Member postings for Neil Greenaway

Hi There,

I have used a 40A plasma cutter for cutting panels and chassis repairs in a landrover - thicknesses range from 1.2mm to about 3mm. Handheld use can be tricky as it will cut the shape including every shake of your hand - especially if you are in an awkward position under the vehicle and reaching!! This is even worse when sparks land in your ear or down your back, and thats even with a welding mask and flame retardant overalls!! With a guide/straight edge the results can be good. The electrodes/tips can be eaten up quite quickly especially with dirtier materials I find however. With the 40A machine I have cut up to 12mm plate also, but the cutting is a lot slower at that thickness.

In previous employment we had a contractor use thermal lances to cut through an aluminium melting furnace outer casing and then through the refractory and oxide layers that built up during extended use. Diggers with heavy breaker hammers couldnt even break through the oxide layers but the thermal lance could. The results were not pretty however.

Thanks,

Neil

If you dont manage to find one you could always have one laser cut from steel plate - if you have the broken pieces at least you would have enought as a pattern and a laser cut part would only require minimal finishing?

Many thanks,

Neil.

Hi All,

I feel I have to add my thoughts here as some others have. I have worked in a variety of industrial situations where I have been/am responsible for new electrical installations/replacement installations of old equipment. We always use qualified electricians for the on-site work, and often consult with competent individuals (consultants) for design phases. I have experienced on occasions situations where our trained electricians are unfamiliar with some of the types of technology often mentioned in this forum e.g VFD's or servo drives etc. Obviously they are first class at installing new equipment, installing containment (cblke protection systems), specifying suitable cable sizes for power capacities, cable runs, installation method etc etc etc. They are very capable of installing new distribution boards etc or terminating new supplies. They do come stuck where it comes to some electronic controls, and this is where specifically trained electricians come into play. I take on board the opinions of "Kinlet Hall", however if an individual is familiar with the nature of the work and carries out the design/installation according to the 17th edition IET Wiring regs there can be little room for error. Surely the thankfully rare cases of fire are generally caused by poorly installed circuits, poorly terminated cables (with a high resistance/low continuity) or a badly selected cable with too low a current carrying capacity.

I know and work with many electrical engineers and electricians, who work in very different circumstances - domestic, industrial, local utilities, automation etc, and I have to say there is no one size fits all electrician, and as a result you may find that your NICEIC electrician may not have an awareness about things such as motors, drives etc.

It has also been mentioned about levels of Public Liability insurance cover - there are normally various levels of cover depending upon the level of risk and the loss that can be incurred - I was in the belief that NICEIC required up to £2M PL cover. Of course if a contractor were working in a large factory where losses can be higher then PL may need to be more. The potential losses under other works may be a lot less.

Just my own thoughts.

Neil

Hi There,

How abouy dry ice blasting - leaves no residue as the dry ice goes through sublimation and evaporates to CO2.

An alternative is soda blasting - the soda can be washed off with water and simply disolves and leaves surface clean.

Many thanks,

Neil

Hi There,

Could you machine up a solid bar to run up inside the minor ID of the open ended sleeve and cross drill it to accept a pin that can be inserted through the ejector MT3 slot. Insert the solid cross drilled bar and then the cross pin and locate against the back of the open ended socket. Then use either a sleeve/drawbar to pull out, or a simple sliding hammer and a few knocks might pull it out?

Neil

There was an article in a recent MEW about rebuilding and adjusting the saddle trip mechanism on a colchester lathe (cant remember if it was a student or a bantam) - might be worth a look.

Neil