Member postings for old mart

If you chuck it very gently, a sharp tool will mark the copper if you turn the lathe by hand. Then hacksaw and file will finish the job. You could also turn a piece of steel or aluminium so that the tube pushes on and carefully use a parting tool.

Welcome, Stuart, I was born in Worthing, have lived in Glynde, Bognor Regis, Lower Beeding, Rusper and Northchapel, in E & W Sussex, as well as Gloucestershire, Surrey, Devon, and now Somerset.

There's a lot of Sussex coast, which bit are you living in?

I may have misunderstood your first two posts of the 12th, I thought there was about 75mm of thread showing when the knee was fully down. Or are you saying that the base of the knee is close to the drip tray when it is fully down? If it is the latter, then nothing to worry, the knee backlash adjustment can be done with the knee partly raised.

Thanks, I will be able to incorporate the antibacklash above the level of the existing nut easily in that length of screw. I will also add some sort of cover to keep the threads clean. The two nuts could be screwed into an external tube and the adjustment would be easy to do. That thread in your photo must me unworn as it never reaches the nut.

As drilling holes in aircraft skins has to be perfect, these adjustable countersinking tools were first tested on a specimen sheet of aluminium and passed by inspection having had the countersunk made measured and found to be in tolerance. The design made fast countersinking to tight tolerances safe to carry out.

I've just looked for the crab and winkle line by googling it and to be sure, it is missing from my GE markings. Having some practice, I'm pretty sure of the route from the clues and it will be added straight away. I am sure more lines are there waiting to be found.

Maurice, thanks for the link, it shows one of the most difficult to find lines in Suffolk, but misses most of the Bordon Military Railway in Hampshire. I have bookmarked all of the links so far, they will be very useful.

Edited By old mart on 12/11/2020 19:41:34

Sam, I have the north-south line already marked, but would never have found the colliery line, thats the reason I have come to the conclusion that 20% is a realistic goal for the industrial lines. Some of the maps can show back to 1945 arial photographs which is useful. Mind you, there is a 1945 overlay south of Edinburgh which should be north of the Firth of Forth.

I have found several sources of old maps which are invaluble, and also Wikipedia. Sometimes even street names help, station road is a dead giveaway, and there are even some Beeching terrace and the like, type of names.

Edited By old mart on 12/11/2020 19:17:49

I don't think those covers would work, they are for coolant. The Z leadscrew goes down into a sealed tube to keep the coolant away from it. I could wind the knee as high as it will go and block it up. Then if the bolts holding the nut were removed, the nut could be screwed up the leadscrew and measured, and the depth of the tube could be measured as well. I want to find out the depth of the tube as I have enough bronze to make two nuts, and the magic word "antibacklash" comes to mind, but the length of the nuts and the length of the leadscrew are factors as well as the depth of the tube. If there is some leadscrew showing above the nut when the knee is fully lowered, then the antibacklash nut could be above the existing nut position. It is frustrating not to be able to even see the mill during lockdown.

Difficult without the length bars they came with when new. To check the calibration of a micrometer properly, a box of slip gauges are used to measure odd sizes so that the micrometer leadscrew wear or damage is also checked as well as the zero which is what the length bar is for.

I like looking at Google earth on a large, 27" monitor and thought it would be easy to highlight all the disused railways in the UK. Starting with great confidence, I have found that with luck and much research, my realistic chances of marking all of the disused lines have dropped to about 80% of branch lines and 20% of industrial lines. They are certainly not all from the Beeching era, many predated that by a long time.

I thought I would post this as another way of keeping mentally busy, there are many ways required to unearth some of the more elusive track remains. I keep finding more just when I think a region is complete. I may also add the airfields in the country, there are more than you would think. The detailed picture is of Barnsley, Yorkshire.

Edited By old mart on 12/11/2020 17:35:49

The jaws are missing. Our inspection department had a complete set, which got used very occasionally, as they did not deem them very accurate.

Bad luck, I would never have guessed that cast iron would do that. The light stoning that you have carried out should have remedied the problem, though.

If you have a surface plate, a sheet of 600 wet and dry and a couple of rubs will sort it out easily. Before getting the 24" cast iron table, we used a glass plate made from thick float glass. It is about 12" square and is an excellent poor mans plate. The one we have is still in use for smaller jobs.

The forum works well enough for me, I even manage posting pictures. The only thing that I would like to see is the little box "remember me" to be present when first logging on. I frequently move to other forums and later back to this one, and always have to log in a second time. The box is always present the second time and when ticked keeps me logged in all the time the browser is open. My browser is set to forget all passwords when shut down, which is as I like it for security reasons.

No update will ever please everyone, the Home Shop Machinist forum was updated and although it suited me, there were a lot of complaints at the time.

Edited By old mart on 12/11/2020 16:15:21

The thoughts of using the unworn end of my spare Smart & Brown lathe leadscrew will probably be shelved. It is 6tpi as against the 5tpi of the TS knee. Mechanically, this would be the easiest option, but the scale would end up being a compromise. the Z would be 83.33 thousandths on an inch per turn. I know some lathe cross slides have the 6tpi pitch with the result of a scale of 0-80, but I think I will keep with the 5tpi and 0-100 as the gearing is 2:1. I will check carefully any uneven wear and address that.

Which Smart & Brown models had reversible leadscrews? The model A, infortunately does not have one.

Good point, so do ACME, but square threads would not work very well with that sort of nut.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is enough difference in the threads to modify your Boxford plate. I have turned Boxford backplates into Smart & Brown ones, but thats going from 1 1/2" to 1 3/4".

What is the thread pitch?

Edited By old mart on 10/11/2020 20:05:52

Thats exactly what I would have done, you have to be prepared to think outside the box with these old machines. What are you going to do about the nuts?

You'r right to get your hat, Steviegtr, A 1 1/2" Boxford backplate would fit a 1 1/8" Myford spindle like a -ric- in a bucket.

Alan, this is a good time to get yourself a set of thread gauges before going any further.

Edited By old mart on 10/11/2020 17:29:24

Ilike the clamp design, just right for that type of vise, and you can move the vise a little if needed.