Member postings for MW

sounds like a decent bunch of fellows. I like how they have time for an individual customer, it shows dedication.

Michael W

You can either embed a URL or you need to make a new "album" and post pictures into it, then you can click the camera icon on the post and insert it from the album, hope that helps.

Michael W

I believe mitutoyo have their own metrology lab/institute based in the UK.

Michael W

Shining like silver, very well done.

Michael W

I think the ARC euro price is fairly decent, i would simply go for that, it offers itself as a permanent solution.

Michael W

Yes, it only happens rarely but you find that sometimes your finest isn't fine enough for what you're doing, i found parallelism and concentricity and hole positions to be the worst ones, alot of what i do i'll spot through if i can, i dont suspect for a moment that i'm alone in that though.

Neil, i suppose the terms can be a little synonymous at times, i dont think many of the inspectors i knew would be able to tell me unless i said something like "repeatability" or "true to nominal".

Yeah i was aware of fakes of mitutoyo, will have to check against that graph though :P! it hasnt listed my product specifically but i guess the warning signs can be similar, if i remember rightly, i took steps to make sure i bought it from them directly through their listed retailers and the micrometer wasnt cheap, Funny you should mention it, i do remember telling one of the production engineers how much i bought it for and he said "ha! theyre listed at half the price in our catalogue", yet i was fairly certain i paid what it should cost, maybe theyre buying fakes after all

Michael W

Henry!! he gobbles it all up!! Mr, pah! make that Dr. Swarf Eater!

Michael W

I actually am quite fond of mitutoyo but i would say that as i worked for a company that used nothing but mitutoyo measuring equipment and would say it is good enough for the job but consistent reading between inspectors are hard to come by, but you could take that as a general "rule" of measuring equipment (no pun intended)

Other than that, i do believe that it wont last as long as some of the equipment still being used today like baty, or moore and wrights famous slip gauges, i think they would have them "calibrated" every year or chuck'em, so its not meant to last basically, but were used nearly all the time.

Does beg the question sometimes of how accurate is enough, well i went to college where the verniers seemed to be the cheapest of the cheapo, but there were alot of old tools like baty and starret from their old premises.

Michael W

The idea of made in UK, in the popular imagination died years ago, i certainly cant think of many things made 100% in this country, it's just bits and pieces mainly,(not as a retail item anyway, more like bespoke) just look at the price and you can see why nobody can afford to, even many things that have a claim to British heritage are on dubious foundations.

Michael W

Edited By Michael Walters on 12/02/2016 03:24:40

You could make you own oldham couplings (just saw cut if you dont have a slitting saw) i've seen people use moulded plastic stuff before, like this;

Edited By Michael Walters on 11/02/2016 18:28:29

Actually i think my one is a chinese no name, not a clarke per se, one is a little "sticky" on the plunger and the casing for it broke, i paid a little more for the lever type one, which is clarke, that seems to have a nicer feel to it, i still keep it in its box.

I guess in terms of "accuracy" it actually tells you on the dial how accurate the movements are, mine are to 0.01 of a MM but you could get accurate to 0.001 of a MM (if what is said is to be believed) it obviously gets much harder to make sense of the reading the finer you go, for general workshop use that is.

So i've discovered a new meaning to the word precision, that being repeatability and general sturdiness/product support if it does go wrong. I think my plunger one has almost "had it" to be clear.

you definitely learn from experience whats worth paying for and whats not,

Michael W

Edited By Michael Walters on 11/02/2016 16:06:21

There's also the cooling consideration, most totally enclosed DC motors i've seen never use fan cooling, yet they are dependent on the temperature in order to operate well, a cost cutting exercise or a design flaw?

Michael W

Now, many many years ago, i probably would've been beaten over the head with a large rock until my innards spilled out and then later burned for tea time, for asking such a diabolically mad question;

I use a cheap Clarke dial indicator and wondered why the branded ones are so much more to buy, so do you really get alot more accuracy for your cash?

Michael W

Hail, friend!

Michael W

Bear in mind that they probably ran these machines at fairly low RPM by todays standards (like less than 500 RPM) and with good reason also; the sliding bar/slotted lever is taking the whole force of the drive and if you're not careful it could break or shake itself to pieces at high speeds, just think of what a pulley does thats out of balance with the other.

Its very neat looking design which i applaud, but would also like you to consider the required strength in the materials and good fits to minimize the risks involved in a real working piece, there's no harm in using emery paper to improve the fit.

You could improve the movement of the Yellow component by using a roller bearing on the supporting shaft below made to fit that particular slot.

I'm assuming the "wedge" action is what also helps the momentum of the driven component and in order to change direction, it would be easier to position a kind of small"idler" wheel between the wedge and the "wall" of the bigger wheel that rubs against it and spins freely on its axis this would give you the room needed to change direction of force on the wedge without it ceasing when trying to move backwards.

I know half the stuff i say is ramble so, take what you want from the utterance, if anything

Michael W

Yeah i didnt use a centre but i guess its rather alot to take off in one go, i shouldve considered that.

Michael W

were talking 38mm mild steel, i was trying to take 2mm cuts with a large roughing tool. I guess that makes sense when you think that a morse taper works a bit like that.

lol, a "machine shop fascist" i dont think anyone should qualify or aspire to be such a thing on here, wheres the fun in that?

I started out with an old sherline lathe and mill (that i still have) that my company used for 2nd ops but didnt want anymore because sub-spindle cnc machining was replacing the need.

I've found that for a small machine, its got alot going for it, if you only want small parts that is.

Maybe you could try their motor/speed control, its fairly reasonable for a complete "ready to go" system.

Michael W

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone had any good ideas on how to successfully clamp a round part on a bar in order to turn the whole length without rechucking it and therefore keeping all the diameters concentric to one another.

I, at the moment, have a method of simply threading a bar with a larger diameter at the back as a kind of "back stop" and am really asking if the form of the clamping nut makes a big difference to how well the bar holds it, i've seen someone do this for gear cutting in MEW before.

I do find that despite this i get a kind of "judder" effect when roughing steel where it skips round either in the chuck holding the bar, or the part itself. (it just ruins the finish)

Edited By Michael Walters on 09/02/2016 11:40:35

"I'm guessing the people who prosecuted him had no knowledge of Bletchley Park & those who knew weren't telling?

Tony"

That is a very good point, from a historical perspective, the work at bletchley wouldve been top secret and valuable knowledge to soviet spies. If he had a reputation for being a bit of an oddball anyway it would've neatly lined him up for a guilty verdict. A pretty torrid time for Alan Turing. He was very knowledgeable with the acids he was using for his electroplating experiments so i'm fairly sure he committed suicide in the end.