Here is a list of all the postings Nigel Graham 2 has made in our forums. Click on a thread name to jump to the thread.
Thread: What is it and what is it for |
28/07/2023 20:23:27 |
It is indeed a Filing-rest, used for forming flat and hexagons on the turned end of the work-piece. The flanges guide the safe-edge of the file to maintain correct and consistent length; the column with screw-adjustment and clamp give the depth-limit.. It is fitted to the top-slide having lifted the tool-post or tool-clamp off its stud, and for more than a single flat you need some form of dividing-arrangement on the spindle - typically a simple detent engaging the bull-wheel or the change-wheel pinion. Does anyone have one to photograph fitted? |
Thread: What did you do today? 2023 |
27/07/2023 23:34:16 |
You wouldn't think working out a new location for a small plug-cock in a big chassis would be awkward, would you? Oh yes it can! Nothing ventured... Finished this evening screwing its support hangar to a handy bracket, all of four inches from its original spot using some slots originally cut in a chassis member for Something Else subsequently scrapped as unworkable and horrible; and there it is - one Mounting, Valve, Injector Water Inlet. The valve appears to be an old motor-cycle petrol-tank fitting: I fitted the operating-spindle with a slotted steel bush to fit the cock handle. I could have used the DRO to drill the bracket and hangar, but to keep my hand in, elected to use all those little lines and numbers, to space 3-each 4BA tapping and clearance holes. Lo and behold! They all line up, none broke out of the material (nor broke taps) and none of the screw-heads or the spanner foul on anything ! |
Thread: Awkward Question Time! (Genuine Survey, But...) |
27/07/2023 23:08:21 |
Spotting the thread in the list reminds me: I've not yet heard anything about arranging an appointment. Must send them a message. |
Thread: Strangest Things |
27/07/2023 23:05:24 |
A rainbow. Strange? It is when only one colour - yellow. . Two very odd cloud effects. 1) Flying back to Bristol I think, from Glasgow in the middle of the day we were above a complete sea of cloud right across the country. It was split by a single, nearly straight rift of clear air that would have been well under a mile wide, stretching away Eastwards into the distance. Whilst I have seen other cloud patterns that suggest very long (miles) wavelength pressure-waves, eddies, shears and such-like in the air, this feature defied any basic physics. . 2) Late one night, in a clear and moonless sky some distance from any towns, seeing what appeared to be a vapour-trail form. Then three more developed, creating something like the letter 'Pi' in the sky (couldn't resist that), with a diagonal across it. Vapour-trails? Well, central Dorset is not far from Hurn Airport, and only 70-80 miles from each of Exeter, Bristol and Southampton Airports; but these things developed along their full length not from the leading "end". and there were no signs of aircraft lights. Also they did not disperse in the way exhaust trails usually do, and the entire pattern slowly drifted away, gradually fading as it went. |
Thread: Alibre: Recovering From New Part / New Design Error? |
27/07/2023 22:46:09 |
This is it. They are meant to represent two stock gears, by their pitch cylinders. The spigot on the smaller one is as manufactured, intended to fit in a recess bored in the larger wheel, though not to full depth to give a small clearance between them.. That was the one the wrong way round, but I managed eventually to twiddle it round - once you told me how!
What more do I want to do? Finding the IQ allegedly I once had would be a start! |
27/07/2023 15:05:41 |
I found the two arrows again, but though they obligingly turned the thing round after I'd highlighted the two faces I want in contact, that's as far as it goes. I can't make the rest of the assembling work. There's clearly a lot more to this "Assembly" and "Constraints" business than meets the eye, and I am probably missing something obvious to everyone else but not to me.... |
Thread: Help me identify this 3 1/2 Guage Part Built 4-6-0 Tender Model |
27/07/2023 09:45:23 |
It will be great to see this loco complete and running! Do let us know progress. A welded steel boiler? Unusual in 3-1/2" gauge, but no real reason why not although a club boiler inspector might have waffle moments about it unless its provenance is known. Actually it looks quite new - its colour suggest black mill-scale rather than brown rust. While the rust on the other parts looks light enough to clean off without leaving pits. A worthwhile project - plenty of advice on here, and for general machining and other metalworking advice there is available a goodly range of handbooks such as those sold by TEE Publishing. Not to mention two by one of this site's moderators! |
Thread: Alibre: Recovering From New Part / New Design Error? |
27/07/2023 09:31:29 |
Thankyou Ady - I'd not seen that control before. I was trying to assemble two parts, one with a spigot to fit a socket in the other, and that was the part facing the wrong way.
Jason - I know, and use, that view-cube and the little view symbols on the tool-bar; but as far as I can make out they affect the whole drawing. This drawing had two objects. I wanted to turn one object round while keeping the other still. . A conventional rocker switch won't work as we want, no, but this instrument is different. Depressing the centre of the rocker itself presses both switches together, or operates a third, central switch. Either way, it replaces the scroll-wheel action with moving the whole thing, though it is not so easy to operate. The previous version I have is called a Penguin by its makers, and humorously suggests an Antarctic bird in formal dinner-dress. It has a scroll-wheel and a rocker-switch as buttons, respectively the bird's beak and bow-tie. In computing terms it is a wheel "mouse" turned on its side. Unfortunately it won't work on this computer. Both instruments are a little like a joystick, and designed to minimise limb problems by being held and operated in a much more natural way than by the ordinary digital rodent.
The design of that mouse I had bought is so poor that its switches are just not positive and reliable. Instead of two keys in slots in the case, patches of the case itself are made to act as quasi-buttons. You need push just the right spot quite hard for it to act at all. It has a tiny scroller, but awkwardly placed. So this device puts heavy, un-natural stress on your fingers and hand; not right for frequent button-pushing and holding; not only in CAD but also e.g. photo-editors and spread-sheets. |
26/07/2023 22:22:10 |
Thank you! Ady - I take it you mean by "movement app", animation. Yes, I know this can be a very useful tool but I'll leave that to the experts for now. Not much use animating something unless you can draw it in the first place! . Jason - Just watched your video. Not very easy on my monitor as enlarging it to make the labels readable started to make them go all fuzzy!. Still, I think I got the gist of it. I'd been trying to use "Component Placement" but it would not place anything, and I don't know what it's really for and what conditions it needs to work. Similarly with the Constraints - they seem very particular about the objects and how you use it, so the combination made me think that if you assemble two parts into contact they become one. I often had the constraints tool "stick" on one thing, the one I didn't want, even after closing it and trying again, and still have these "over-constrained" errors for no obvious reason. I also had one part facing the wrong way but could not rotate it no matter what I did. I thought there is a thing called "Flip" and I looked it up in the manual, but that didn't help me. This proved it does exist but bound up with something else. I think I was looking for the wrong tool for the purpose. . Funny mouse? It's not even mouse-shaped! Yes - I went back to it after the conventional mouse I bought proved even worse. Its two switches were controlled by springy bits of the plastic cover, so had no positive, reliable action; not very cheap but nasty. I tried an older but much better-quality mouse from my spare computers, but it didn't work on this PC. The thing I have replaces two buttons with a rocker-switch, and the scroll-wheel with pressing the rocker centrally so it works both switches while you move the device as a whole. It works but does take a bit of practice and is not really ideal for a mouse-enthusiastic CAD programme, but at least it is not knackering my shoulder like a mouse-shaped mouse does.
|
Thread: Why do modern car engines have different types of bolt type heads like Torx etc? |
26/07/2023 21:49:05 |
I like that, NDIY! My steam-wagon is getting like that because I have been building it over such an obscenely long time with any number of changes of parts and mind. Some fastenings are not very accessible either. I started the project in a larger scale, and for that was going to use UNF for all the structural fastenings because they and the A/F spanners were easy to obtain, and they looked neat as the hexagons are a little smaller than BSF/BSW ones. Well, it is a vehicle... So at least I am in professional company. . Vehicles are not only cramped by having to pack more and more stuff in less and less space, (like my workshop but at least that is not hampered by the stylists and "value-engineers" . The first plague lock-down's enforced idleness was too much for my car's battery, which seemed to have been the one installed from new. The two clips were held by Torx screws, one out in the open, the other hiding in a narrow canyon of full battery depth. I had to make an extension handle to hold the driver, of right-angle bent form. Nothing special, just a bit of pipe with a slot sawn in one end, and a load of insulating tape. And as for the "cabin air filter"... I have never managed to find where Renault has hidden that! |
Thread: Chop saw |
26/07/2023 21:31:08 |
Interesting progress. I've not seen a tap-wrench of that pattern before! Some tipse I hope you won't mind me passing on..... Threads for operational parts of machines, especially hefty great ones like that M22, are far better and more easily made by screw-cutting on the lathe. It will usually leave sharp thread crests unless you skim the bar down to a wee bit under size. Remove the bulk of the metal that way then use the die to trim the profile, rounding the crests to their proper shape. If the work allows I cut a short lead at root diameter on the end of the bar first to indicate having reached that (the dial or DRO should also tell you of course!). It also gives the thread end some protection in use. If cutting to a shoulder I carefully put a root-diameter groove there first, too, to give a clean run-out. Note that if the part is highly-stressed in operation it should have a tiny, smooth fillet radius, not a sharp corner.. . The disc is better tapped in the lathe - again even better screw-cut first. Use the tailstock to guide the tap: easier if it has a centre-hole in the end, otherwise put an oddment of rod in the tailstock chuck and drill a female centre into it from the chuck. Lacking a self-aligning tailstock tap-holder, my trick for a tap too big for the tailstock chuck to hold without slipping, is to use a tap-wrench but let the handle bear on a harmless area of the saddle. Rotate the lathe by hand for this, keeping the centre up to the tap. Use a suitable cutting-oil or paste. I also sometimes use a die-holder similarly, for smaller-sized threads, using the tailstock chuck against the back of the die or holder to keep it square to the work. Note - and this is something I picked up from this forum a while ago - when using a die straight off it is often best to turn the bar down a few thou under-size to give a properly circular surface and ease the load on the die. Stock materials are sometimes a bit over-diameter. Best practice is to turn complete, drill and thread then part the disc off; from stock bar. I find it always comes off with a hefty burr but careful work with a small file and the tap, and a final rub on wet-and-dry paper on a flat plate, clears that. This will give you a properly concentric part with the face perpendicular to the hole axis, and with any appropriate face groove or recess. If you do need hold a disc like that in a bench-vice, don't simply grip it as in your photo. That gives very little support, makes tapping it accurately very difficult, and worse, risks bending it. Instead, put an old Vee-block or piece of channel between it, even a Vee cut in a block of wood, and one jaw for better support. (A pipe-vice is of Vee-block form). . I have an old 3-jaw chuck screwed to a big angle-bracket for holding in the vice, for such work. I did not make it but acquired it second-hand, and it took me a while to realise why its jaws had been bored to form internal steps. |
Thread: Gear |
26/07/2023 17:34:35 |
If you need buy a gear from a stockist like HPC etc, they are normally sold with pilot bores for you to machine to correct bore. Be careful the pressure-angle of the replacement matches that of the existing set, though it may not be so critical if only used once in a blue moon. |
Thread: Which Collet Chuck Do I Have |
26/07/2023 17:30:16 |
AH! Thank you for that last point! My Myford mill uses R8 tooling but I wonder if some that I have is actually Whitworth 12tpi rather than Unified 13tpi threaded, hence being more awkward to screw in. Alternatively, since I had to make a new drawbar (original one lost in a house-move) I may have given it the wrong thread! Though I think there is a problem inside the spindle, to prevent reliable engaging. |
Thread: Alibre: Recovering From New Part / New Design Error? |
26/07/2023 10:30:53 |
Thankyou! Ah, but I don't know what makes constraints conflict, and what I was trying to do does not look as if they would. One to align one part with another, then a second to slide it lengthwise. I have found that the index in the left-hand column highlights a failed constraint in red, and you can delete it safely. (It's not done anything.) . I thought if you try to rotate the figure half-way through a particular operation like constraint, that diversion closes the original operation. I could not pick up a face by identity, only the edge or the outer (visible) surface. . I don't think my PC struggles with running Alibre, certainly not with my modest drawings, though I follow the suggestion in the exercises to turn the "Ambient Occlusion" tool off to save processing and memory. (Is it a shadow effect with a fancy name, as its own symbol suggests?) Drawing gears just as circles and cylinders is an old manual-draughting convention, but I don't think it would hurt at least at my level in CAD; and in any method the pitch radii are what dictate the shaft centres. I know it would be necessary at a more advanced level needing a more realistic image, or of course designing the gears themselves. I realise the trap in this simplification is not leaving enough space around the wheel for the tooth addendum. I have though discovered the radial copying tool, and used it in this particular exercise for a ring of screws or pins. |
26/07/2023 01:01:51 |
After a long holiday in the Slough of Despond (not of Berkshire) I've tentatively picked up Alibre Atom again. On several occasions I accidentally picked "New Part" instead of "New Design" in Assembling something. Disastrous! That loses the Assembly drawing! The little back-stepping arrow on the tool-bar is inactive in that situation; so is there any way to recover the assembly-drawing immediately prior to the mistake? Or is it lost, at least back to the last Saving? . Also, can a part be constrained only once? I'd concocted a simple shaft with several parts along it*, but having placed imported components concentrically on the shaft, I could not see how to put them in face-to-face contact. You cannot select a surface facing away from you. Anyway, even trying it only raised "Over-constrained" warnings. (Nor come to that, how to place a Part at a set distance along another.) . [*Part of a back-gear type speed reduction for driving a horizontal milling-machine. I was not so daft as to try to represent the gear-teeth, but drew the two wheels by their pitch cylinders.] |
Thread: Winding Engine Peculiarity |
25/07/2023 10:26:21 |
Interesting detail! I'd always assumed winding-engines had Stephenson's or similar reversing-gear. I think some do, but since it would probably run at a set cut-off in both directions a simpler gear would be appropriate. Some stationary steam-engines were manufactured with a slip-eccentric screwed to a keyed clamp-plate. This was to set during installation, the permanent running direction for its intended use. The Mann Steam-wagon gear is a slip-eccentric operated by a mechanism on the crank-shaft itself. Note that although the Blists Hill engine's slip-eccentric is rotated round the shaft to work, other ways are available. Examining the drawing (by LBSC?) quoted by Jason, shows that though that eccentric too turns, moving it in a straight line will achieve the same result; and some engines I think including the Mann, were built in that form. The eccentric has a straight slot sliding across flats on the shaft. Marine reciprocating-engines were usually fitted with Stephenson's Link Motion, or with Bremme or similar radial gear. These had to run in one direction against a fairly constant load for the voyage, for days, even weeks, on end; did not need notching-up, and if the controlled by screw-reverser that was sometimes fitted with a simple locking-clamp to prevent it drifting out of setting. |
Thread: Awkward Question Time! (Genuine Survey, But...) |
25/07/2023 09:51:58 |
Thank you - I'd not taken it personally! |
Thread: Tony Seba’s Prediction |
25/07/2023 09:50:44 |
This what his own web-site claims: " Tony Seba is a world-renowned thought leader, author, speaker, educator, angel investor and Silicon Valley entrepreneur. " That is the heading line. What do " world-renowned" , "thought leader" , " educator" and " angel investor" really mean? Along with further self-congratulations by lists of his "best-selling" books (compared to what other sales, to whom?), obscure trade-awards irrelevant outside their own formal-dinner circles, arcane lecture-circuits and the like: " His work focuses on technology disruption, the convergence of technologies, business model innovation, organizational capabilities and product innovation that leads to the creation of new industries and societies and the collapse of existing ones. " All the sort of fancy words that say little but impress those no cleverer than they should be. "His work..." Oh aye? I bet he wrote it and left the web-site designer to turn it from "my" to "his". Basically just a self-glorifier making a lot of money from business investments and complicating the simple; but it looks as if his other main earner is expounding his opinions on how to run businesses and on "green" industries. His professional line and apparently main investing, is IT and managing IT-related companies. He has a Degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business. He might make very good points. He might write a lot of rubbish. I don't know as I have not read his books nor seen his video, but I'd rather reach his work via peer accreditation. |
Thread: Awkward Question Time! (Genuine Survey, But...) |
25/07/2023 09:19:45 |
No I do not have that impression, but I do agree that politicians can and often do decide on poorly selected or understood data. The data themselves that are used by Governmental agencies and politicians are probably fine, collected and analysed properly. As you say, it's what's done with them that counts!. Just a few minutes ago (a little before 9 am here), on BBC Radio Four's Today programme, an item on "smart"-'phones mentioned many ways we leave trails. They included so-called "smart" loudspeakers and even devices like the "Fitbit", Though to be fair the latter was not accused of being an eavesdropper. It is not. It simply records when you are active or at rest, but not what you are doing or where. In one criminal case the accused was proven by his Fitbit to have active when he had claimed to have been in bed at home, supporting other evidence against him! The massive collecting and trading of personal data are almost all commercial, but so many people walk straight into it by thinking everything has to be on-line all day and night, that they need a "smart-speaker", umpteen-G 'phone and wallet-full of shop cards, that they need plaster their lives across Facebook; and above all, have little or no sense of privacy or security. We are being pushed relentlessly that way by the banks, supermarkets and some of the public services cramping our choices of how we use them; but I try to encourage them as little as possible. I certainly do not own a "smart"-'phone and 'speaker, and accounts on Twitter, Facebook and their ilk. |
Thread: Chester face mill inserts |
24/07/2023 22:49:50 |
I don't know the specific ones but some inserts have part of their identities etched on them in teeny-weeny letters. Might be worth examining one or two with a magnifying glass. |
Want the latest issue of Model Engineer or Model Engineers' Workshop? Use our magazine locator links to find your nearest stockist!
Sign up to our newsletter and get a free digital issue.
You can unsubscribe at anytime. View our privacy policy at www.mortons.co.uk/privacy
You can contact us by phone, mail or email about the magazines including becoming a contributor, submitting reader's letters or making queries about articles. You can also get in touch about this website, advertising or other general issues.
Click THIS LINK for full contact details.
For subscription issues please see THIS LINK.