What did you do Today 2018

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Ian,

Yes it's intended for use with a bow, and I only shared the one on ebay for 'interest'

My interpetation is that the seller "made" this "lathe" from a set of turns.

Bazyle has proffered a value-judgement, although I chose a more subtle comment.

MichaelG.

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P.S. very happy to give yours a good home, if you're offering !

Plenty of other people doing superb exhibition quality work but Cherry Hill does seem to be that bit extra even amongst the elite. It's not just that the lady demonstrates top-end craftsmanship, it's that she researches the originals in detail and then designs and builds her models from scratch. And it's no fluke - she's produced many excellent models since she started, I believe in the 1960's.

Comparisons are odious at this level of skill, but who else would the team put in the same league as Cherry Hill?

Dave

The much-missed, late Sir John summed it up nicely in describing the effect on the expressions of those viewing her work at the MEX. The change from the happy expectant faces of those going up the stairs, to the realisation of those coming down that their best efforts wouldn't match up, summed up the quality they had just seen. The thing I find most remarkable is that I can see a photograph of one of her masterpieces and recognise her 'authorship' with no further clues! Truly amazing!

rgds

Bill

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Heading in the same direction, albeit on a parallel path ... I might put Barry Jordan **LINK**

https://www.craftsmanshipmuseum.com/Jordan.htm

MichaelG.

Today was time to top up the oil levels in the lathe. There was till a decent showing in the headstock, but might as well top it up. No matter how much oil I poured in the level didn't go up, so I drained it all out (not too easy on a Myford 254) and removed the sight glass. It has a clever design with a white screen held off the back by about 1mm so you can see it more easily. The little slots were full of gunge, so oil couldn't get in or out. Not too good. Cleaned up and refitted, if it happens again the white screen is going to have to go! This is something to watch out for if you have similar sight glass.

Today I put the 6" x 6" x 3/4" 6082 blank up on the mill and flycut both faces, this is for the adaptor plate I am making for the small rotary table and it is too big to put it up on the mini-lathe. Pleased with how it turned out, managed to get a really good surface finish.

I have also decided to bite the bullet and order the high/low range replacement gears for the lathe and get it fixed. I have lost the low range since I stalled the lathe parting off. I still havnt made up my mind whether to go for the nylon gears or the steel. The nylon gears are quieter plus some say they provide something of a safety valve against any damage happening further down the line. Of course the metal gears are far stronger but said to be noisy and could cause damage else where should the lathe stall or jam up.

I am making a flycutter at the moment and only having high range on the lathe is a real pain, I have to get 40mm down 16mm and the high range and a HSS tool only let me take really shallow cuts which would take forever. So I have changed to a carbide insert tool and wound the speed up to get the lathe more into its power band and that has helped, will continue tomorrow.

A small thing, but a win's a win.

Since I got my Rotary Table about 6 years ago I've been meaning to make a couple of clamping blocks for it. As a break from my current engine project, today I got them done.

Jim

Nice job Jim! great workmanship.

Nice finish Jim... what was the blackening method used... chemical / heat & oil ?

George.

Thanks Jeff and George.

I blacked the parts by heating to red and then dunking (a technical term) in engine oil till cooled. Best done in the open as lots of smoke results and probably a fire risk. As you probably are aware used car engine oil is carcinogenic, although I'm not sure how much you have to drink before there is a real risk, so I use clean oil. It works for me and a part I blacked 8 years ago still retains its colour so I'm happy to use the process.

Jim

I smashed my mini-lathe gears when a rod came out of the chuck and wedged between a jaw and the bed. Went straight from 2000rpm to zero with a loud bang! I was surprised by the amount of force delivered by a genteel little 600W motor when things go wrong. I was pleased to find that the only damage was to the nylon teeth and the rod.

If the energy had not been dissipated by the gears, it would have gone somewhere else. I'm not sure what's next to break in the chain. Snapping the belt seems pretty harmless, but I worried about bending and wrenching the spindle, headstock, bearings, change-gears, keys and motor. Shock loads do unexpected things. Anyway, because my mini-lathe didn't have any shear pins I accepted the 'gears are a fuse' theory and replaced nylon with nylon.

With hindsight I'm not so sure. True something else would might smash if steel gears were fitted but the other parts are all outside the headstock and are easier to get at.

Perhaps the best solution is to not crash the lathe! I learned a painful lesson and am much more careful these days.

Dave

Have finally completed my stepper driven Index table/hobber mechanics and the associated electronics/controller.

Photo below shows the table, stepper powers supply and driver enclosure, and the controller unit.

The controller is based on an Arduinio look-alike - the NUCLEO, using a 32bit STM processor. The module costs around US$10.00. The control box is a plastic box, 200mmx150mmx35mm.

Modes are:

RPM mode - rotate continuously clock or anti-clock at a selected RPM ( up to 30RPM)

Hobbing - normal continuous Hobbing mode, using the encoder above, driven by the hob spindle.

Division Mode: - Set the number of segments to divide a circle into and step clockwise or anti-clock segment wise. The current segment is also displayed.

Angle mode: - Set the angle to step, and then step that angle clock or ant-clock. The accumulated angle is also shown.

The Jog encoder wheel also rotates the table for manual positioning to a specific point or angle.

Now, what to do with this thing...

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What did I do today? Drilled the first of many holes in my (expensive) steel boilers to fit the smokeboxes. Holes were drilled with a mag drill:

To get to the side and bottom holes I had to dismantle the rear end and up end the boiler. Quite a lift, and close to my limit without doing myself a mischief:

The second boiler is now also vertical, but I haven't finished drilling the holes.

Andrew

That is some size Andrew, how much will it weigh when complete..?

About 500kgs, give or take - Andrew

Wow, I guess your planning on a trailer of some description.

Ron

2 * 500KG traction engines.... In the Kitchen. I like your style!

Dom

Made a vibratory polisher for my daughter to polish her special stones with! the plastic container lifts off so that she can have different polishing medium in seperate bowls, thus avoiding the mess!
Phil