Making Square Nuts, 4 mm Spanner, 3 mm high in 8BA or M2

Hallo together

For some historic models I need about 400 Square Nuts, Steel, with 4 mm Spannersize and 3 mm Height in 8BA or M2. These do ot seem to be available anywhere, or are they?

If I'll have to bite the bullet and make these myself (have a Myford S7, but not a Pultra Lathe, though)), what would be a clever method to produce alle these nuts?

Out of interest, I've asked a company in China for a quotation... The minimum volume was 5000 Nuts at 1100 USD, plus a possible import duty to the EU. Not really attractive...

Thanks

Johannes

I had to make some stainless threaded spacers, 9.6mm o/d, 9mm long tapped through M6, I did about 300.

I used one of them tailstock turrets, (c/drill, drill and tap) and front tool to face and chf with a rear part off tool.

Bored the hell out of me...........

Jim

That is quite a high nut, GHW do them in M2 but they are only 1.2mm high.

Failing that a square collet and some 4mm square keysteel unless you can find some 4mm Mild steel square that has crisp corners. In the past I have used round stock and milled the square but not for such a large quantity of fixings

Edited By JasonB on 20/01/2018 09:51:52

Get them laser cut, and tap the holes after they been have cut. And ask for a sample before you place the order to see if it works out for you, good luck.

Edited By John Gregson 1 on 20/01/2018 09:49:42

I would get them cnc made.

EKP supplies say that they welcome enquiries for bespoke fastenings. Probably worth a try **LINK**

HTH,

Rod

Laser cutting is capable of cutting square edges but an edge 4mm long in 3mm material is not gong to have a good enough finish for a scale model.

Quite apart from the fact that it will be impossible to find any laser cutting company to cut 4mm square blanks in 3mm material (especially with a centre mark or hole).

I would like to be proved wrong on this!

Ian P

I would also worry that a laser cut tapping holes for 8BA are likely to eat taps at a frightening rate...

AccuScrew do them in stainless steel but again only 1.2mm thick for 41p each! They will custom make items, might be worth an enquiry. *** LINK ***

John

A laser cut hole at 1.6 diameter in 4mm thick material is probably not achievable.

Ian P

41p each!

Drops to 19p for 100 units!

That's for 1000 not 100!

Still not as cheap as GHW who want 3.75 euros for 50 or 0.075ea

It won't laser cut, one of my jobs was programming cnc laser cutters. As a general rule you wouldn't expect a laser to cut a hole with a diameter less than the thickness being cut. You also have to remember that you need to collect small parts or they need to be tagged to the sheet, ain't going to work at 4mm square. Cr4 sheet usually used for laser cutting doesn't tap at all well.

Michael

Bl**dy amazing! Believe it or not, when I keyed in my post I was sure I keyed in 1000, but on checking, before posting, I noticed the ‘error’. It read ‘100’ so I changed it (as I thought) to 1000, and posted it. And it still turned out as ‘100‘!

New ‘puter. Better for adding quotes, rather than copying and pasting (although I rather like to p*ss off one particular moaner), but it will not capitalise the singular first person pronoun automatically like my old slooow ‘puter, will not shift the cursor to the end of a word it does not like and has a few other other quirks I have yet to sort out or get used to - like it will not change properly to a new paragraph (on this forum, only!).

Please PM me with any useful tips. It is an Apple Pro 12.9.

.

How very sad

MichaelG.

The particular poster is a PITA at times (my opinion of course), but one only needs to look back at some of the late JS comments and one could very well come to the same conclusion.

Hallo

To come back to a serious discussion...

Yesterday evening and this morning I made together 63 such nuts - learning - using read and front toolposts with lathe cutters and a toolholder/turret in the tailstock. I learned that doing all operations in the lathe was too ambitious for me: The 4 x 4 steel profile easily bends if the profile sticks more than 3 times the width of nut plus cutoff-tool out of the collet. In the end I did the tapping at the bench.

Johannes

Johannes

May I suggest another approach ?

The job would, I think, be much easier if you could purchase the tapped holes !!

That may not be as silly as it first appears: I am thinking of items something like this **LINK**

http://www.theinsertcompany.com/steel_rivet_bush.php

which are made in vast quantities on automatic machines.

If you already have the tapped holes, and a threaded rod, your manufacture becomes a simple milling exercise.

MichaelG.

.

Edit: That was just the first nicely documented link that I found

... I do realise that example starts at 2.5mm

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 21/01/2018 11:16:30

Thanks Michael

I'll continue with my own approach, making the Nuts from Square Section Rod. The diameter of the threaded rod is already fixed to 2 mm and I do not want to change that now. Your hint has been noted in my Tips&Tricks Database.

Johannes