindle.

Edited By Hopper on 31/01/2023 23:17:38

First thing you need to do is determine whether the problem lies at the headstock spindle end of the drivetrain or at the motor end.

Next time it stops, shut off the power, release the belt tension and see if the chuck rotates freely by hand. If it is stuck solid, see Bricky's post above about adjusting the S7 tapered bronze bearing which could grab like a morse taper if not enough clearance and it gets hot and expands.

If the chuck is free to turn, problem is most likely in the motor or wiring. Check if the motor spindle can be turned by hand. If it can be turned, problem is not motor bearings b ut something in the wiring, most likely.

(All assuming of course that belt tensions are correctly set and not slipping.)

Edited By Hopper on 31/01/2023 23:08:14

Murphy's Law says that a piece of copper tube in the workshop will not split when squeezed, but a piece of copper tube plumbed to a CH system in mid-winter will always split when squeezed.

Those of us who regard Murphy as an incurable optimist will also point out the corollary: It will not always split right away but will wait until you are out of the house and then split, emptying contents of CH system onto floor of house to await your return home.

Proceed at your own peril.

Edited By Hopper on 31/01/2023 23:24:33