Member postings for Mike Hurley

John's suggestion of drinks cans is good - use them myself. However, most are aluminium these days which can be OK up to a point, but ideally get your pocket magnet out and find steel ones - much better. They are a very consistent thickness.

I have a handy small tray with strips like these, plus offcuts from jobs etc (any old bits will do - isn't critical) and you soon build a good selection that will suit all your needs.

mine to, link is dead. Server probably broken?

Thanks Paul, I was OK with the post-Flash copies on the site, but hadn't thought of trying Pocketmags again. However, when I did it only gave me access to the recent copies and no archive copies at all. So I'm still no better off. Looks like i'll just need to grin a bare it! Regards Mike

When I decided to subscribe to MEW for the first time just before Christmas (my local WH Smith having closed), i decided the print & digital would suit me as I had missed print issues in the past and the archive would be useful.

Oddly, I don't remember big, clear lettering in the 'subscribe' pages saying 'Sign up, pay a bit extra for a service that will only work properly until the end of this year', I'm sure a cop out is in the small proint of the T&Cs but it still annoys me. I relise the publishers have no control over external products and suppliers, but it would be nice to make things clear up front and I might have saved myself a couple of £

regards to all. keep safe.

Totally agree Stuart. Yes there are youtube videos out there on almost every subject on the planet, but would 'Joe Public' go looking for one on, say, repairing fine china / cleaning a fine skeleton clock etc. To my way of thinking it does a superb job of letting people know that you CAN repair almost everything as good as new and not add more rubbish to landfill. Just grin & bear the 'soppy' bits

With all the program's need to appeal to a wide audience as entertainment yes it does concentrate a little too much on the sobbing relatives at times, but even a true cynic must agree that sometimes in these grim times it does warm your heart a little to see the genuine joy on someones face when the 'reveal' happens. Regards to all

Edited By Mike Hurley on 10/01/2021 10:39:58

Oily rag - Somebody sold me a Lancia once (ex-friend), Magnificent engine, but the drivers door fell off - literally. Oh the joys of motoring whem you were young and naive!

Maserati Merak c. 1970?

Regards Mike

Edited By Mike Hurley on 08/01/2021 10:31:38

Getting fed up with so many iffy calls, we invested in a super-duper call filtering phone last year. It works really well, and allows you to automatically block unwamted calls very easily. Has cut nuisance calls by 99%. You need to spend a bit of time setting it up correctly but its not the proverbial rocket science. Regards

Welcome Callum. Sounds (no pun intended) like you've got a lot of interesting projects ahead of you.

My only words of 'wisdom' are to be careful what you plan to buy, with a specialised interst like yours it would be easy to buy this and that and end up spending a lot of money on stuff that isn't really suited to your tasks.

You will for example regularly read here postings advising 'newbies' to engineering to buy the biggest you can afford as often you will find the capacity of what you have (say a lathe or milling machine) is inadequate at some point.This is sound advice for general model engineering as, usually, as experience grows so does the size and complexity of what you tackle grows. In your case, it would seem to me that generally you already know the sizes of most instruments you will be dealing with, so I would tend to think carefully and plan exactly what you are likely to actually be doing in the future and budget accordingly.

Soldering and brazing are great skills to have - simply remember the mantra - KEEP IT CLEAN - then you'll never have problems. Regards Mike

If you need to remove the handle(s) they are usually held in situ on these older machines with a taper pin. These can be a bit of a sod to get out if they have been fitted flush both ends, and will have corroded a little so won't come out without a fight. Carefully clean off any grot and polish the handles boss, then use a magnifier and you should just be able to detect which is the 'thick' end and which the 'thin'. Get / make a proper sized drift sized for the 'thin' end, support the other side of the boss and tap away.

Dont go too heavy, a little heat may help. If you're too enthusuatic you will sort of 'rivet' over the thin end and it will be almost impossible to get out without drilling.

£10 for a lathe like that Arthur? You're obviously like one of those Lucky people I see on the Antiques roadshow on tv who buys a piece of costume jewellery from a charity shop for 50p and it turns out to be Faberege worth £1000's! If I spent 50p like that I'd usually find out that it was only worth 20p! Happy turning!

Edited By Mike Hurley on 28/12/2020 09:59:57

Totally agree with both of the above. Usually busy with 100+ jobs and outings etc in the summer, but this time of year I think my time in the workshop is the only thing keeping me sane. We've only got terrestrial steam TV so none of the fancy streaming stuff, but it is unusually dire this year. So I think its back into the (slightly chilly) workshop for a few hours of mental stimulation (might have a small* sherry first though - well it is Christmas and its not over warm in there)

regards to all.

* Obviously VERY small, as I wouldn't want to suggest alcohol and machinery mix!

Edited By Mike Hurley on 26/12/2020 09:54:14

Robert - I've actually messaged Neil Wyatt directly and asked something similar about a "shopping partner" .

Sounds like you owe me a virtual pint then Andrew

Thanks for all the thoroughly depressing feedback folks. A merry Christmas then! At my age, I should have learned by now not to take things at face value, but foolishly 'trusted' this web site to promote reputable companies (to be fair, they may not have been fully aware of these issues before).Still - you never stop learning do you? At least I shall take ALL advertising on this site with a large pinch of salt in future until confidence is restored.

As I said in an earler post I've previously used another company several times who were superb - (that was Metals4U). I'll know better next time won't I.

regards to all

I've previously used another company who were to be honest - superb (unusual these days) allbeit a touch more expensive than other places - but worth it for the rapid turnaround and cutting service etc.

Unfortunately they don't stock the specific size brass sheet I wanted, hence trying MK. Never used them before but saw they were a 'shopping partner' featured on this ME web site home page so thought they would be OK.

Can you still get Kasenit - I thought they had stopped making it?

Yes - online with PayPal, and I initially had a ...thankyou for your order it is being processed email, but that was just an automated one.

Probably no problem getting the money back via PP if necessary, its more the alloyance as I can't progress the current job without one of the items in the order.

Is anyone else having problems contacting these people? I ordered stuff a while back and have heard nothing since, have contacted them again recently to query the delay and still no response. Are they still trading?

I appreciate Covid issues and extra xmas presuures may delay things, but see no reason for a simple lack of communication.

Fascinating. I'm certainly no chemist but was genuinely surprised by Bob Stevenson's comment "....made of synthetic 'bristles' similar to nylon and this is easiy corrupted by oil" (I'm certainly not disagreeing with his point) but I suppose thinking about it, most of the cheap brushes I use for cleaning do end up useless & grotty very quickly! I had thought most synthetic materials were pretty well oil-proof (as most oil comes in synthetic containers in the first place).

Can any scientific bod clarify this (in laymans terms) just out of interest. regards Mike

I agree totally with Chris, and as you will find, many members of the forum have said this before - buy the best you can afford. You can guarantee that if you buy the 12 at some stage you will wish you had the extra capabilities of the 14. If you do buy a 14 at some stage you will wish you had the extra capabilities of the 16 ad infinitum! Where does it stop? Look realistically at your overall budget - if that means going without a few weekly takeaways and you can push to the next model - it will be worth it in the long run.

BUT - don't forget that the machine is only part of the package - a decent range of tooling soon mounts up the cost!

all the best. Mike