Member postings for Gone Away

I don't see the point of this and similar statements. There are plenty of other ongoing threads on the site discussing model engineering. They didn't stop when this - additional - thread started (under "General Questions"  ). So there isn't a question of "getting back".

Anyone who is bothered by this particular thread can just ignore it and read those others. I'm sure many have. Nothing here impacts anyones ability to discuss "pure" model engineering in the appropriate forums.

Edited By Sid Herbage on 22/01/2013 01:15:52

I would say gross exaggeration even among forums of this type and excluding Usenet. Many forums have a hands-off approach because of the perception that, as soon as the forum is moderated, the host thereby incurs some liability for what is said. Not to mention that a user who's post is removed might consider himself "damaged" by that removal in some circumstances.

If the forum is clearly unmoderated and stated to be so, that responsibility lies with the poster.

A grey area to be sure but murky enough for many to take a non-intervention stance.

In the case of these forums, MHS's intervention/censorship history goes way back so they could not claim to be unmoderated and David might well have felt obliged to step in in this instance

Get the widest and longest you can afford and/or have room for. Whatever you buy you'll find situations when you need it just that bit bigger.

.... but it still is published twice a month (actually bi-weekly..... 26 times a year)

But I agree MEW is a lot less interesting. I can still pick up one of the earlier copies and read it for days on end. These days .... well ... TWO interminable beginners series and a stepper-motor lathe series that's been going for a year and I can't believe that a significant proportion of subscribers is contemplating building it.

Edited By Sid Herbage on 18/01/2013 23:20:19

..... it would be nice.

.... but one of the useful applications of a mill/drill is laying out an accurate pattern of holes using the x and Y movements. You will want to do some drilling on the mill.

R8 is a mounting system for tooling in the mill (or other machine) spindle. It has a more obtuse taper then MT and therefore releases (much) more easily. It also has a keyway to prevent rotation.

You can use R8 collets, and many people do, which will give you maximum height availability. Personally I use an ER (32 or 25) collet-holder in an R8 mounting. This loses a very little bit of height but gives you more diameter tolerance and is arguably quicker changing collets.

Depending on just how small a machine you get, don't rule out using drill chucks. I have enough height to use a chuck in many cases and I have fitted some with 1/2" parallel arbors which slip into a collet very quickly. In any case you won't be able to conveniently hold a full range of drill bits in collets (especially R8 collets which have limited gripping range).

I'd give a lot of weight (pun?) to table size in your decision making.

With these smaller machines, if you're using the mill for general purposes you will frequently find that the table or table-travel is just not quite big enough for the job you want to do.

(Of course, the price goes up with table size).

John (DMB) your choice of spindle is interesting. I agree with you as-written but a local vendor changed the spec on the small mill that I bought (after I had bought it) from MT2 up to MT3. When I asked why, they told me it was by popular demand because " there is more tooling available - to hobbyists - in MT3" . I disputed that and felt it was the other way round .... even in their own catalogue.

The nice thing was, they also came up with an R8 conversion kit which I've much preferred to my MT2.

Same for me. When I open in new tab, Firefox simply opens the original window in the new tab.

If I do the same in IE (which I don't habitually use), it opens the original window in a new tab plus the vendor's page in a new window.

Bummer really because I typically open such links in a new tab by clicking on them with the middle mouse button - it's quite automatic now.

Are you sure that's the right number Jeff? I think we use considerably more than that in everyday drilling.

According to my math (suspect at best these days) a 5mm hole has a cross-sectional area of about 0.03 sq.in. That would amount to an axial force of ~ 5 oz .... not a lot.

According to Tubal Cain ("Drills Taps & Dies"  ) typical axial load an a 3/16 drill drilling mild steel in a drill press would be ~50 lb

Edited By Sid Herbage on 07/01/2013 01:11:24

Ah, thanks guys - I didn't appreciate that.

Edited By Sid Herbage on 01/01/2013 18:08:49

Bob, am I right in thinking that, in the z-axis, you have a scale on the coarse feed but not the fine?

Not a "design" per se but there is a book, if you can find a copy, called "The Engineering and History of Rocket: a survey report" which is truly excellent and contains detailed drawings constructed from measurements made on the machine in the Science Museum. Plus a lot of background information. I feel sure you could construct a decent model of any of a number of the phases that Rocket went through during its development.

Even my 8 year old great nephew, during a brief sortie away from his iPod, pronounced it "so kewl" ..... high praise indeed!

Edit: I got mine from Camden, I think, but they don't seem to list it now so it may be out of print. Amazon UK list some "used, like new" copies starting at £12.45 with V2.80 shipping .... a real bargoon IMO

Edited By Sid Herbage on 31/12/2012 15:38:37

What the EULA used to say in most cases was that the the licence (more often "license" ) could not be transferred without the express permission of the software supplier - not unreasonable since otherwise how would they keep up with who is the current licence holder?

And generally they would readily agree if asked. I sold a spare Autocad licence that way and similarly obtained a Photoshop licence. It's probably to the software vendor's benefit to have a licence transferred (with potential income from subsequent upgrades) rather than have it languish.

I haven't read a EULA in years (does anyone?) so I don't know what the actual wording is these days. In any event, if I had any licence to sell I'd certainly go back to the sofware source and ask.

I remember Microsoft's first product offering (8-bit BASIC for the Altair on punched-tape) which came with the agreement that the user simply licenced the software rather than owning it (and moreover wasn't allowed to modify it except in certain limited areas **). Such an agreement was standard in business applications but caused an initial furour among home users.

** It was necessary to modify input/output coding in those days to suit the way your particular machine was configured. You were also allowed to make a new punched-tape copy with your changes.

Well, Canada actually but close enough. I know you can get Starret blades in the UK and I know that they catalogue these so I assumed they'd be available but obviously you would know better than I.

It's a standard blade size made by a number of manufacturers. Starret also makes one. They should be available at any decent supplier of bandsaw blades. Just be sure to throw out the crappy blade that comes with it (once you've used it to check out your installation) and fit a decent bi-metal blade.

(Just realised this thread has woken up again).

I know where you're coming from, Andy - there are surfaces at all angles compiunded by the fact that when you lay the thing down on the bench it isn't in the attitude that it would be when cutting. I sweated it for a bit too in designing a mount but it'seasier than it looks.

One of those angular surfaces was parallel to the blade (and therefore vertical in use) and that's the key. I simply bolted a piece of 1-1/2" or 2" x 1/2" bar to that surface. Since it's thin metal, I actually put a back-up piece inside, sandwiching the surface between the two. That takes care of mounting the saw and rest is just a couple of bearing-blocks from the hardware store and a piece of drill-rod or bar for a pivot shaft.

Here's another view of mine that might make it clearer:

Glutton for punishment, eh Don?

I had oil nipples exclusively on mine and they just unscrewed (2-BA thread).

The oilers (eBay) had M6 threads which I turned down and threaded #10-32 UNF which is what I have here and is close enough.

The Myford manual for the ML-7 (with exploded parts diagrams and parts list as well as lubrication info) is kicking around the internet as a pdf in various places if you don't already have a copy. The relevant Yahoo group(s) used to have it. PM me if you have any problem.

I picked up on that when you mentioned it some time ago David and it always worked well for me with a scrap of soft kitchen towel ..... thanks.

Based on another thread, I've recently replaced what nipples I can with regular, brass flip-top oilers which has simplified things enormously.