Member postings for OldMetaller

They look fantastic Rod- you can't beat having beautiful tools to work with. I thought I was the only one who varnishes file handles!

Regards,

John.

It's not the steam loco hitting people that's the problem, it's the idiots that stand on the 80 mph slow lines to take a 'better' photo of it that will get scrambled, as another train hurtles out of Scotsman's steam cloud and tw*ts them. This nearly happened in several places last time.

Regards,

John.

Hi Mark, here is what goes on at at the NRM behind the scenes! This is Henry Oakley, we were in the process of moving her from one side of the York railway area to the other, as the NRM has two access points to the Big Railway and they are both on opposite sides of the main line. This means that a company like the one I work for, with main line-registered locos and a safety case/operating licence, have to make these moves. Henry, being part of the National Collection, had been out on loan and we had to recouple her to her tender as she had arrived by road on two low loaders. After running a temporary air brake pipe along her frames cable-tied to whatever we could find, she then had to be gently hauled from the North Yard, across the York Avoiding Lines, to the Leeman St access point, where we left her in the secure compound. This took almost six hours to do!

I have been fortunate to get a guided tour of these workshops, they are very much a place where the giant, endless task of making and keeping steam locos fit for use takes place, the viewing gallery is really just a bonus for visitors. Yes there is mess, but not any worse than other workshops. The only hazards I saw were the ones you would expect to find in a workshop, there was nothing untoward or that would make a safety inspector worried. I did, however, notice next to a lovely Harrison lathe a pile of 7 & 1/4" wheel blanks, so maybe 'foreigners' go on here!

Last time I was there about two months ago the Scotsman was in a bay with her motion down whilst a defect was fixed, just a day before her much-trumpeted 'return to steam'! Yes, they fixed her on time!

Regards,

John.

Hi John, I'm going on the Saturday, I'll look out for you as I have some 10 - 20mm MT2 drill bits that I'd like sharpening, that's a nice thing you are planning.

What's the charity, do you know?

Regards,

John.

Steve, you'll have no trouble finding your way around a track at night...very impressive!

John...I am lost for words!

Regards,

John.

I've got a lovely J & S that just won't quite fit into the four-way tool post on my ML7, I can't bring myself to vandalise it by grinding it down...

It would be great if some smaller J & S-type toolholders were available.

John.

John who worked for Nick Staniford sometimes, when I wasn't driving trains or playing around with narrowboats! You taught me how to solder etched brass kits using Coke as flux...I still do that to this day!

John.

Hi Rod, I remember you from 30 years ago and Percy V. Rance! Welcome to the forum!

John.

I finally decided to subscribe to MEW yesterday...£54, no problem, direct debit...click, click...all done!

What's this email? 'Subscribe to MEW, eight issues for £19.99'. Aaaaarrrrgh!

Never mind... I've been buying it from newsagents for several years now, it was just a matter of time before I bit the bullet.

Great timing, though..!

Regards,

John.

Hi Dave, Live Steam Models-

http://www.livesteammodels.co.uk/

- have what you want on p. 35 of their supplies catalogue.

Regards,

John.

That looks really interesting Steve- I hope you'll post your progress occasionally. That is very much my kind of model engineering!

Regards,

John.

Nice work Steve...what scale are you working in?

Regards,

John.

Hollowpoint, that is a work of art mate, you have done a great job there! I want to make one now...

Here's something I made a while back:

It's an oil burner made from an old brass weight. I bored for the three columns on a PCD, then bored the dished copper top to the same PCD. It fitted ok after a bit of tweaking.

In the first picture you can see the calibration stamps on the underside, they start at 1943 and the last one is 1951.

Regards,

John.

I have stripped, stained and varnished floor boards throughout my house, including the workshop which is in the smallest bedroom. I wear an old pair of steelies unlaced and worn like slippers. I don't always take them off when I leave the workshop, but I've never had a problem with swarf or indeed anything else migrating from the workshop into the rest of the house.

The downside with real floorboards is of course, when you drop something tiny it's gone forever.

Regards,

John.

I sometimes get an hour or two in London: last year I managed a whopping 14 minutes in the Science Museum! Time enough to walk round the Trevithick engine, watch them start the big mill engine and pay my respects to the Rocket- I even managed a surreptitious touch on the left hand cylinder as the security guards were distracted by the thousands of children milling about!

I don't remember being allowed to run about screaming when I was taken there as a child..? At least, I think I'd have remembered the resultant thick ear that I would have collected!

Regards,

John.

Thanks for uploading the photos Paul, that looks like a very nice engine.

I think I especially like the Trevithick engine as I have a very early memory of being taken to the Science Museum in London and seeing this engine in profile as we entered the gallery where it was kept- it was the first historical engine I'd ever seen and I still get a frisson every time I see it!

Regards,

John.

Paul, I'd love to see some pictures. I've got the build article somewhere, I've always fancied doing one of these.

Regards,

John.

Grant, how about a short article for Neil on this piece of tooling? I have exactly the same problem with my ER32 collet chuck used on my lathe.

Regards,

John.

Thanks for that Michael, you've saved me getting my wallet out!

Regards,

John.

Here's what I got after a two-hour, very messy battle to strip an old HP printer:

• Several lengths of silver steel down from 10 mm to 2.5 mm
• A hank of cable
• A small handful of springs of all shapes and sizes
• Ditto of small machine screws
• One big and three small electric motors
• A tiny toothed drive belt
• Some strange metal bushes that are only slightly magnetic
• A huge amount of plastic that went into the recycling bin

Well worth the struggle!

Regards,

John.