Member postings for Chris Gunn

Richard, I guess your copper head hammer has mushroomed over so you cannot grip it and twist it out. My method is to smooth the face off, and mark it out and drill a series of 1/8" holes at 1/4" pitch, then open them out to 1/4", and then chimble the bits out.

Chris Gunn

Alan, you will need to create a D1-3 mount to fit your chuck, which is on the big side for a Bantam, so you will need the locking pins as well as drilling the holes, do you have these?

Have you considered buying a D1-3 back plate available from "our" suppliers and fitting the chuck to that?

A lot would depend on the configuration of the holes and the register in the back of your chuck, and the size of the commercially available plates.

Chris Gunn

Maybe bit late to comment, but like some of the other posters I have 3 x 4.5" grinders, one with a sanding disc, one with a thin cutting disc/thick grinding disc and one with a wire brush, and a great asset they are too for larger work. I have used these at work since they were in common usage. I concur with most of what has been said, but I really prefer to have the grinder held firmly in my bare hands, I feel I get a better grip, and a good feel for the on/off switch unencumbered by gloves. The hand is generally close behind the guard so sparks to the hand are not an issue in my experience. My other tips would be to make sure the work is firmly held in a vice or clamped to the bench or a Workmate if working outside. Always unplug it when changing discs, and be careful with sanding discs as catching these on a sharp edge can shred them in a heartbeat. Use the correct backing disc for the sanding discs. Buy the best branded sanding and grinding/cutting discs as the cheap ones just do not stand up.

Chris Gunn

I have always used a light spring for my traction engine clacks, albeit a slightly bigger size than for a 5" loco. I felt that the spring helped to keep the ball under control over the top of the incoming port, and stopping it moving sideways and blocking the outgoing port. However Gordon Smith wrote an article in January this year on making clacks without a spring, keeping the ball above the hole with a sleeve, without a spring. This is worth a look.

Chris Gunn

I am lucky enough to have 2 of these, and very handy they are too. They were standard issue in the machine shop at Timsons when I did my Apprentiship. They had 3 uses, firstly to tap the drill back into the tailstock, secondly to get it out again, and thirdly to "bang in" any latecomers as they hopefully walked the length of the machine shop. For the latecomer the sound of 100 or more of these banging on the lathe drip trays was worse than losing the quarter of an hours pay.

Chris Gunn

Clubs can test both copper and steel boilers, it is worth joining one to get help and advice as you go along, plus you can get access to a track, and play with someone else's loco while you are building yours as well if you are lucky.

Chris Gunn

Roy, this thread may help.

**LINK**

Chris Gunn

OK Paul, I was missing something, and I get it now. I would imagine that this is easier than trying to position the mounting holes in the hornplates from the boiler stays as we tend to do. However on larger scale engines I would be concerned that nothing is pulling the hornplates in to the boiler half way up the boiler at the front. The cannon shaft would probably do it at the back.

Chris Gunn

Maybe I am missing something, but if the hornplates have square holes, and the bolts are like rivets on the head, how will you turn the bolt with the square shank in the square hole to tighten it? A coach bolt pulls into the wood, but that is pulled in with a nut on the other side of the joint, I assume in your case it will be screwed into a blind hole in a boiler stay.

Chris Gunn

Nick, I have just rebuilt a big vice and the 2 slotted screws in each end most certainly hold the 2 vice jaw plates in place. it may be that the ends of the screws have got burred over and will not be easy to free off. if you need to replace the vice jaws you may have to be quite brutal, and make 4 more screws or use socket head cap screws for the new jaws. You could try welding a suitable size nut on the end of the slotted head screws and using a spanner to get them out.

Chris Gunn

Swarf, we used to use K&E steel, I can go back 50 years, and I believe the company was perhaps Kaiser and Ellison, and we used to get a tough tool steel, maybe oil hardening from them.

Chris Gunn

I spent many happy hours operating a 6 spindle Alfred Herbert version of these during my apprentiship, the one I remember had 4 high speed spindles, and 2 slower reversing tapping/reaming spindles. Some of the spindles had power feed if I remember right. Later in life I bought a 6 spindle AH for next to nothing, still in war finish, when I started in business, and it was in use until I retired in 2004, so did at least 60 years service. It was the favourite drill as long parts could be drilled with ease, and it doubled as a marking out table and long surface plate. It was bought from me by someone just starting out, so may still be working somewhere.

Chris Gunn

Rob, I have a 3ph Bridgeport, with power feed and a coolant pump. I run mine from a Transwave 1ph to 3ph converter. Once the main motor is running, I can then use the other 2 motors. All the solutions proposed above only deal with the main motor, so if you think you will need feed or coolant, both essential in my view to get the best from the machine, then you need solutions for these too. I did not touch any part of the electrics apart from put a 3ph plug on the end of the mains cable to fit the converter. I should add that I already had the converter to run my Bantam lathe, so for me this was a cheap solution, and did not involve me in messing about inside motors, something I personally am not happy about.

Chris Gunn

I used to work on nailing machines with an action like a press brake, the mechanical clutch hub was fitted to the 2.5" up to 3" shafts with an 8" long taper key, the 7" long clutch hub having a matching taper. It could take half a day to properly fit the key to the hub and get the hub in the right position along the shaft. The whole assembly transmitted 12- 30 HP depending on the machine size. Sometimes we needed to change the hub, and our 50 ton press would not always be enough to break the joint. Our local power transmission engineers broached the taper keyway for us. Anyone wanting a taper keyway in a flywheel should check out their local power transmission company, they may do it on the premises, and if not will know a man who can. With the right tackle this is a 5 minute job, so should not be expensive. As already mentioned, It is inevitable that a flywheel doing any work will come loose if secured with a taper key in a parallel top keyway, as there will only be point contact between the top of the key and keyway, and in time the key will loosen and the flywheel will slide along the shaft.

Chris Gunn

Since posting some days ago, I have got some Frisket film, and I made some templates out of thin brass to cut out masks from the film to paint the quadrants of a circle at the corners of my tanks. I found that cutting the film needs a sharp scalpel, (thanks Dave), and the edge of the brass template needs to be nice and smooth. I cut the first set from the masking paper through, but seemed to get some feathering on the edge of the cut. I did some from the film side and these seemed better. I positioned 4 masks to form the corners of a rectangle, and painted through with Craftmaster lining paint, removing the masks after the paint had gone off for about 20-25 minutes, and I got acceptable results. There was a little bleeding of the paint here and there, but this was down to me I think. I joined the corners up with the lining masking tape, and the job was done to an acceptable standard. I think with practise the results will improve.

Chris Gunn

Jason I cannot speak for Myford lathes, but in operation, the turret on the capstan production lathes I worked on was rotated automatically I step when the turret was withdrawn from the work. The release lever allowed the turret to be spun round to what ever station required for setting up. If we did not have a full complement of tools in the turret it was quicker to advance and withdraw the turret to rotate it to the next tool than use both hands to use the release the lever. The chances were that the spare hand would be doing something else.

Chris Gunn

Gordon, the cylinder is relatively long, and is steel, so you could get some chatter using a boring bar. if you clamp the cylinder to the cross slide and use a between centres bar, the boring bar will be supported at both ends so you are likely to get a better finish. This depends on what machine you have and what boring bars you have got as well.

Chris Gunn

I would imagine Maxitrack would issue a certificate when selling the kit or boiler, so maybe this is what you have. If the loco is a bit shabby that certificate could be a long way from current.

Chris Gunn

Jason, just looked up Julia Old's thread on Traction talk, for anyone interested it is pages 92 and 93. I read that Julia was able to use a Craftrobo stencil cutter to cut stencils for her 6" GMT belly tank. She also used stencils for the wheel spoke lining which seemed a much quicker method than I just used to do the wheels for my 6" 4CD. I used lining tape, I got reasonable results on the straight sections, mixed results on the curved ends, but I knew that before I started. Stencils would have been a better bet as far as curved and tapered lines are concerned.

Bill, I think I was reading your piece about Frisket film.

Chris Gunn

I just read a piece about painting a loco, and the author needed 1/4 circles for the corners of his lining. He used Frisket Film, which is a low tack masking film used by the air brushers. it is also very thin, .001" much better than normal masking tape, and shapes can be cut using templates and a scalpel. I need to do this on my 4CD so intend to give it a try. If you google it there are dozens of sellers, a pack of 10 sheets can be had for a tenner or thereabouts. I would be interested to know if anyone has tried it.

Chris Gunn