Member postings for Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Brian,

Suffering three motor failures is a bitter portion! I can't add anything to the technical advice you have already received from other members.

However, I am moved to offer you words of encouragement:

Thanks to this forum, you are not on your own. Hang in there and keep trying! These things can usually be fixed. Remember, tenacity tells.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Gerry,

A retired professional microscopist * I used to meet at club meetings advised me that he used 'spit' (i.e. saliva) for cleaning small areas. Just make sure you haven't recently been eating liquorice! Oh, and toothpaste is abrasive too!

He applied his 'spit' on a cotton bud BUT BEWARE!!! Standard cotton buds can contain sharp silica particles. You can, however, find grit-free cotton buds if you search diligently. A friend with optical interests advised me that ordinary paper tissues can also contain sharp particles - he advised me that kitchen roll is free of nasties (I presume that is because kitchen roll is made from recycled paper fibres). Then there are special lens-cleaning tissues available from some opticians, laboratory suppliers or eBay. One well known make to look for is 'Whatman', the same people who make the filter papers.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

* He wasn't originally a professional microscopist but an amateur. When it was realised that asbestos was a health risk, his manager appointed him as 'the asbestos man' and the search for asbestos fibres took over the rest of his career!!

Hi there, all,

My apologies for being a bit late to the party.

I just thought it might help to mention that the old Imperial electrical conduit threads were 16 tpi (Whitworth form), certaily for the ¾" and 1" sizes - I'm not sure if that's also true for ½". Conduit threads were 'borrowed' by some machine builders, e.g. my Coronet Minor woodworker mandrel was ¾" conduit thread.

And I seem to remember that British Brass thread was 16 tpi while some (Imperial) cycle threads are also 16 tpi though one or both might not be Whitworth form.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Alan and Brian,

Alan, I suggest that you investigate the cross-slide handle and scale. Excess clearance there could give at least some of the 'perpendicular' back-lash of which you complain. Lock the cross-slide and then examine how much free angular movement there is in the handle & screw.

Look up under the bracket attached to the front end of the cross-slide and find a way to hold the shank of the feed-screw without graunching it. Then turn the cross-slide handle counter-clockwise to loosen it. From memory, the scale and the handle act as nut & lock-nut. They need to be adjusted so the handle & screw can together turn freely but with minimum slack. Again from memory, I believe there is a fibre washer in there, simple but effective.

If you don't have the Myford User Instructions booklet, have you down-loaded the parts lists and exploded diagrams from the Myford web-site?

Also, have a look at the modifications to fit thrust bearings in that part of the machine, see Arc Euro web-site.

Another possibility is wear in the cross-slide feed-screw and/or nut. Again, you can explore this by locking the cross-slide and waggling the handle. You might need to remove the top-slide to see what's going on.

Do, please, come back and tell us how you get on - it's very frustrating to make suggestions and never to hear the conclusion!

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 29/12/2020 19:15:45

Hi there, all,

Thermal comfort is a complex subject. Even if the air temperature is warm, you can still feel cold if the walls are cold. The body is sensitive to transfer of radiant heat as well as to conducted heat.

Fortunately, it isn't necessary for ALL the walls to be warm - you just need enough warm wall area for the radiant gain to balance or exceed the radiant loss. That's why those infrared bathroom heaters with the spiral element inside a quartz tube (preferably backed by a gold-plated reflector) were effective.

I guess it helps if there is some warm surface both aft as well as fore - otherwise you could be warm in front but chilly behind! (Am I allowed to write 'behind'?? ) Thinking a bit more about that, I guess a radiant heat source will raise the temperature of the other walls faster than will heat conveyed by the warm air?

And I guess the radiant heat source doesn't have to be wall - one of those free-standing oil-filled radiators works for me.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 29/11/2020 16:41:49

Hi there, all,

Either Rolls or Royce (not the financial partner) denied being an 'engineer' - he claimed to be a 'mechanic'.

By the way, I think that in the UK it's an 'Institution' not an 'Institute'. If that matters.

And don't get me going about non-technical managers preferring the advice of an inexperienced colleague with a degree over mine based on lots of experience plus a degree-less C.Eng.!

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

P.S.: Eventually B.Sc. (Hons) Open!!!!!!!

Hi there, all,

I thought I'd better have another search and, this time I found the thread. It's on the Mad Modders web-site, here:

Skiving Tool

The thread is dated 2014. The problem is that the videos are all unavailable. He showed the process in use for a three-ball handle as well as the tear-drop type. (So my previous post wasn't all that off-topic after all! )

If anyone is interested in the process, there are some still photos there that are interesting.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, all,

I hope I may be forgiven for a slightly off-topic post. Well, it is to do with handles.

In the background of Evan Lewis' post you can see what I describe as a 'tear-drop handle'. Somewhere on the Internet there is a video of one of these being turned using a form tool so arranged that only part of the tool is in contact at any time. If I remember correctly, the top-slide (aka 'compound' ) is set at a slight angle to the cross-slide and is mechanically driven. Again if I remember correctly, the technique is named as 'skiving' (until I found this video I thought that was the process for producing a thin sheet of leather, such as is used to surface a bureau writing flap) .

I found this video fascinating but my recent searches for it have been unsuccessful!!!

Maybe one of the members here is familiar with either the video or the machining technique or both?

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 22/11/2020 17:40:22

A common method with cutting plastic pipes, e.g. underground waste pipes, is to wrap a piece of paper around the pipe so that the edge lines up where the paper overlaps. On your 54 mm copper the same method would probably work. Once positioned, hold the paper from moving and go over the edge all round with a Sharpie. Then remove the paper and cut at the edge of the Sharpie mark. I reckon the result would be accurate enough, assuming that you're going to fit an end disk with a soft or hard soldered joint.

If it had to be a lathe job, the fixed steady rest could help but I'd regard cutting thin copper tube with a parting tool as quite an adventure!!!!!!!! Filling the tube with a wooden bung (or maybe even Plaster of Paris) sounds like a good idea.

When you've done the job, please come back and show us a few photos of the result.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Peter,

I have a modern two-wheel grinder that actually specifies a duty cycle on the motor rating-plate.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

The French verb meaning 'to melt' is 'fondre'.

However did Kelly's Directory manage before the Norman Conquest?

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Jason,

Oops, I'm sorry to have started a thread so close in topic to the one to which you linked. In my own defence, the title of that other thread is not exactly an intuitive search string.

In my opening post, I should have made it clear that I was concerned with grinding a new tool blank - not merely touching up a tool that was already at the right shape.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, all,

I've noticed that, when grinding an HSS tool-blank, some folks cool the blank at intervals by plunging it into cold water. (I'm trying to avoid use of the term 'quenching'. ) On the other hand, I've heard it said that such plunging of HSS blanks leads to micro-cracks at the tool cutting edge.

Please can any knowledgeable members here give us a metallurgist's comment on this proposition? And what is the experience of the general membership?

Some 'real' workshop tool grinders or their pedestals have water-pots built-in - is this a historical legacy from pre-HSS days when tools being ground would have been carbon steel?

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

I hope this helps:

The uppermost item is the four-way tool-post.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 13/10/2020 16:05:32

Chris,

Believe it or not, the rule is 'a vowel or aitch'!

My wife has amended her criterion from 'see' to 'put your hands in the water'.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Mike,

I agree that a submarine is a boat. However, the nearest my wife gets to a submarine is when she plays 'Silent Hunter'. So a real submarine is sufficiently remote from her everyday experience for her to disregard submarines when formulating her definitions of boats vs ships.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

My wife's definition: you're on a boat if you can see the water both sides at the same time without moving!

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Ian,

Maybe you should have included football?!?!

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Here's an interesting read:

Hydrogen

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Hi there, Paul,

First of all, it's 'Tufnol', not 'Tufnell' which I think is a district of London.

I suggest that a surf through **LINK** would be a good way to spend a half-hour or so.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 10/09/2020 17:51:57