Quick setting nuts

Apologies for any double entendres in the title, but years ago I saw somewhere designs for those quick setting nuts that look as if they have another hole drilled through them at a slight angle to the main thread so allowing them to be slipped down a long thread easily before tightening. The original article I think was somehow related to a design for a drawbar of some sort but memory could be playing tricks. Any ideas for the design to save me hours of fiddling around with angles and diameters. Or indeed any other bright ideas for something similar? Are any available commercially (at a sensible price....)?

As with so many other recent questions here, Google is your friend. Put in 'quick setting nut' and see what it brings.

Start here, for example:

https://www.wdscomponents.com/en-gb/machine-hardware/nuts/quick-action-nuts/c-444

deleted

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 05/05/2020 17:59:46

They are easy enough to make yourself. I don't recall the angle but it needs to be such as to remove the full depth of the thread at each end; obviously, the angle depends upon the length of thread.

I remember these as threaded knobs from WDS in the late 70s. They were used in drill jigs and milling fixtures - typically on quick repetition work - where a swing latch was impractical for whatever reason, sometimes with a loose-fitting ring and chain to prevent loss.

WDS as mentioned above and I think they have downloadable cad files.

There may be some useful measurements somewhere on this site LINK

Drawings and instructions here for DIY manufacture and this video (which for some reason doesn't seem to display automatically, hence edits).

Brian

Edited By Brian G on 06/05/2020 08:43:27

Edited By Brian G on 06/05/2020 08:45:26

Edited By Brian G on 06/05/2020 08:45:50

Hi Added this sketch of 12 mm Slip Nuts we fabricated and used to quickly remove machine guards

Brian G:

Thanks for the video link but I couldn't get the drawing, etc link to work.

Does anyone have a feel for how the maximum grip of such slip nuts compares to a normal full nut?

It seems that the maximum tightening torque will be less than that of a full nut. But how much less? Wild guess says about half that of a full nut torque would be prudent assuming similar lengths of full thread with the stud decently perpendicular to a flat surface for the nut to screw onto.

Thinking of using as an alternative to very hard to start nuts but that would only be OK if they can be done up tight.

Clive

Clive Foster:

Brian G's YouTube man says he would not use these nuts to hold work on the mill. I only hand tighten the nut in my photo which is used to hold the Vise-Grip type clamp on the drill table.

I wonder whether WDS have the answer to your question.

I included a section about such nuts in an article I wrote for MEW about 7 years ago, entitled "Enhancing a Centec Vertical Head". I called them "tilt nuts".  It can be viewed **HERE**

Edited By Gary Wooding on 06/05/2020 12:46:28

A different approach to the same problem is used in some old-style calipers (like school pairs of compasses only with points at both ends) - the adjuster thread is gripped by a pair of semicircles with internal threads. These have coned ends one end, and locate into a countersunk thick washer; the other ends pivot loosely within the knurled adjuster knob. This enables rapid setting and resetting over a wide range of sizes - very handy when transferring details from a drawing to real metal.

Cheers, Tim

Re-living the overhead crane training I had at work...

I realise the eye-nut in the first photo is purely a neat version of a wing-nut for the clamp, but I would wary of so modifying an item of lifting tackle lest it find an opportunity to re-live being lifting tackle.

That is one area where you need maximum thread and no risk of an angular pull detaching the fastening.

On which note if the pull is at all angular to the axis of the thread, the eye-bolt or eye-nut should be the collared and screwed down to full contact, with a washer if necessary.

'

Tim's comment about dividers (which I think you mean there) sent me my to tool-chest to examine a pair of Moore & Wright calipers (curved legs terminating in chamfered but blunt points, for measuring in particular, solid diameters), with somewhat similar arrangement.

The adjusting-nut is a knurled disc holding a split sleeve that carries the thread. The sleeve is closed onto the thread by its coned end engaging the countersunk outer end of a clearance-drilled bush, which in turn bears against a pillar on one caliper leg- the screw passing through that and secured in a corresponding pillar on the other leg.

'

Talking of calipers or dividers...

I've sometimes wondered about that splendidly dotty old "Ancient of Days" painting of a hairy, naked God measuring the Earth with a pair of dividers. I am sure The Creator would have correctly used calipers, but I wonder if the artist did know that too but felt it prudent to depict dividers instead, as prominently as God, and very suspiciously suggesting a certain long-established private-members' club!

'

I am also the proud owner of a very distinctive pair of calipers with flat blades (cut from sheet) only about three inches long, with a simple tightly-rivetted joint, reversible for internal and external diameters. I have no idea of their origin as they were among used tools "paid" to me for a workshop task, but definitely not by M&W or other respectable manufacturer.

If not home-made they were most likely a "bunny", or "homer"; and they are shaped and hand-engraved as a pair of rather "large-boned" lady's legs complete with high-heeled knee-boots and fishnet stockings....

Nigel Graham 2:

The (unmodified) eye-bolt was replaced by the knurled quick nut.

Your "lady's legs" rang a bell with me but I cannot recall where I have seen them; the female anatomy appears in a number of artefacts, of course. Might we see a photo?