Member postings for Brian Wood

Andrew,

Like my father, my qualifications amount to a DDLM ( Dan Dan the Lavatory Man ), actually an ONC in Physics, but what little I have has seen me well throughout my whole working life.

The quality of your work sees them coming back for more, not paper qualifications and even worse the modern NVQs

I have met well educated people who have to call in an electrician to reset a circuit breaker.

Brian

Hello Peter,

Not silly at all. To find inside diameter for the blank, subtract 2 and divide by DP.

Regards

Brian

For those interested, the whole sorry tale can be found by Googling

'The sinking of USS Guilarro' which gives the whole enquiry report from the US Navy Department

Brian

A good many years ago in the company library I found a report by the US Navy on the causes of a submarine sinking.

You really couldn't make it up and all of the evidence was amassed in the usual ponderous way with an accident report of this kind.

Briefly, two crews were sent aboard the submarine, tied up in the dry dock and tasked with carrying out trim trials, which as you probably know, involves the flooding or pumping of tanks fore and aft to hold a level boat.

Trials progressed until they collectively managed to sink the boat in the dock! Neither crew was aware of the presence of the other and they could therefore only flood the tanks accordingly as the boat level altered.

Brian

Hello Chris,

I am also a dry stone waller and what Jeff describes is all that is needed. The feathers will deform readily to fit whatever hole you put them into and will become expendable, so don't waste a lot of effort on them.

The wedge will drive more easily with a little grease on the taper face. You will be surprised how many sets you need to split a big rock.

Regards Brian

Edited By Brian Wood on 14/01/2014 16:12:53

Edited By Brian Wood on 14/01/2014 16:13:23

Hello Graham,

Thank you for enlightening me, you have a really nice clean machine there too. I am a bit ashamed of the rather rusty appearance in the belt space behind my machine, I don't often take the cover off and if I was really fussy I would have made it look a bit prettier before taking pictures. The front end is a different story!

I've made it look more cared for since.

Regards

Brian

Hello Graham,

I can't help you with your question on the knucklehead, I don't have one and haven't seen one set up

I have attached 3 photos of the belting on my machine. There seems to be no adjustment for tensioning to the table feed drive. The suds pump is driven off the vee on the outer end of the bottom pulley. The main drive belt from the motor runs around the outside of all the pulleys, tensioned initially by jacking the motor on it's mounting bolts. Then finally by swinging the eccentric mounting for the drive input into full tension and held by the pin.This last action also tensions the belt inside the body of the mill.

I usually leave that setting un-tensioned so as to avoid stretch and permanent 'sets' in the belt when I am not using thye mill

I hope that helps you

Brian.

Hello John,

In the absence of any definitive test you are likely to be able to conduct, the safest course of action is disposal. Dilutuion with water is the first step BUT, please ADD ACID TO WATER. If this is concentrated sulphuric acid and water is added to it , the water will boil and you will have a steam bubble blowing acid everywhere.

Having diluted it, add a large box of washing soda until all reaction stops. You will then have a safe liquid to dispose of onto say a gravel driveway. I recommend gloves and a face mask until it is finally dealt with. Then wash everything down.

Brian

Mark,

It may add confidence to this discussion with some measurements from salvaged brake pistons from our old Landrover.

These were for drum brakes, but the principle concerning lip seals still applies. The larger are 31.66-31.68 mm diameter, the smaller are 25.32-25.33 mm in diameter. There were 4 of each size. They are hardened with a chromed finish.

The brake cylinders in which they operated were all aluminium alloy, it was those that corroded from the conbined effects of road salt and agricutural manure spray that found it's way into the drums. a devastating mixture. It would eat holes in a chassis in a few seasons!

I hope that helps with the tolerance concerns.

Brian

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Diane,

I also second Michael G's suggestion, good idea

Brian

Hello Andrew and John,

John. I disagree with you, climb milling is when the cutter is trying to 'drag' the work into itself as would be the case if the blade in this example was mounted the other way round. This arrangement is not prone to that.

Andrew. I can't see a fault unless the cut closed up behind the blade and grabbed it, but that woulldn't be obvious.

A stop block at the foot of the job would ensure the work could not move with cutting forces; is that it?

Brian

I dropped ME many years ago in favour of MEW which is more aligned to my interests in machinery, methods and workshop innovations rather that building locomotives.

I agree with Peter over the distribution of magazine content since I can only afford to subscribe to one of them. Some overlap is inevitable and probably beneficial, but it might be considered to be unreasonably dicriminatory if a long machine tool build series; or it's equivalent with a popular locomotive series, is published in the 'wrong' magazine.

It will not please readers of either magazine long term and interest in both might wane as a result. So on balance I think the editors should compare content for the target audience.

Brian

Hello Harry,

One approach is to set up for thread cutting and take just a skim off the flank of the thread on the adaptor with it mounted into the lathe MT socket. A second approach is to run a 12 tpi die along it if you have one, or even a 12 tpi tap [bottoming] held in a tool holder in the tool p[ost to use as a thread chaser. Don't overdo it, you are after all trying to take off only a few thou without altering the thread form.

Regards Brian.

Hello Robin,

It's nice to get to hear the outcome of a question, all too often advice is dispensed and that's an end of the story. I'm glad to hear you have a satisfactory piece of kit after your efforts; wise to leave it alone now.

Your observation about the thrust plate may well have been the problem all the way through, I found mine had been distorted by the end access clamping screw so that the needle bearing it was bearing down on had been loaded on one side only; it gave a rather lumpy and imprecise action to the end float adjustment. It was much better for corrective machining.

Regards Brian

Not relevant at all I know, but as a schoolboy I was enormously impressed by the crush strength of an ordinary Fletton house brick on a visit to Stewartby brick works.

It took 70 tons on an Avery machine before crumbling.

I think as the others have said, the headstock castings will fail long before any distortion of the spindle can occur. I doubt if your could even deliiver the power needed from the usual motor size these lathes are equipped with.

Brian

Gentlemen,

I'm old enough to have that method of thinking built in as a primary function when it was hammered into us during the war years and the decade that followed. In fact I am still finding uses for stuff I picked up as Govt. surplus and I mourn the passing of Merlin engines being used as road ballast for example.

I have never forgotten the sight of a big shiny pyramid in the distance at Woburn Park which my father told me was a heap of scrapped aircraft still being brought to the site straight from places like Preston where they were being built. It takes some time to create new business to replace a full throttle war effort.

So yes, such endeavours are to be applauded and encouraged. Our local tip used to be very enlightened where you could buy stuff or exchange in lieu of, all that has changed with big steel bins that groups of 'waste' are just dumped into; no 'totting' allowed at all. Sad days

Brian

Robin,

I'm still following this saga with some interest. I think the clearance between the worm and it's gear by having them partially dis-engaged should provide more than sufficient clearance to rule out binding from that source, unless the misalignment is gross.

What is the case when they are fully disengaged; do you still have a tight spot then? If so that will be down to the bearing surfaces at the spigot end of the table.

If you can properly establish that the gear and table fit is to blame as John says above, selective assembly might be the answer. I would though take the gear off and mount it, gripping the gear end in a lathe chuck, suitablly protected with masking tape or similar, and look for wobble on the mounting face. That you could correct with a light skim. Check the corresponding mating face under the table try clocking it off your mill, rotating the table in a vee made up of two clamp blocks on the mill table surface. Correcting that will test your ingenuity but orbital milling comes to mind. You could also check the spigot for true running at the same time.

If you pursue John's plan and find a null point, mark it with centre dots to assist the memory on any future strip down! I was clearly lucky with my purchase, other things I have put right but those fundementals were good at the start..

Brian

Edited By Brian Wood on 09/01/2014 09:29:23

Hello Robin,

My table is badged Myford.

I bought it about 10 years ago at the Harrogate Exhibition to take advantage of a decent show discount. Generally it is nice quality, but even with that provenance there were some minor niggles purely down to building to a price.

Regards Brian

Hello Bob,

It is a while since I dismantled mine, Coalburner is correct, there is a small hexagon grub screw in the side that is easily overlooked. After that is free the whole eccentric assemply can be pulled out.

Photo attached

Brian

Hello again Jack,

My apologies, the sizes are very close and hard to sort on short lengths. The cap screws are 2BA x3/8", NOT 3/16" BSF in my earlier post.

Dennis I think has explained why it is so hard to unscrew, but rather than hold the drive plate with Stillsons, which will chew it up, a better alternative might be to make a pin spanner with two buttons to engage in the holes for the heads of the BA capscrews.

It could be held in contact by the end nut [1/4" BSF] using at least two spring washers to allow for thread space in unscrewing the drive plate. Clamp the clutch and motor belt to prevent turning and smack the end of your pin spanner anti clockwise with a hammer to shock the thread into release. Thereafter you can take things more gently and work the drive place back into position with the locked nuts approach that Michael Poole suggests.

I hope that and Dennis's information from the manual bring you some joy

Happy New Year

Brian.