Member postings for Bill Phinn

The cheap and cheerful one may be less likely to give accurate repeat readings even several times in a row, let alone in the long term.

It really depends on the quality of its construction; a tear-down could probably show whether the cheap one is objectively inferior constructionally to a top branded counterpart. Not that many of us would be prepared to do a side by side tear down if we'd paid for both of them ourselves.

Nick, it's quite time-consuming but you can turn any perfect-bound book into a section-sewn book if you really want.

It's done by "guarding" pairs of leaves together in the correct sequence using strips of bank paper or Japanese tissue to make whatever sized sections you've decided on and then sewing these together like an ordinary section sewn book. If you're careful you can space the pairs of leaves on the guards in such a way that when several pairs are folded round into a section the text at the fore-edge all lines up, more or less. Whether you choose to trim after sewing is up to you.

The main difficulty in doing this to a perfect-bound book is reducing "swell" at the spine caused by all the guards being folded on top of one another. You need to avoid a spine profile that is over-round and a fore-edge that is excessively concave.

Before sewing books that have been heavily guarded or have very many thin sections, bookbinders use hammers and then long periods of pressing in a nipping or standing press to reduce swell. More hammering typically takes place after sewing as well.

Sounds good, though I'd say the true test of an insurer is how they handle things in the event of a claim.

The Tap and Die Company's apparently unique [to them] use of the phrase "Highest Quality Steel", aka HQS, to designate a material category for taps is ambiguous at best. When you analyse the totality of what they say about taps made from this on the one hand and taps made from HSS on the other, their claims are in fact absurdly contradictory:

https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/postings.asp?th=183361&p=2

Edited By Bill Phinn on 16/02/2023 11:46:34

read "efficient".

I've just threaded two 5/16" BSF holes in 6mm mild steel plate, the first using a tap from a "tungsten steel" tap and die set I have and the second using an old Harris branded tap purchased secondhand.

The difference was night and day. The Harris tap cut the threads almost effortlessly, whereas the tungsten tap required much more force on the handles of the tap wrench to achieve the cut. What was also noticeable was that the tungsten tap created a much more pronounced lip around the top and bottom of the hole, which then required more work to chamfer off afterwards. Whether this was because the tungsten tap was oversize [I didn't measure it] or just not very inefficient at cutting I don't know.

The same tungsten tap was good enough when I used it on brass a few months ago, but I wouldn't be in a rush to use it again on any kind of steel.

Problems with these cheaper, non-HSS, sets I've encountered:

• The steel isn't hard enough or tough enough for cutting ferrous metals efficiently.
• The tap diameters are significantly oversize or undersize.
• The cutting teeth are badly formed
• The square section for gripping in a tap wrench isn't square, or, if square, is lumpy or otherwise mis-shaped
• The included tap wrench and die stock are sloppily made out of monkey metal.

Any of these problems can waste time, ruin your work, lead to frustration, and cost more money in the long term.

Buy these in the short term, by all means, if it gets you out of a hole [assuming it's one not too hard to get out of], but if you plan to cut threads long term go out and buy decent taps and dies one by one as you need them.

Edited By Bill Phinn on 13/02/2023 20:44:50

Right. I think I avoided putting them there because it says: "Please put non specific questions...here".

I'd always thought of my questions as being quite specific.

Full title of each is:

The Perfectionists: How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World

Exactly: How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World

It looks like it's the same book, and like someone in the editorial team wanted to avoid the negative connotations [in some people's eyes] of the word "perfectionist".

You've got me worrried now. I've started numerous threads in that sub-forum. Perhaps you could clarify whether any of those have been wrongly placed, and, if so, where they should have been placed.

My decision to place them there has often been based on the wording of Neil's opening post of 01/09/2014, which states:

"It's a more formal place to offer or request assistance in the form of surplus tools, materials, advice, loans of use of specialist machinery or tooling, or even a practical helping hand."

Thanks to everyone for your replies.

Interesting to read the British Standard, and to see that it approves the use of grade A nuts with fasteners up to grade R.

Something I omitted to mention earlier is that Thomas Smith's reply:

"Gr R is the grade for the majority of BSF Bolts. Our stock is Gr A..."

is at odds with the information on their web page stating that their bolts are Grade R.

Jelly, my understanding was that Zoro and Cromwell belong to the same umbrella company, namely W. W. Grainger Inc.

My BSF screws may well have been end-of-stock items, but I did buy nearly 10,000 of them ranging from 1/4" to 1/2" in various lengths, and the majority of these seem to be still available from Zoro, albeit at prices that are now between 30 and 600 times higher than the prices I paid.

Coming back to the question of grading, I've also been having fun lately buying UNF hex nuts from three well established fastener suppliers. Judging by the orders I've received, not one of these suppliers has been reliably able to distinguish between grade 1, grade 5 and grade 8 UNF nuts, and I'm inclined to think the explanation for this is ignorance rather than them knowing full well the grade of what they're sending out whilst hoping that the customer doesn't.

I bought some BSF socket head screws from Zoro a while ago. They are advertised as grade 10.9. There are no grade markings on any of the heads.

10.9 is a metric grade, so I'm not sure how to interpret the claim anyway. My understanding was that most self-colour steel BSF screws and nuts were traditionally Grade R, which I believe is a near equivalent to metric grade 8.8. I haven't bought any of Zoro's BSF hex nuts, but I see that Zoro's are either not graded, or described as grade 6 or grade A, sometimes both simultaneously.

I recently asked Thomas Smith fasteners for some information on their own BSF hex nuts specifically:

"Please could you tell me what grades of BSF hexagon full nuts you have available off-the-shelf and which of these grades would best match a supply of self-colour BSF screws I have in various thread pitches and lengths that when sold to me were described as grade 10.9. I have only ever seen graded BSF nuts for sale in grades "R" or "A". My understanding was that R is medium carbon/medium tensile and grade A low carbon/low tensile. Grade 10.9 in metric fasteners is usually considered fairly high tensile, I think."

Their reply:
"10.9 is a metric spec. Gr R is the grade for the majority of BSF Bolts. Our stock is Gr A which again is the common grade for BSF nuts. Never seen a BSF nut in anything harder than EN8. EN8 are manufactured on demand at a significant higher cost. Prices for Grade A are on our shop online."

So my questions are:

Are Thomas Smith essentially saying that the only off-the-shelf BSF full nuts they sell are low tensile Grade A nuts?

If my Zoro BSF screws are genuinely equivalent to metric Grade 10.9 (though how would I know?) then what nuts would ideally go with them and where can they be had? Zoro's own BSF nuts, graded at grade A and grade 6 simultaneously, seem as unsuitable a match for my screws as Thomas Smith's.

When I have the time I plan to use quite a number of BSF nuts with my screws, and I would like the grades of each to be a close match and to be fairly high tensile.

Some clarity on BSF fastener grading generally would be appreciated. There is very little clarity in the marketplace on this topic, from what I can see.

To update my post on page 1 of this thread, as well as my own thread about diamond and CBN wheels, I was contacted by Axminster Tools today. They took both my slow speed grinder and the two CBN wheels I'd ended up with back to base three weeks ago after I'd been unable to cure the lateral runout problem with the CBN wheels when fitted to the new grinder. I won't go into what remedies I tried here, but they were numerous.

Gratifyingly [in a way], Axminster Tools told me that their technical staff had been unable to cure the lateral runout either, and not just with my wheels on my grinder but with all the CBN wheels they have in stock on several examples of the same type of grinder. They concluded that the wheels, the purpose-made bushes for mounting the wheels, and the grinder are not compatible as things stand, and they are currently working on incorporating some design changes to newer versions of the wheels, bushes and grinder. They couldn't or wouldn't elaborate on what they feel the root of the incompatibility is.

It appears from recent reviews of the grinder on Axminster's own site that I'm not the only buyer who was unable to cure wheel wobble when fitting CBN wheels to it.

A full refund is currently being processed for my purchases.

Overcoming my initial pessimism, I've done some slow but determined prying and managed to get the bezel and lens off. I'll disassemble the guts of the gauge when I next have an hour or two spare. At the moment, if I return the needle to zero with my finger it just springs back to its original position at around 0.5 bar.

Noel, I've unscrewed the gauge from the regulator. The thread appears to be M9x1.0 - definitely not BSP 1/8" or 1/4" at any rate.

Is there a suitably threaded gauge to fit that out there?

John, I'll have a go at blowing and sucking now that the two parts are separated.

Thanks to all so far.

The needle isn't fouling anything visible to me.

The thin-walled bezel is welded to the body of the gauge, hence, if disassembly takes place, re-assembly won't, at least not with the same bezel and body. The lens is plastic.

Posted by Paul Lousick on 05/01/2023 23:57:01:

I or get a new gauge.

They're no longer available from the supplier I bought it from nor from any other supplier in the UK I'm aware of.

The regulator pictured was bought new last year and has only been used a handful of times. It is for use on disposable Bernzomatic style gas bottles.

The problem is that the needle won't return to zero, and wildly erratic readings now result when it is used.

Does anyone know whether there is a cure for this sort of problem, and if so what?

Thanks.

Bob, can you upload a picture showing what you're trying to solder to what, with what torch and in what micro-environment?

I've successfully silver soldered quite a bit of mild steel, stainless steel and cast iron using just Easy-flo flux and either Silverflo 55 or a similar silver solder.

Thanks a lot for everyone's replies.

I've given the lube some time to work its way down the shaft, and rotation speed seems to have increased somewhat. However, it still seems slower than normal [even in the warmth of indoors], so I'm not convinced the capacitor isn't faulty.

Do I take it I can't test the capacitor unless it's desoldered, or unless I have an ESR meter, which I don't?