Member postings for Tom Sheppard

I scrapped the 18 month old VW because despite a wonderful engine, every other aspect of the car was so diabolically apalling, from the always being misted up to the woeful lights HVAC, positively dangerous roadholding and everything else it was so horrible I couldn't bring myself to sell it. I had it turned into an aeroplane tie down. The VW was replaced with another Mercedes but the quality was not up to "the best or nothing" so it went to be replaced with a current model Fiesta with every conceivable conceit. I love the stop start as I live in a town, The big powered mirrors, keyless starting, heated screen, comfy seats and effective HVAC make it easy to drive all day and the road sign recognition, navigation, phone integration, rear view camera and overall refinement (Synchromesh on reverse for example) make this little gem the final reason not to buy a classic car ever again. Keep your lumpy draughty noisy old bangers. This does nicely. A thoroughly modern Mini.

Job for 638 really, Steel will soft solder with the right flux but with the diameters you are using, I really wouldn't bother.

Yes, it can. It has pretty good gap filling and cures in the presence of metallic ions so surface area is a good thing. I have seen it do some things I would not have believed possible and would not think twice about trying it first.

Isn't that a full size 26 2/3mm chuck?

I expect that it means drive. there are two types, brushed and brushless. The latter is desirable but bumps the price up between two and three hundred pounds so expect to be asked the question. I have an Amadeal brushless lathe but I haven't yet had the time to plug it in!

0.00004432951''', not 0.00004432951''. That is something completely different!

To a watchmaker it measures 0.00004432951''' but one such will be sensible enough to use microns which are a proper measurement and coincidentally, what the dial is calibrated to.

It is good enough to make watches with. It doesn't need to be any better than tha so it simply doesn't matter what its absolute accuracy is. The quality is in the hands that use it.

Edited By Tom Sheppard on 16/03/2021 17:09:28

Steam bent bamboo wrapped in carbon fibre tube electric scooter with regenerative braking and 25cc LPG four stroke range extending high voltage alternator feeding a switched mode charger supplying 120Volts at 3 Amps.

Inflatable luggage containers to reduce space required for storage.

But it isn't model engineering.

As a newcomer here, the comments about the general unfriendliness of the ME community resonate, unfortunately. The fact that they will argue about fractions of nothing, often to the death over arcane examples of dead technology, (yes, steam junkies, I'm looking at you,) brings nothing to model engineering. Old men in sheds, one of which I am in danger of becoming are terribly boring when my company's apprentices grabbed the 3d printer and started mass producing PPE for the local hospital. Making copies of antiquities in small scale is old hat. Where are the new designs and projects? The Arduino and CNC modellers seem to be having a lot more fun.

Certainly the light aircraft homebuilt community, of similar demographic are more sociable and better humoured. Whether that has to do with the unforgiving nature of aviation, I don't know but after three months of looking in at it there isn't much for me in model engineering. Different strokes for different folks, I suppose.

The narrow end of the assembly has a circlip which is to prevent the shaft being pushed through the wide end. Remove it and the shaft goes thataway. Detach the cover at the wide end to ensure there is no increased diameter behind it.

In what way is a number of microswitches not an electronic brain? The principles were carried over into the 4004, " micro processor" which was created to run washing machines.

Edited By Tom Sheppard on 03/03/2021 15:27:16

Have you considered replacing the carburettor with a simple spraybar as used in a model aircraft engine in order to establish a calibration datum? This would help you to get the engine running nicely before spending a lot of time going down a series of trial and error blind alleys to find a solution.

Or RS-232.

A digital signal is an analogue signal with only two or three levels. That is why it is called a digital signal. (Yes, if zero is a level, and it is, then digital signals can have three levels, but they are still digital signals.)

The correct way to do sometthing varies between engineers and bogmatism doesn' t help. Nor does the blanket condemnation of products from China. The work produced on them gives the lie to that. A Myford is a thousand pounds and fifteen hundred with a new coat of paint but it might be knackered and how is a beginner to know? The Chinese equivalent needs work, all of which is explained in many tutorial videos, freely available. It is new and half the price. Accessories are readily and cheaply available and their availability brings many people into the hobby, most of whom don't have the space, money nor skills to get the best out of a ton and a half of toolroom lathe.

Sheer twaddle. Electrons aren't fussy.

Given a piece of tinplate, a drill and a soldering iron, you can fold up a simple boat. Find a coil of brake pipe to make a coil with two ends like a hairpin . The coil sits in the middle of the boat and the ends poke out through holes drilled in the stern , just below the waterline. Use a bottle top and some meths soaked cotton wool to heat the coil. This makes the simplest of steam driven boats . A Myford will come in at a good thousand pounds these days but a Chinese mini lathe will be around half of that new and £300-350 used. Spend a few months learning how to make it work well and by then, your son will have amassed enough engineering understanding in his head and hands to be able to make a wobbler engine which can be run on air at first until the skills are acquired to make a boiler. Mamod engines can be found for around £25 in rough but functional condition. Probably the very best present a steam enthusiast could receive at a young age.

The upper classes do not join the police. They employ them in order to protect the haves from the have nots. Years ago, it was considered a good and charitable thing to give our old computers to developing nations. The recipients, not burdened by the pressures of life in the more developed world, studiously embraced the machines and became very proficient in their use. This made them adept at working cyber cons and redistributed many millions of poundes from the gullible to the dishonest.

Put the new lathe in its unopened box behind the motorbike, the bits of which are currently occupying the required space. The engine will be rebuilt over the next week and then the fun can begin.