I have two outstanding projects that stand in the way of my resuming the Seal engines. One, making some simple gears, has become something of a marathon purely because I cannot source a gear cutter at a sensible price. I thought I had the answer when I bought a hobb at a reasonable price from Arc Eurotrade only to find I couldn’t get it to work properly. So I sent off an email to John Stevenson (very experienced engineer) and at the time of starting the session, was waiting for his reply .
The second is a set of adjustable handle bars for one of my brother in laws. This project is only held up because of the amount of material that has to be removed is causing me some discomfort issues with all the turning of the ‘Y’ axis on the milling machine. Since I didn’t feel up to resuming that work I thought I would have a go at a non critical project. A new bait board for the new (to us) fishing boat I share with one of my brothers (see http://.www.dartmouthfishing.co.uk ).
So having decided what to do I went to the marina and picked up a tube used to fit in a socket on the floor of the boat, the other end fits into a bracket attached to a table top. My idea was to simply make an oblong table that would use the tube, but instead of putting the table on it I would make a bracket that would allow the new bait table to sit on top of the tube.
A look into the stock room soon produced a piece of aluminum that had been ‘scrapped’ when I cut the wrong thread pattern for another project. It would be ideal when bored out to suit the tube end. The design was simple really; just bore the centre to size then turn down the outside so four holes could be drilled and countersunk. These would be used to screw the bracket to the new wooden bait table made yesterday which already had its first coat of paint applied.
The first machining task was to mount the aluminum in the 4 Jaw chuck on my Myford ML7. Once the piece was centered and faced off a boring bar was used to bring the required diameter. I nearly made a mistake when taking the required diameter as I used the base of the tube for my measurement. When I had the bore close to size I picked up the tube and saw that the plastic insert that fits into the table, was about 100 thou wider than the base. So a little more metal was removed from the bore before cutting down the outside where the 4 holes for the screws would be located.
Initially I had the part flush with the chuck face when boring it out but then I had to reset it using parallels between it and the chuck face and of course had to center it again. Something that a little forethought would have overcome. Still that job has now been completed so onwards and upwards as they say………………………..
Nearly completed- all that remains is to transfer the brass ruler made earlier
About Mike Freeman
Hello, my name is Mike Freeman and I am a retired Chief Fire Officer from the United Kingdom with a keen interest in model engineering, silver caddy spoons and sea fishing. I live in the pretty fishing port of Brixham, South Devon, in the United Kingdom.
I am a sufferer of degenerative osteoarthritis, which impacts on the amount of time I can spend in the workshop, and is the reason why you will see seats and a stool in some of the photo's. I have only recently added the above sentence after a discussion with one of my Doctor's from the excellent pain clinic, based in Torbay. This does affect concentration one of the reasons why I double then re-double my measurements and set ups.
Before completing nearly 30 years of public service I and my wife Sandy, owned and ran, a small restaurant in Okehampton Devon. Prior to marriage I worked for my father in his various businesses, in the early days these were garages, which he bought in a run down state, then built them up before moving on, to start again.
I took every opportunity in those early days, to work in his workshop's
learning 'on the job' rather than as an apprentice. This, I suspect, is the reason why my building various model's in the early days, turned into model engineering, when funds allowed the required equipment to be bought.
My workshop comprises one half of a detached double garage. It has a
stud wall separating the two halves and unusually perhaps, its own
shower/toilet/washbasin compartment! (the true reason for buying the
bungalow - don't tell the wife!!!)
It is fully insulated with a ceiling and fluorescent lighting supplementing the one window. Several double electrical sockets are dotted around in
relevant positions.
Equipment consists of 2 lathes (1 Myford ML 10 and 1 Chinese variable
speed motor with etched glass DRO's), 1 milling machine (RF25 far East) floor standing pillar drill, Proxxon bandsaw, Warco bandsaw, 6" wire brush and polishing mop motor, 6" coarse and fine grinder, Proxxon mini drill, various benches and an engineers vice. I have just acquired a third lathe, a Myford ML7 which I am at present evaluating so I can decide which of the Myford's I will keep.
I have only just bought the Chinese lathe and had it fitted with DRO's prior to delivery. And what a bonus they are! So good in fact that I decided to buy another set for the Milling machine. Whilst my engineering experience can only be described as limited, I find the use of DRO's has affected my accuracy levels which have improved tremendously (although that's not saying much!) and would recommend their fitting to any model engineer.
Prior to retirement I built for my son's 17th birthday a Locost car. This
was a tremendous project and a great feeling when it passed its test. The book it was based on suggests it can be built for £250. Ours was nothing special in the sense of all new parts but still cost about £900 to build!
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