Member postings for J BENNETT 1

Have a look on YouTube for clough42 3d printer. You can see his designs for 3d printed tool storage. He has lots of other interesting stuff.

John

I am pleased to see that my suggestion that you get a QCTP has raised a good deal of comment. I have found the responses very interesting, particularly with regard to rigidity. I would agree that by and large you do find yourself using three or four tools and they can be accommodated in a four way tool post, with other less used tools kept with their respective shims.

Personally, I am not very fond of the four way tool posts as I used to find myself getting caught or cut on the tools not in use. Perhaps I am just clumsy.

A QCTP was the first accessory I bought for my Warco WM250 and I have amassed a good collection of holders over the years. I find it so convenient to quickly change tools in a matter of seconds that I would certainly not contemplate being without one. But, as with all things in life its a matter of personal choice.

I would strongly agree with advice about not buying tools in a set. I started with a nice set of 7 12mm Glanze tools, and after many years there are at least 2 I have never used! Start with the basic turning facing tool, parting tool and boring bar and then buy more as required.

John

Don't bother with the changing numbers, just treat all Amazon calls as scams.

In my experience £109 is just the start of things. In my humble opinion the next thing you need is a quick change tool post (QCTP), unless you enjoy spending more of your time setting up than actually turning.

Also, as you have a Warco lathe I would recommend you look at their QCTPs as they will fit without modification.

John

Running mine with Thonny on a W10 laptop. Works fine. Whilst I have lots of different models of RPi's its handy to run it on the laptop and makes it portable.

Don't know if anyone has tried Apple.

John

This scam has been around for a long time. I get at least two of the "Amazon" calls every single day.

Beginning to think if they stopped I might miss them!!

Got one last week. Just started using it with Thonny. Easy to get started, just got to get back into Python. Started learning it a couple of years ago, but seem to forgotten most of it.

They are so cheap its worth having a look. However, unless you have other items to order it costs almost much in postage. Pimoroni and The PI Hut both have them back in stock now, although they are limiting it to one per customer. RS will have them in stock as well soon.

There is a lot of documentation available for download, looks like they got ahead of the curve for once, before releasing the board.

There is also a book "The Official Raspberry PI PICO Guide - Get started with MicroPython on Raspberry Pi Pico". This sells for about £10 -12. However there is also an official free download although they don't make it very obvious. Its fairly low level but still a good place to get started.

John

So would I, but it's been a long wait so far!

However, I have at last just got my R8 16mm Face Mill Arbour and 40mm Face Mills form ARC. Only been waiting since July for them to come back into stock..

You just have to be patient, and make sure you have signed up for Email notification and then act fast.

John

Is there a reason you are limited to these two machines. Don't forget the Chester machine attracts a £54 delivery charge, unless you are collecting. Similar charges will apply to other suppliers.

There is a wide choice of machines in this size/price range available from the likes of arceurotrade, Warco, Amadeal and others. Suggest you have a good look at the alternatives.

Apart from tooling cost you also have to consider what space you have and what you are going to mount it on. A solid stable base is essential if you want good consistent accuracy.

Just a few thoughts, I am sure others will be along soon with further suggestions.

Just a small correction APKT inserts are size 10 or 16. APMT inserts are size 11 or 16.

The 40mm shell mills from ARC take an arbor with a 16mm spigot, 50mm and 63mm use a 22mm spigot and the 80mm uses a 27mm spigot. Also, from the web site it would appear that all of the ARC shell mills take size 16 inserts i.e. APKT 16 or APMT 16.

As you have a SX2P mill I assume it has an R8 spindle, it was the only option when I bought mine.

Now the bad news, ARC are out of stock of of R8 shell mill arbours in all sizes. When I spoke to them they said it would be around Christmas time before they expected to receive any more. I was on the email notification list for the last batch which came in a couple of months back but delayed a couple of days before trying to order and the 16mm arbors were already sold out. They seem to sell out very quickly.

R8 16mm shell mill arbors are available from other sources but are at least two and a half times dearer than ARC's. R8 shell mill arbors in 22mm and above are much more widely available.

I have been very pleased with my SX2P and try to support ARC as much as possible as I have found they provide acceptable quality at a fair price. (Usual disclaimer, I have no association with ARC whatsoever)

John B

Recently, looking at ER 32 nuts with a ball bearing to reduce friction and increase clamping force (ARC and others sell them) got me thinking about how much torque should be applied when tightening an ER 32 collet.

After a bit of searching around the internet and looking at various manufacturers web sites it became clear that the standard figure for ER 32 is 100ft-lbs / 140 Nm.

From experience in my youth of working on cars and engines that it a lot of torque. Given the relatively short length of the standard collet nut spanner there is no way I could now ( in my dotage) exert that kind of torque, particularly with the collet holder mounted in the spindle. And, even if I did manage to torque it up that much I don't think I would ever get it undone again.

Anyone care to give comment?

The bearing is stuck on the shaft. With taper roller bearings the second bearing to go on the the shaft needs to be a sliding fit on the shaft. This should be a very close fit but you should be able to just slide it by hand. The first bearing on the shaft is normally a press fit. In this way when you slacken the adjusting nut the shaft can slide through the rear bearing a little and the front bearing can separate a small amount. You can then re-adjust.

Without the rear bearing being able to side it becomes very difficult to adjust the bearing - which in itself is a black art - it also makes assembly and dismantling straight forward.

I converted my very early model Warco 250 Lathe to taper roller well over 10 years ago and after a little running-in and final adjustment it has been fine ever since.

Very recently I have been rebuilding the spindle assembly on my old Warco X2 mill, as part of my very very long running project to convert it to CNC. I have replaced the original morse taper spindle with an R8 version and fitted taper roller bearings. The lower bearing on the R8 spindle has a larger internal diameter than the top one. This lower bearing is a tight fit on the shaft and I spent a few happy hours making a "puller" to pull the bearing on. The puller consists of a bottom cup which fits over the lower end of the spindle, a ring piece which slides over spindle and engages with the inner race of the bearing, a length of 50mm steel tube which engages with the ring and extends beyond the top of the shaft and a top cap which fits on to the tube. The bottom cup and the top cap both have a 12mm hole. A length of 12mm studding is then passed through the assembly. A pair of nuts are locked together at the lower end and a large well oiled washer and a single nut to the other.

This "puller" worked extremely well and I was amazed at how little torque was required to smoothly pull the bearing down the shaft and on to its seat. In practice two of the "ring pieces" are required, one to fit the upper part of the shaft and part counter bored to the larger diameter to fully seat the bearing a little way on. The second "ring" is bored all the way through at the larger diameter to push the bearing all the way down on to its seat.

Before fitting the lower bearing I carefully measured and polished the the upper part of the spindle for a very close sliding fit of the upper bearing. The main point I found here was the need for a very small amount of lubricant when test fitting the bearing. Although a "sliding fit" had been achieved, with spindle and bearing fully degreased I found it almost impossible to slide the bearing on without it jamming and sticking. Spraying a little WD40 on to a paper towel and then lightly wiping the spindle and bearing allowed it to just slide on.

Sometimes feel is better than a torque wrench. A while ago I was replacing the gas re-circulation valve on my Vauxhall diesel engine. Smallish bolts into alloy, so I thought better get the low range torque wrench and set the correct value. Start torquing up and its feeling pretty tight but keep going a bit more expecting the click at any moment and then the thread starts to fail. Left it there and did the other three by feel.

However, when tightening suspension components I would still always use a torque wrench as some of them have to be very tight and that is difficult to do by feel.

I bought one a few years ago and from the start had the feeling that it didn't work very well, if at all. It was quite cheap and is fairly small so just assumed it was a gimmick. So stuck it in the cupboard where it's been ever since. I will fish it out and see if I can find anything wrong.

You should not use the screen on this type of cable as a protective earth. If the far end requires earthing it should be done with a cable of the correct size in accordance with the wiring regs. The shielding on armoured cable can in some circumstances be used as the PE but it depends on the size of the cable. Tables are available.

Thanks for the replies. Wasn't thinking clearly. In the normal course of things I only ever use metric coarse or Whitworth threads. There are of course many many other variations.

Apart from fine adjustment are there any other uses/ advantages for very fine threads?

Should have posted this in the "beginners section"!! Clearly lock-down is starting to bite!

Many thanks

JWB

I have been looking at fullform 60 deg ISO inserts for internal threading. I noticed that in the smallest 11 size they are available in 0.5 mm pitch upwards. However, I cannot see what use they are as 0.5 mm pitch would normally be used for 3.0 mm metric coarse or 5.0 mm metric fine, whereas the very smallest bore you could get a tool with this size insert into is 10mm.

I am sure I am missing something obvious, perhaps someone could enlighten me?

Sorry about the double post. Completely missed that. It is a very good site and has so much of interest, to me at least, I have spent (wasted) to many hours on it. Whilst there are quite few suppliers who cater for the hobby end of the business as well as the esoteric, **LINK** are worth a look. They stock a good range and are very helpful.

Have a look at the forum on www.mig-welding.co.uk. Apart from mig welding there is a lot about TIG welding and engineering in general. You will need to sign up if you want to post or ask questions, but you can just browse if you want.

I have just stripped down my Warco 4" Rotary Table prior to converting it to stepper control. I bought the RT several years ago but have never used it. The grease is old and sticky and so I will give it all a through clean before reassembly. Does anyone know what type of grease is used in these?