Member postings for John Coates

That supply of spare parts would have made me a very happy bunny!

Hi Paul

Well it's the only lathe I have ever owned so I have nothing to compare it to but it is a lovely machine (albeit in need of some TLC now it is 68 yrs old). It is big and heavy probably 250-350kgs going by my Elliott 10M shaper. After I bought mine about three came up on ebay within the year but haven't seen any for many years so folks must be as happy as I am.

Good look with your searching mate

John

Nowt wrong with bar bed lathes! Mine is of 1947 vintage

**LINK**

Mine is the sixth picture

John

Oh bugger! The only time I get commented on by JS (and it sounded favourable) and it's gone forever

Mwahahahaha

Norman

As I paid almost £25 for a single issue of MEW to complete my collection you could be sitting on a little gold mine which could fund a future purchase of something you need or want

regards

John

I was updating my MEW index the other day and noted the multi part articles that I do not read

- Dave Clark's beginners series, I'm a bit on from beginner but this is going so slow I would have given up by now

- Marcus Bowman's CNC (up to part 14 IIRC), definitley not for beginners

- back gear on that little lathe (Unimat? sorry am at work and utilising the memory bank), up to part 7?

So that's a lot of print I've not bothered with. The two or three issue articles i find I enjoy but the Lord of the Rings ones have all gone cold for me. Seems that back in the early days of MEW they said an awful lot more in fewer pages but there were a lot less photos.

But I'm sticking with it as I look forward to it coming through the letter box and what might be inside. The annual subscription is cheap (and my outgoings are reduced now I cancelled my computer mag subs).

John

I've replaced my single phase motors on lathe amd mill/drill with 3 phase running through an inverter so it is just the flick of a switch at the inverter control pad or remote pod

John

I've got one and have moved it around the garage using a 1 tonne folding crane but soon it will have to be relocated to its new home in the workshop in the back garden

The ram can be removed and the shaper unit from the base to separate into three pieces to help with moving it about

The manual is a god send although IIRC the NEMES one is a bit fuzzy

I really like the variety in articles since Neil took over. Some of the mega issue articles do get flipped past if I have no interest (Marcus' CNC, DC's intro to home workshop, Unimat mod, but then I have always skipped them nit just under Neil's management) so I tend to read and re-read the ones about machine modifications or workshop tricks. The current style seems to be more reminiscent of the first MEWs with little snippets of good information

The problem I find with the long series articles is that if they are of interest then progress is dictated by the speed of the print run. If not then any nuggets of machining/workshop knowledge or practice won't get found because I bypass them anyway,

But I've got every MEW and they are a great resource and fun to randomly pick out a sequence of 5 or 10 and just read through them now the nights are drawing in and I'm not riding my motorbike (too little daylight after work)

Keep up the great work Neil

John

Hi Peter

So it's the digital subscription you're not renewing? Must admit I'm a paper copy guy keeping a database of all the articles so I can search when I'm undertaking a particular project then dig the relevant mags out

Good system for the electronic copies. And I'm a Linux user too

John

what a wonderful eclectic post

I'm waiting to finish the workshop so my Marantz can go in there so I can listen to my LPs again whilst hobby engineering away, will be great to get the Led Zep, Floyd and Cream spinning again

on the quality front I studied this for my masters degree and the Japanese learnt quality control from Deming after the war then took it to new levels by marrying their love of individual skill with companies run by engineers not "professional" managers, all the senior managers were engineers and understood the manufacturing process

when they wanted to develop the video recorder the Japanese companies go together to agree a technical specification which they would all use then they would compete on quality and enhancements

as regards machinery I bought an old British lathe and after some five years since doing that have realised it has some accuracy issues especially a worn tailstock which I haven't helped by breaking the clamp!

looking at the prices of Warco etc it seems I will be saving up for quite a while to buy one of these "cheap" Far Eastern machines

John

well I'm a biker who bought a lathe in 2009 for modifying my bikes and went searching on the t'interweb for a support site and found here

over the past five years I have read many interesting posts and replies and bought every copy of MEW either since subscribing at issue 160 or buying up back issues

so 218 sounds right up my street and I can't wait

over the years there has been the occasional "non-model" content which has been more amazing than the normal stuff, thinking particularly where they used a Bridgeport to machine some mahoosive round things (maybe full size loco wheels, I can't be bothered to go in the attic to find it)

I like the way you're taking things Mr Neil

John

Edited By John Coates on 25/06/2014 20:15:19

Roger - well done on this adaptation, totally in the spirit of what home engineering is all about (I don't do models but use the same tools for other purposes)

I can see Jason's perspective about "a certain responsibility to MHS" and their corporate lawyers' paranoia but feel an empathy with John's position about the endless reminders about H&S these days as though we have left our brains behind somewhere. Heck even in the early days of MEW every time there was a photo of someone only wearing spectacles and not goggles there was a comment that they were prescription safety specs (although I secretly hope they weren't and the wearer was cocking a snoot at the H&S nazis)

This is not industry it is a hobby. I tune my own motorbikes and I adapt bits from other motorbikes to fit them. I know I do this at my own risk and I am aware that if the EU had their way none of us would ever be able to modify any vehicle we bought ever again but thank god they have not (yet) got their way

Part of the enjoyment of this hobby is seeing what people can make out of scrap items. Personally I like this a lot more than making models from plans which is just following a path already walked by somebody else which is why they leave me cold. The ingenuity and problem solving involved in recycling items is a joy to read about.

Here's to ingenuity, creativity and invention and two fingers to the H&S nazis (not that Jason is one of these it's to the EU bureau robots)

John

V8 - too true

will use coach bolts so no slot heads or hexagons for screwdrivers or sockets

also gonna wire it up to the house alarm and armoured cable back to the garage for the power

first job is computing the bench space to shelves ratio

I use a collapsible 1 tonne engine crane for my shaper (335kgs) and lathe (about the same). My Chester Champion (135kgs) can be split in two (table and column/mill head) and moved with a sack barrow.

Having just got a new workshop once it is insulated and powered these will have to be moved from the garage over soft ground (grass) to it

The shaper and lathe can be split into two (base and the rest) and lifted onto a trolley truck (e.g. **LINK**) then moved on gravel boards (like train tracks)

That's the plan anyway!

regards

John

oh and guttering and water butt

and don't give me grief about the pathetic security hasp, I know I know and it will be replaced with three far more substantial items top, middle and bottom

Edited By John Coates on 26/03/2014 13:33:01

well the day has arrived, another 5 months on!

bought from a local supplier who built it as well

next jobs are insulation, electrics and planning where the bench(es) and machinery will go

also want some mesh security screens and maybe more solid shutters for when we go away

John

Edited By John Coates on 26/03/2014 13:25:01

The Harold Hall one must be a serious contender

Look in either MEW 89 or his book "Milling - A Complete Course"

John

well speaking as a novice what did I see when I picked up my first learner book, the "Lathework: a complete course" book by Harold Hall, but insert tooling, so that's what I thought I had to use

sometimes the experienced people on here forget what it was like to be a newbie, we didn't all have apprenticeships with someone to guide us, we have to use books to get started

good luck Neil