What Did You Do Today 2021

Almost finished a small fixture plate. My mill is Bridgeport sized and has a large vice and I have found trying to hold small stuff a bit awkward. Particularly at the moment as I am trying to resurrect a Stuart 10V which I bought on Ebay a few years ago.

I wanted the plate to be able to just be dropped in the vice and for it then to be level and square. Cut a 7" length of BMS 25mmx30mm section and squared it up on the mill then drilled/tapped three M8 holes down the X -axis centre line.

I had bought a 200mmx80mmx15mm for this job. Set it level in lathe and brought the two ends close to size and then used face-mill to clean up what was to become the bottom. Turned it over and then drilled and counterbored three M8 holes along the center to match previously machined bar. Bolted the two pieces firmly together and then back into the vice to drill and ream two dowel holes. With dowels made and fitted I then squared up the ends and sides and ran face-mill over the top face. Hopefully all is now square and solid and flat.

Then proceeded to layout a hole pattern for M6 tapped holes (two rows of 9 and two rows of 8), these were then centred, piloted, drilled, lightly c'sunk then tapped M6.

Followed this up with 3 rows of 5.8mm holes (8, 4 and 8), ready to ream at 6mm for location dowels. These were again centered, piloted, drilled and very lightly c'sunk. These dowels will allow me to set stuff up parallel to the X or Y axis very easily.

Part way through all this I then found I did not have a M6 machine reamer, but luckily my mate down the road has spares and am collecting an MT1 and chucking reamer tomorrow.

The first job it will be used for is getting the Stuart 10v sole plate flat. The original builder had filed it but the mounts for the stand (particularly) and the bearing mounts are not perfectly flat and luckily are not at the required dimension so I have scope to correct it.

Colin

Edited By Colin Heseltine on 24/01/2021 17:56:15

It may look look much, but it represents the last couple of months or more of head scratching and brain stretching. The first test run on my cnc router, and when it finished the cutter was still intact. Yes, I know the stock was slightly too small, but the purpose of the test was really to check that I could sort out the Z heights in Fusion 360.

Thanks to all those on here who’ve helped me along the way.

Hello Steve. I dug through related posts but did not find reference to what Controller and associated software you are using. Looks like UCCNC?

Joe

I’m using Mach4 on a Windows 10 box. The controller is an Ethernet Smoothstepper with an MB3 breakout board The spindle is a Chinese 2.2kW water-cooled with a Huanyang vfd. If you search for John Ward on YouTube, he made a similar machine a couple of years ago and has a series of about twelve videos.

Mine is more or less to the stage of working, though I still have an issue with the spindle speed not doing exactly what Mach4 is telling it to do - I think the vfd is affecting the analogue voltage output of the breakout board, so I can’t get the full 400Hz. I’m almost at the point of looking for a replacement vfd with a decent brand name.

Flushed with success at making a tricky little slotted part for my Worden T&C Grinder yesterday, I started machining the radius on the end of the plate that holds the tool-holder and swings round a protractor plate.

It consists of a rectangular steel plate with a bar screwed along each side, and if the bevel is cylindrical it would be a relatively simple rotary-table milling operation. Only it ain't. It's a conical surface I've no straightforward way to mill..

The construction notes show how to turn it, clamped to a faceplate.

After about an hour of very gentle cuts at minimum revs gave only lots of nerve-wracking noises from the headstock for a little rounding-off of corners, I decided this was most unfair on a poor little Myford ML7 manufactured at about the same time as me.

So that's tomorrow's work - but on the Harrison L5 whose much beefier construction and high inertia ought take the strain (still very light cuts at low speed of course), while the bigger faceplate would allow much better support and easier setting-up.

I can't identify Mr. Hemingway's lathe in the kit's handbook, but it does not look like an ML7!

Nigel,

When I built my Worden, I obviously came up against the same problem. My way around it was to mount the tool holder on the faceplate and use a milling cutter in a tool post mounted spindle, turning the faceplate by hand, thus:

The spindle was a cobbled-together first effort which didn't give a smooth enough result, so I finished off with a grindstone as shown in the second photo.

Not much use to you, though, if you haven't got a tool post spindle!

John

Edited By John Hinkley on 26/01/2021 23:17:59

No photos as it is to damn cold to go out in the garage.

However I have given myself the challenge of catching a turbot this year and I wanted some watch leads.

Being to tight to pay for a commercial mould (£17) I designed and machined up my own two piece mould out of a block of aliuminium i had lying around.

Aimed for 6oz size and got 6.5oz, because I drilled the dimples a bit deep.

why go to the effort , well why climb the mountain? , and I had a rotary table brand new, 8 years old, still in its packing grease that i decided I ought to have a go with.

I have to say i was VERY VERY pleased with my results so I made a batch of 12 up ready for .........

whenever.

Regards Clive

PS now constructing a crab pot out of old fibre glass tent poles, even tying my own netting. again think of the mountain.

Printed some fixtures for holding rounds in the milling vice

I'd been puzzled how to best hold this. Worked OK, nice and solid

Also, the vice overhangs the back of the table and restricts the Y travel - so I cut it off

That's better - a whole 3/16" extra movement which is quite important on my mill

Stay well,

Rod

Rod, you have the makings of a miniature camelback straight edge there.

You know what they say Rod - one man's 3/16" is another man's 4.76 mm....

Just kidding, that clearance will undoubtedly be handy in future, I did same sort of trimming on my mill vise some years back.

John -

Thank you!

I don't have a milling-spindle but you jogged my memory of a large, simple, rather unprepossessing adjustable angle-plate of unknown ancestry and original purpose, quietly mouldering in a dusty corner.

I exhumed it, and after some work with a wire-brush, Plus-Gas and oil, found it will just hold my 6-inch rotary-table, using 2 of the assorted holes in it.

I was thus able, via some experimenting, to mount that combination on the mill and centre the table by a plug in the spindle. I used a similar method, with the shank of a 6mm drill held upside down, to then centre the grinder's slide base on the RT for clamping down.

To cut the radius, I tilted this ungainly tower of metal to 75º from horizontal, set by adjustable-square, and eased the steel away by lots of very shallow, steady passes with an end-mill.

As you found, milling doesn't leave a very pretty finish but it yielded to draw-filing and a final touch with wet-&-dry paper.

Then it was time to stop for tea, rather neatly between the end of the In-Tune Mix Tape and the concert, recorded in the Alexandra Palace Theatre in December 2019, a month before many of us made our way up those imposing steps..... .

As I locked the workshop door for the night, I could hear one of the frog-pond's residents in full cry. They are very sensitive to vibrations though, and although I walked as softly as I could in safety-shoes on concrete, he (or she?) stopped croaking and dived into the depths with a soggy "plop".

The set-up is still there for cutting the fiducial lines, using the rotary-table's divisions but also marking their positions by dividers as in the kit's hand-book. Belt and braces. I've also to find a suitable engraving-cutter.

That's tomorrow's task....

Got a phone call at 3:10 "can you get to the rugby stadium by 3:40 for a covid jab?" You bet I can. Let in bang on time, sit down, jab, sit in socially distanced seating for 15 minutes, home within the hour. Really well organised, but then the NHS has sorted it, not some expensive management consultant. There is a silver lining honest

Double post

Edited By duncan webster on 27/01/2021 23:02:09

Correction triple

Edited By duncan webster on 27/01/2021 23:02:52

This was a very quick job. A simple clip to keep the tapping attachment on the UPT raised while inserting a tap into the chuck:

Stay well,

Rod

Well done on that, I think you feel a little safer having had it. They are doing very well now, but it took a few days to get properly organised - took my mum to our local centre on the first Wednesday they were doing jabs, absolute chaos, we were queueing for best part of an hour and the post-jab 15 minute wait was outside in a marquee. However, by the next day when I took an elderly neighbour down, he was in and out in twenty minutes, and my mum's second jab couldn't have been better organised. So hats off to all in the NHS - and the volunteers - for getting things sorted.

Just to keep on topic, I'm slowly stripping, cleaning and re-painting bits of my ML7 - just had some Renaissance Wax delivered to wipe over the shiny bits. Not tried it on a lathe before but it does work well on other bits and pieces.

Rob

My jab was booked for 11:00. Four in the queue ahead. I was sitting down at 11:00 for 15 minute wait.

VERY well organised

Wife is going to a different (JUST opened ) centre at tea time.

Apparently, someone who had been vaccinated some time later tested positive. (WHY test unless out of curiosity ) Does not surprise me unduly., maybe it wouldn't tell the difference between a live virus and a dead one!

Stay Safe

Howard

My jab, two days ago, was at the Wickford community centre Essex. I was there just before the 11,10 appointment and out of the building by about 11,05. They could not have been more efficient and pleasant. Well done NHS.

Alan

I have been following Turbine Guy's 3D printing in metal with interest. This looks like an ideal solution for the cam covers on an engine that I am building. There is a lot of detail that is really not suitable for machining, such as lettering.

I finally got round to uploading a file tonight to get an instant quote for aluminium printed parts. One company wants £480 for two, the other $400 for two. Plus import duties and all the other taxes. They are only 133 mm long, for goodness sake.

Time for Plan B.

Jonathon Van Tam was on Channel 4 news yesterday and gave very good explanation of this and several other issues. Worth trying to get it on backview. If you've already been infected but not developed symptoms when you get the jab it won't stop it in it's tracks, in fact it takes some time to become effective, so you could actually catch it in the few days after jab.

I've got a side affect, my arm's a bit sore. I'll live with that!