Member postings for Roger Woollett

Lathejack - thanks for the tip about the column clamping screws. I wish I had known that then!

I find that the head nods forward if the two clamping levers are loose - particularly the top one. I have often thought about fitting some sort of "gib" adjuster but never actually tried it. Do others have this problem?

Does anyone know why you should not remove the right cover. Before I had been told better I had them both off and as far as I know no harm was done.

My mill had not been used for some years so I scraped out as much of the old grease as I could and replaced with Molyslip. I do not know if this was correct but it is still working.

As Neil says you might consider coming on the Polly course - the next one starts on May 13th and there are still some places.

If that does not suit you I suggest you look at the SMEE general meetings (on the events tab of the website). If you see anything you like come along as a guest. The meetings start at 2.30 but if you turn up earlier and make yourself known someone will show you round and make you welcome. If you like what you see please join.

I have quite a different compressor - a Bambi. but have had two pressure switches fail with split diaphragms. I would double check for hissing from the switch unit.

Incidentally mine seem to be a standard pattern. The first replacement from Bambi cost over £60. The second from eBay less than £6.

Another site you might like.

http://www.shipsnostalgia.com/guides/William_Doxford_and_Sons

Lots of machines making marine engines.

Edited By Roger Woollett on 31/01/2017 10:08:57

Simply Bearings have 65mm i/d by 75mm o/d nitrile o rings.

**LINK**

They also do other similar sizes.

I think this discussion shows that there will always be different opinions when it comes to languages and coding style. My opinion remains that you should use whatever suits you (and perhaps your employer).

I have now updates my program to include a configure view (which you will see the first time you run it) that allows you to put in the parameters for your device. The holes in each plate should be given as a comma separated list. There is a button to load the parameters for my rotary table (HV4) which will show you the format.

It has not had much testing - mainly on Windows using python 3.4. I have run it briefly on a Raspberry pi using python and python3.

Please let me know if you find it useful and also let me know if you find bugs.

It is on Github

https://github.com/RogerWoollett/Workshop

Edited By Roger Woollett on 08/06/2016 10:30:59

My problem with Basic is that as far as I know there is no standard. The original Dartrmouth BASIC was an incredibly cut down FORTRAN designed to run on the primitive time sharing computers of the time. BBC basic was a much enhanced language and Visual Basic is miles away from the original. As I understand it Visual Basic is a proprietary product of Microsoft. There have been many other "BASICs" over time - all different.

Languages like Fortran, C and C++ have standards blessed by international standards authorities. Python does not have this level of accreditation but does have a written standard. As far as I know implementations on all sorts of platforms conform to the same standard making it as portable as any language.

John - I am not sure what you mean about the extra typing but I don't find that a problem. I have used an object oriented approach for many years, mainly with C++, so I am happy with that.

I much prefer C++ as a language but it needs to be recompiled for every platform. Also the GUI libraries are complex and there is too much of a learning curve for me to want to do the occasional project.

I don't like python's reliance on indentation or its obsession with self but clearly the designers have their reasons. I do find it quick to develop programs and it is very portable so for me is the best choice in this instance.

Feel free. You might like to wait until I have got the config screen working.

Thanks for that John. I will look into it. What platform are you using?

I found that python 2 does integer division - python 3 converts to float so I had to float some arguments to get the code to work on python 3. I am working on a configure screen so will look at this later.

A possibly easier alternative is to click "<>code" and then "Clone or download". This will allow you to download a zip file containing Divide.py and two control files you can ignore.

I think I have got the source onto GitHub - you shoud be able to download it from there.

**LINK**

It works with Python 3 - I just tried Python 2 and it fails. Something to do with automatic type conversion, I could fix it if there is a demand for python 2. Most testing has been on windows but it also works on my Raspberry Pi under Linux.

I have forgotten how to put it on GitHub so if you PM me with your email address I will send the code to you as an attachment.

You will need to modify the code - see the comments - to correspond to your rotary table/dividing head.

Sorry to be late to the party but I have another variation on this theme. I have a program that works out how many complete turns plus how many holes in which ring on which plate you need to cut x number of teeth.

It is written in python using tkinter for the GUI so should run on most systems. I am happy to make the code available and if there is sufficient interest I will give it a proper configuration screen (at the moment it defaults to my HV4 rotary table plates)

You might find this link to Cousins website easier to use.

Get the bits out of the clock and measure between the two holes. 'B' on the website.

**LINK**

It may not be what you want but these people **LINK** do a wide range of metric screws and nuts in A2 and A4 stainless. I have used them a couple of times and found their service good.

The way I think of it is that the teeth on the cutter and the workpiece should be travelling in opposite directions. If they are in the same direction you are climb milling.

Just had a PHONE CALL from Arc Euro. Apparently I hit a known problem with browser history. If you hit the problem I did refresh the page. This forces the browser to not use an out of date copy it has kept. On Firefox (and I think other browsers) pressing F5 does this.

Full marks to them for following up the problem and I hope this helps others to continue to use the Arc Euro site.

Unfortunately the new website does not display correctly on my machine. (Windows 10 & Firefox 43.0.4).

The product menu on the left does not display at all unless you make the window very narrow. There are a lot of layout problems in addition.

Looks fine under MS Edge (the new explorer)