Member postings for derek hall 1

Well I can help out what happened to Tom Walshaws workshop stuff.

The entire contents were auctioned off by a local auction house in 1999. Many of the items were bought by the S M E E.

I secured a few hand tools and scribers and wish I had bid for more ....i still have the catalogue and hand written against each lot what it went for. I sometimes look at the list and feel sad that I was not in the position to buy much, but also sad to see a massive influence on my engineering life reduced to lists on an auction catalogue.

Still his designs live on and I have built many of them...I regret that I never had the chance to meet him.

Tom's super 7 went for a very low price as did his VMC vert mill.

Regards

Derek

When you say cleaned and oiled it, did you mean stripping down the clock completely and checking the condition of the pivots and pinions etc. ?

Adding extra weight can keep the clock running but will cause any existing wear to accelerate.

What did you use to clean and lubricate the clock?

WD40 is fatal for any clock.....

Regards

Derek

I am sure Malcolm is correct about this problem.

I have a very old LCD Honywell central heating programmer in the airing cupboard, obviously it is warm in there but the LCD display is slowly degrading exactly like MichaelG's scales....

Regards Derek

To add a tenuous link to this.

I did my first year mechanical marine engineering apprenticeship at Lowestoft College of FE. in 1974/75. Shipyards around there were Brook Marine and Richards, all gone I suspect.

Lowestoft what ever the time of year it was, it was always windy - well it is the most Easterly point in the UK....

London Road South and London Road North.....remember it well and the old ABC and Odeon cinemas us apprentices used to frequent......at 16 too young to go in the pubs - but the cinemas would let us in to see the "X" rated movies especially in the Winter when Lowestoft was "dead".....

Regards

Derek

Built my GHT versatile dividing head, raising blocks and tailstock some time ago. It is such a well designed piece of kit.

Only thing that maybe I would now change is the method that GHT secures stock in the spindle originally it was by means of split sleeves. They work fine but I suspect that a modified spindle to accept ER tooling is now more appropriate. At least you would not have to make all those split sleeves !

Regards to all

Derek

Wow that brings back memories doing all that stuff in Technical College in the 1970's !

Just read the saga of Brunell and some unhappy customers on another forum dated over 10 years ago....I wonder if anything has changed over the last decade ?

Hi

Wasn't there a recent series detailing the building the ME beam engine in the Model Engineer?

This is another engine on my "to make" list. I will probably only buy the cylinder and flywheel as castings, the rest I will build from stock.

Good luck with the build !

Derek

Ramon, Happy new year to you and your family !

Wonderful work, I have been following this build with interest. A superb example of building an engine without castings.

We will all be waiting impatiently for your next update !

All the best

Derek

Didn't the designer Tubal Cain aka T D Walshaw make the prototype Lady Stephanie without castings?

I have got a set of castings for this engine and to be honest most of them did not need to be castings..

Regards

Derek

Morning everyone,

Thanks for the advice on what to do re my leaking workshop flat roof.

I think I will replace the area where the felt has perished, then when the weather improves I will strip all the existing felt off and check the OSB boarding it is laid on. I should have done it last Summer!

Meanwhile I can at least look at the costs of alternative solutions to roofing felt. I have to say that the felt I laid down when I built my workshop (about the same size and shape as a single garage), around 2008 (or was it 2004?) has lasted well to be honest....

All the best

Derek

Most politicians should not even be in charge of a wheelbarrow

Was planning on spending some time in the workshop on the Quorn grinder, but yesterday noticed a water leak through the flat roof of my workshop.

So it looks like I will be outside the workshop replacing some of the perished roofing felt.

In the summer I will have to strip it all off and inspect the condition of the top decking before I refelt completely.

The roof didnt do too bad, I laid the felt back in 2008

I would like to consider some alternative methods though, including modifying the flat roof to increase the pitch, but that is not a job to do in the middle of winter !

Happy Christmas all and all the best for 2023

Derek

Merry Christmas and have a Happy and Healthy New Year to everyone on this forum.

All the best

Derek

Serious stuff there Joe....looks very impressive.

I would love to tell anyone who comes round to my house "let me show you my POWER ROOM"!!.....brilliant !

Regards

Derek

Did my apprenticeship in the 1970's, and although I was taught how to grind a drill by hand, I could never get the knack of it.

I eventually made a drill grinding jig to a design in the ME by "Duplex", works very well. I have never used spotting drills but using some drills already ground to 4 facet was a revelation!

Derek

Edited By derek hall 1 on 12/12/2022 15:09:46

Edited By derek hall 1 on 12/12/2022 15:10:28

Ramon, I always follow your work!

Current build looks terrific.

Will you mount the engine on representative bed plates, frames and double bottoms of the ship it was supposed to be installed in?

Too many fabulous looking models are just stuck on a bit of polished wood - while that is ok, I think for a marine engine, it would look far better mounted on a cut away part of the frames of a ship for example...

Looking forward to the next part of the progress of your engine !

All the best

Derek

Its is a similar problem for me every xmas and birthday "what do you want?" the family all ask,

"metal please - I have a list here" is my reply

"We can't just buy you metal!" is their response.

Sometime we come to a compromise and I convince them that I need a kit from Hemingways Tools for example.

I would rather that they convert their money into something useful for me to use in the workshop than waste it on unwanted rubbish - I would sooner they not bother.......Bah Humbug !!!

Regards to all

Derek

Hi Michael,

I also have oil fired central heating. I used to have the Watchman" ultrasonic level measurement device. It looked very similar to yours.

However the device did not last more than about three years despite new batteries and repeated "pairing". Hopefully your is more reliable than mine was.

Looks like the sw 1 DIP is always ON, the rest of them seemed to be switched depending on the height of the tank. I wonder if it ever worked?

Currently I am using a low tech method, a piece of wood approximately calibrated with levels of 100 litres that I occasionally "dip" to check the level !

All the best

Derek