Complete novice in Hampshire

Morning everyone.

Thought I’d say hi and make my wholly inexperienced presence known to the world of home engineering. 😁

With no background in engineering or machining, I’ve arrived at this point through a lifetime of interest in machinery and engines that started with motorcycles and became a general fascination with all things metal.

I’ve just installed a Warco WM240B lathe - manual feed and belt drive - and a Warco WM12 milling machine in the workshop/garage. All I’ve got to do now is learn to use them properly…which is where all the information and advice throughout this website will come in very handy.

Here goes on a new adventure. They say you should never stop learning - at least that’s my excuse when the credit card bill arrives 😉

Take care everyone, don’t let some fast-spinning lump of metal or Covid get you.

JerryP.

Hi Jerry where in Hampshire are you iam in Barton on sea happy to help give me call or pm me if you need help

Geoff

Welcome to the party, any questions you have will be answered by someone on here. Good luck Noel.

Welcome I am a relatively new to the hobby to..

Regards

Robin

Thanks everyone, it's great to see such a friendly forum.

Geoff - many thanks for letting me know. I'm at the other end of Hampshire, quite literally a few hundred yards from West Sussex at the back of Emsworth, so a good few miles away. It's good to know there's people not that far away...

Got the bank holiday week off and not going anywhere...wonder what I'll do...

Jerry

I live in Cowplain and am building my first 5" gauge loco a Don Young Aspinall. I have a Warco WM250V lathe and a. WM16 mill. If you want to pop round and see what I am doing pm me.

Welcome to the hobby!

Find a local Model Engineering Club and join.

When we are able to meet again, you will be in the company of fellow enthusiasts and able to get bface tom face advice, hands on guidance and possibly demonstrations.

This will supplement the advice available on here on almost everything under the sun!

As a complete newbie, some reading would be time and money well spent.

A set of Zeus Charts. Contains useful data. Still using mine, bought in late 1958!

L.H.Sparey "The Amateur's Lathe" Old, mainly aimed at the Myford ML7 user, but the basic principles are the same.

Ian Bradley "The Amateur's Workshop" More general approach, but gives detail of how to align a lathe to remove twist from the bed (Something that Sparey omits, strangely )

Important if the lathe is to cut parallel.

Do not rush into model making, too early. Learning the techniques will be cheaper if you make a mistake whilst making some simple tool, such as a Centre Height Gauge, or Tailstock Die Holder.

(I prefer the type that slides on an arbor, to minimise load on the newly cut thread. )

You will probably work almost exclusively in Metric, so Drills, and eventually Taps and Dies will be Metric.

You can expand, later, if the need for other threads becomes apparent.

You do not want to learn the hard way by ruining an expensive casting from a kit!

As a beginner, you will learn more about tooling by buying a Bench Grinder and using High Speed Steel.

As time goes on, you will find a need for a 4 Jaw independent chuck. This will lead to the need for Dial Test Indicators and a magnetic base.

Make haste slowly, learn the basics and apply them, so that the machine and techniques become familiar.

As you gain experience and confidence, the range of things that you do, and make will expand. One day you will look back and realise that you are doing things that never thought possible when you started the journey.

Model engineers produce some fantastic work, as they gain experience.

LOTS of enjoyment stretches ahead!

Howard

Wow Howard! Thanks for all the advice 😁. I’ve got Sparey’s book, and a set of tables, but not come across “The Amateur’s Workshop “. Everyone says HSS tooling is easier to use, so I’m keen to learn how to grind cutters on my bench grinder - although I’ve started by buying some already made from Arceurotrade. I’m expecting more to go into the bin than make it through to a finished exercise initially, so will be starting very throwaway 👍 Definitely baby steps…Got a week off at the moment, so am simply making swarf out of steel and brass to begin to understand how speeds and feeds effect the result. At some point the tools will need repointing on the grinder - the first opportunity to start learning that.

Take care all, off for my second jab in a few minutes 😁

Just over in Horndean if you would like any help.