Member postings for I.M. OUTAHERE

I tested a spare nema 17 stepper and with nothing connected it turned freely but if i put a jumper wire across the pins for each coil creating a closed loop or really two separate closed loops the resistance was substanially more .

I know that with my 3D printer when the power is switched on the motors lock - possibly the driver is supplying some current through the coils to cause a braking effect , if i turn the power off i can move the steppers easily .

I'm guessing you will be using an arduino to supply a variable frequency square wave to a stepper driver or possibly one of those cheap pulse generators from China ? so if you wire it up so the main power switch is also the activation switch ( power is supplied to the Arduino which boots up and starts supplying the square wave and power is also supplied to the stepper driver with this switch ) you have a separate potentiometer or rotary encoder to set the pulse frequency ( travel speed ) and a forward / reverse toggle switch . You could also use a pushbutton nvr set up to activate the unit and add limit switches to shut it off at a set point but i have never used the limit switches on my power feed so don't think they are really necessary .

I have also heard that a driver can be damaged by turning the stepper over with no power supplied but as SOD also mentioned the voltages would never get high enough besides that there should be protection diodes in circuit to stop the voltage spikes created by the coils in normal use , i have zipped my build table of my 3D printer back and forth all over the place and fast enough to generate enough power to light up the lcd screen even though there was no power connected and it hasn't failed yet ! I think this rubbish came about because of cheap dodgy drivers that were around a few years back and i think they have improved a bit over recent years .

Also measure the drill bit you used - would't be the first time i have seen undersize or incorrectly marked drill bits!

Backlash can also be a product of feedscrew endfloat , while winding the feed handle in and out take a look at the gap between the dial and backing plate to see if it opens up or closes . On some lathes this is adjustable and on others shimming ir required .

Backlash is more of an issue with a milling machine than it is with a lathe where all of cutting is only in one direction - ie you are feeding the cross slide in to turn the OD or you are feeding it out to bore a hole .

I personally would be more concerned with gib adjustments on a lathe rather than backlash .

Question remains - why ?

I was thinking of making a smaller one from 100mm pvc pipe so it ends up being i bit like a stick vacuum , when vacuuming the floor the long wand with a hard surface head plugs into it but also have a short hose with a nozzle that can be interchanged with the wand to do in around the machinery . The problem i mostly have is long curly swarf jamming up halfway along the hose which on my wall mounted shop vacuum is about 5 metres long and a pia to unblock . I did a test a few months back using the removable vac bin from an old vacuum cleaner i use to create vacumm in my sandblasting unit and it worked qiut well even though i had to bodge a lot of fittings to get the hoses to plug into the canister .

About 15 min in he shows how to set up the leadscrew so it wont bind .

You want to go back and forth doing this adjustment a couple of times and once you are happy with that loosen the two cap screws that hold the saddle onto the apron and let it settle( half nuts still engaged ) before re tightening them , the allow the apron to settle so it is not pulling or pushing the leadscrew in or out . Another very important setting is the leadscrew end float - in the video he sort of touches on the subject but with the way his machine is set up you would have to shim the nut out so the pin hole lines upand there is no end float . My sieg has a long nut with a grubscrew in the end to lock it and that is much easier to work with .

If you mean the rack and pinion gear set up that allows you to move the saddle along the bed with the handwheel is jumping teeth i'm sure the mounting holes for the rack gear are slotted so you can loosen the cap screws and allow the rack to drop a little to engage the pinion better , IIRC my lathe had an issue where the pinion would rub against the lathe bed and this was fixed by skimming the end of the pinoin gear .

If after all that you still find the halfnuts jumping the only solution is to remove the apron assembly and take a look at the half nuts and their operating mechanism , the nuts could be partially stripped out or maybe they are not closing fully .

I can highly recommend Neils book - if you are new to machining with these little lathes it is well woth the purchase price and also a couple of others from the workshop practice series that are dedicated to the mini lathe .

Edited By XD 351 on 10/09/2018 04:19:50

Edited By XD 351 on 10/09/2018 04:33:39

Edited By XD 351 on 10/09/2018 04:38:03

Edited By XD 351 on 10/09/2018 04:38:23

Set it up on an angle plate - or a vertical slide if you have one on your lathes cross slide then mount a 2mm parting off blade in the four jaw chuck and set it horizontally so you can use the carriage to rack work piece onto the tool and use the cross slide to feed the workpiece across . To cut the other side just turn the chuck around 180 deg and feed out .

You can do something similar with the mill but you will need to make a cutter , a piece of silver steel 1/2 round is set up in the mill to machine a flat on each side for a length a little longer than the slot you wish to cut and this leaves a tang of 2mm width ( a square collet block makes this easy as you are really just making a parting tool with a round shank ) once shaped - harden and hone it and the workpiece can be held in the vise or bolted down to the table to perform the cut by using the quill to rack the tool up and down .

You could also make a custom fly cutter if you don't mind grinding up a toolbit for it .

Way oil has a tacking agent so it sticks in there and doesnt run out like hydraulic oil will .

If you put a drop of way oil on your thumb then press your index finger against it and slowly open them you will see that way oil will string between the two but hydraulic oil will not .

What make / model is the mill ? Maybe someone on here has one or used one the same or they may be able to point you in the right direction .

Btw congrats on the 14k posts that you will pass in the next 24 hrs !

I think Ramon Wilson may have beaten you to it !

All good info there Neil ! I haven't had the need to anodise anything yet but that will probably change once i finish the hit 'n' miss engine i'm currently building , then a ME beam engine , a mastiff etc ,etc.

Eventually i want build a murrays engine but really bling it up , the frames made from polished then jeweled alloy so maybe some of the other fittings could be anodised .

Hopefully there will be more replies here so it becomes a nice long thread with plenty of info in it for us to reference later on if needed .

By the sounds of it the min / max being written below the components would to me indicate a potentiometer .

If you still have the back off would it be possible for you to post a few pictues of the board just for future reference if any one else needs it later on ?

I would definately be asking the seller to inspect the repair or replacement unit before you get it back ! Having the earth diconnected is extremely dangerous and could have killed you ! I would also be making them aware of that fact and also that it doesn't come up to the electrical standards of your country that they are required by law to adhere to !

I personally would want a refund then go and buy a machine from a more commonly know brand and seller - you will find them advertizing on this website on the right hand side of the page .

I used to keep all of my tooling in a double door storage cabinet on the opposite side of the workshop - it had everything in there , drills , taps cutters , measuring equipment , everything for the mill and lathe all sorted out on thier own shelf .

A few months ago i parted with my oldest lathe and X2 mill which both had some storage underneath so i had to find a new home for that stuff , i ended up buying a small mechanics type tool chest and split the top toolbox off from the lower cabinet . The upper box went to the spare room to store my electronics and 3D printer tools and the lower cabinet now sits between the mill and lathe that i have left , I managed to fit the tilting vise and angle plates in the bottom of the cabinet and this left two 500mm x 300mm drawers and they now hold the tooling i use most - things like collets , parralels , all of my cutters and drill chucks etc and the top serves as a tray for things like chuck keys , a shifter , ER collet spanners and of course a hammer ( just in case i get frustrated and feel the need to bludgeon something to death !) . This has made life so much easier as 90% of what i need when i'm using the mill or the lathe is litteraly at arms reach and i no longer have to go into the main storage cabinet on the other side of the workshop to dig something out . I really like when a tool serves more than one pupose so simple modification to the copper hammer i use to set jthe workpiece down in the mill vise has the ring off an old ring spanner welded to the end of the handle and this is used to loosen the drawbar on the mill then give it a wrap with the copper end of the hammer to free it .

Sounds like the switching transistor has popped and gone short circuit . I have had IGBT 's do this but that was because i didn't pay attention to the gate voltage i was supplying it ! If it is new then claim warranty but get them to fit the new board or parts required to fix it then test it before you accept it back .

I would make up a roster so every member has a go at charging the batteries !

The charging controller from a dual battery system used on a 4wd sense the alternator output and main battery voltage so it will only charge the auxiliary battery when the engine is running and the main battery is fully charged ( alternatirs never fully charge a battery as thier output is typically 13.7v not the 14.4 v needed to fully charge a lead acid battery .)

The controller will also limit the current in two ways :

It ramps the current up slowly as deep cycle batteries don't like a lot of current to start with and they limit the total current as the construction of a deep cycle battery is not designed to deliver or recieve a large current like a starter battery can .

Please also be aware that when charging a lead acid battery it will give off hydrogen gas so if it is locked in a boot of a car that sealed compartment can become a bomb - open the boot and the little switch for the boot light makes contact , gives off a spark and boom !

You can buy what is called a dc to dc charger that connects to your car battery and boost the voltage up so it will charge another battery but they are not cheap and you could set up a solar cherging system for less money .

The light globe idea will work but you really want to hook it up to the car so it will only connect the battery when the engine is running , maybe a relay activated from the ignition circuit ?

I'm guessing that the batteries are for power at the clubhouse ? Maybe time to purchase a generator ?

Congrats on the 4k Andrew !

I think Neil and Jason are racing each other to 20 k !

I wonder if they are the two highest amount of posts on here ?

I also use some of those toggle style clamps but there have been times where i have found i can't get one fixed to the table where i need it as the piece i'm drilling gets in the way but they do have the advantage of stopping the part lifting as the drill breaks through .

I like marks idea as it is simple to use and the post can be made shorter to allow the workpiece to overhang it if it's mounted in a vise .

That reminds me , i have some accesories to make for my drill press - after i finish a mountain of other projects !

Any chance you could take a couple of photos of the underside of the table ? I suspect the tilting bracket is just cast on the end of the table with no gussets - If you have a mill then making a stiffener bracket may be possible .

My taiwanese drill press had two really annoying attributes - no matter how much i tightened the tilting table it would move under pressure , i ripped it apart then discovered that one mating surface was flat but the other was dished so it only had a small contact area and a skim in the lathe sorted that but it also had issues with the morse faper - no matter what i did the taper would not lock in so i took to it with a morse taper reamer and it is now rock solid - well as solid as one could expect from a reasonably cheap drill press !

Modify and conquer i say !

These are the ultimate as they will not remove any material off a flat surface - only the high spot , you can buy them but they are not cheap ! I end to use a finer stone (i think around 600 grit and fairly blunt ) to show up any high spots then work locally on any shiny spots that appear .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVLXsq7pi9Y&feature=share

Edited By XD 351 on 27/08/2018 20:06:22

All of my T nuts have had the bottom of the thread staked or peined over so the stud or bolt can't screw in past the bottom of the t nut . I took my vise off the swivel base as it gives i bit more headroom and removes any risk of the vise swivelling when not wanted and lightened the load up on the table .

Merlin , i have done the same thing more times than i care to remember - annoying isn't it ! The thing i find really irritating is the ads on the side of the page as i use an old ipad , the slightest brush against the side of the screen with a finger or thumb seems to open a new page for the ad but when you want something to open i usually have to tap the screen a few times ! Might be time for a new ipad me thinks !

I use spray on lanolin and it has saved my machines from serious condensation many times !

This year was the worst and one morning i went out into the workshop early only to find my machines literally dripping wet , it looked like they had just been hosed down but the lanolin protected them .

The good thing with lanolin is it doesn't smell and is a natural product , the down side is once it dries you have to use a degreaser or wd40 to loosen it up especially if you have applied a heave coating .

I just spray some on some papre towel and wipe the machine over but in winter i tend to apply a heavier coat .