Member postings for Chris Evans 6

The £49.30 is not right, you may get the bar for less than that.

Where are you based ? I have a local steel stockholder who I can ask for a cost. I am in the Midlands. Chris.

Sam, I married a skinny one from Northern Ireland that I met in Spain. Still together after 44 years.

The rings I made where a bit of a fun thing for a few girls that worked where I served my toolmaking apprenticeship and a few other friends. I did make my wife one but she lost it, hers turned out a bit wide to get down to the skinny size. 5/8" diameter from memory.

On line suppliers have good web sites for bearings. I use "Simply Bearings" a lot when re-bushing motorcycle girder forks or old ground keeping equipment. Price comes down as quantity goes up.

This brings back memories of making rings from 2 shilling coins. I still have the little jig somewhere that has a vee shape milled in it with a shallow angled dovetail cutter. The coin was then held by hand in the vee and gently hammered to roll the outer so that the writing on the coin was readable from inside the ring. Sizes where taken from a ring that fitted the girl. At the correct inner size the hammering stopped the ring put in the lathe and bored to suit ring size the on a mandrel to form the outer. Polished up they looked nice. Early coins with more silver content where used. One girl I made a ring for had big fingers which meant using a half crown coin to get the size.

Good luck with the ring making. Chris.

Jason, your comment re low speed is higher than you would want. My 14x40 Excel lathe will only go down to 82 RPM. Way to fast for screw cutting a coarse thread. Ideally for me 35 to 40 RPM would be nice.

Plus One for Tractol. I always painted my Land Rovers with it. Very durable. Maybe the Ferguson TE20 (Grey Fergie) paint would look OK on my Bridgeport to see how it stands up ?

From a practical point of view it would not matter if the bush was loose on the peddle hole by a couple of thou. It will not wear the peddle out in your lifetime and will be retained by the peddle fixing.

Agreed VW garage prices are high. 8 years ago my wife's VW Golf was towed in to a local agent, the fix was charged at £85 plus vat per hour. We ran two VW cars a Golf and a Passat estate both nice to drive but the most unreliable and expensive cars we have ever owned. The Golf was the worst only managing 4000 miles in the first two years as the rest of the time she drove a loan car whilst the latest problem was sorted out.

Welcome along Ray. I am not a model maker my interests are motorcycles. You will find the lathe useful not only for your car but for other projects as well. When you have a lathe you get 100 friends, I regularly repair parts for a local football clubs ground keeping equipment as well as friends bike stuff.

My Dad was a good all rounder in the building trade so when he passed I kept all his tools. His saws and planes wood chisels etc. I still get special pleasure using them and remember the joint projects we did together. Building a boat or an ash body frame for a car restoration. When he was still alive he would always comment on what I had done around the house, checking the gap around a door I had fitted with a coin and disapproving looks if the coin was to tight or loose in one area !

The colour certainly looks like Stankoimport. I have used a few Stanko machines and all came really well equipped with rotary table/dividing head and vice.

In the days when Warwick machine tools sold them the service from Russian engineers was good. Electrics on the bigger machines where "interesting"

I made one earlier this year loosely based on the design by Steve Bedair. Plans via google.

I must say for a simple design it works well, far more ridged than a toolpost mounted job.

A photo of the head before it was stripped down could be useful. It may be similar to my French made one (can't remember the make) I did strip it once when it malfunctioned but a long time ago as I have owned it for 30+ years.

Phil, take a look at the Warco Bridgeport clone. I have not seen one in the flesh but someone on an old bike forum I use bought one due to it being lower than a Bridgeport. He was restricted in garage height to accommodate machinery for his model traction engine. He bought a little used second hand machine.

Having access to a cutter grinder I make my own from worn out slot drills and the odd one from 4 flute end mill.

I do lots of motorcycle related parts (no models) If you have the space/money a Bridgeport turret mill should do all you need. Not the best machine in the world but probably the most versatile for our type of work. Oh and welcome along.

Chris, if I do have the machine it is only for the odd job where a ground finish is required instead if milling. Grinding "dry" I have done for over 50 years, the only grinders I used coolant on where the bigger surface grinders and cylindrical grinders where the coolant is essential. I will be grinding things like motorcycle cam followers and small parts.

This is all rather worrying, I recently ( in last 12 months ) bought a Vertex 10" rotary table with the facility to use vertical. It was new and boxed bought for £99 so very cheap. I then sold my British made Elliot 10" table to recover most of the cost. Now thinking I should have kept the Elliot.

No coolant tank with this one, I will most likely use the shop vacuum as a dust extractor.

Thanks Muzzer if I go ahead with the machine I will use two. Normal operation is to start the hydraulics and leave on. Wheel only normally stopped when changing or setting up. I will take a couple of test pieces to try the machine when I go to inspect it.