2016 POTD Thread Archive

[Firestopper]

Just to clarify, you're a hobby machinist? That is an incredible shop, and beautiful work.

Thanks, both hobby and for hire. I still have a career outside the home shop (another five years).

 

[TOOLMASTER]

My sandblaster has gone to pot!!!!!!!!!!!!!




got tired of the tiny filter clogging up so I went bigger

got a "FILTER HOUSING" at salvation army for $2.50

grabbed a new filter from auto parts store and it was time to start cutting...

trimmed down the pot..drilled a center hole...installed the stud for the new "FILTER HOUSING" and installed

didn't bother the clean it to much, it will get blasted soon enough;-)

 

[mattthemuppet2]

Are you using the control from the treadmill or some other power supply and controller? I looked at the PWM controllers on the Bay for cheap, but I would need a 90 VDC supply at 10 amps which is difficult to get. So I get a DC motor controller for about $80 of the Bay.

a treadmill controller - MC65 from memory, although the MC60 is more common. They tend to be around $40 or so. There are also controllers from KB electronics (KB125) that are supposed to be very good, although I've never tried one. The MC ones are pretty basic, but work well enough for me (plus it was free with the duff treadmill )

finished balancing the lathe motor flywheel, now there's very little vibration from the motor. Still some overall though, so I'll buy a new poly-V belt as the current one was a) old and b) originally an 8 rib. Way better than it was though.


made some more progress (finally!) on the drill press treadmill motor conversion. I had already bored out a V pulley to 0.999in, so I spent a lot of care getting the flywheel stub down to 1.001-1.002. Then remeasured it and it came out a 0.999 Bugger!


so now it was a tight slip fit instead of a press fit. Oh well, lemons and lemonade I guess (what a muppet!). Ground a flat on the stub for a set screw


drilled a hole across from the original pulley set screw hole, then installed the pulley


used that hole in the pulley to drill through the stub


then tapped for a 1/4-20 set screw which will go through both pulley and stub to secure the flywheel to the motor shaft


ta da!


I wanted to make sure that the pulley and flywheel OD were concentric to the motor shaft, but the flywheel interfered with the steady rest, so I center drilled the end of the motor shaft like so


then held the shaft with flywheel attached using a dead center. Here I'm taking very light cuts with a parting tool to true up the faces of the pulley. Next is the other face, then the OD of the pulley


After that it goes in the balancing rig, then I can start on the electronics. Very excited!

 

[andy.alford.75]

Bought a Snapper 52 hydro walk behind mower and then worked on servicing it. Lubed and changed engine oil/filter, sharpened blades. Used my fancy home-made blade sharpener, which worked great. The blades were so dull, after sharpening each side of a blade, I had to adjust the grinding wheel down.

Still to do:
-replace the hydraulic fluid/filter [not done because I couldn't get the filter today]
-figure out how to inflate one of the front tires. can't get it to seal along the bead, tried wiping/rubbing the tire and rim surface down with a rag, spraying on windex [helps with making it seal just enough to get air pressure to hold it on the bead, didn't work], trying green slime around the bead on each side overnight and see about inflating it tomorrow. If that doesn't work, see I can get proper "rim sealant"
-fix the deck height adjustment screws. it's stupid that they are way up at the front of the deck and sticking up above the frame, so something solid can hit them and bent them over a bit, and they are threaded screws...

It's a little tricky to drive, left and right levers on a horizontal handlebar, you have to hold both in the 'middle' of their range of travel to be stationary, you release [so it goes forward] one or both levers to turn forwards/go forward, and pull one or both levers to turn in reverse/go in reverse. And it's faster than my Gravely Zero Turn. There will be a little bit of a learning curve for me.

Bone-headed mistake of the day: while warming up the motor to change the oil, was leaning over to look at the hydraulic system, and placed my hand squarely on the spinning air inlet on the top of the motor [the grill just over the fan that pushes air over the rest of the motor]. Fortunately, the bolts holding the grill only damaged a bit of my thumb, rest of the fingertips just have a good rubbing-burn thing happening.

Squirt some starting fluid in the tire and toss a match in after it.. not a lot. . It will blow the tire back on the rim.

 

[Steve Shannon]

Squirt some starting fluid in the tire and toss a match in after it.. not a lot. . It will blow the tire back on the rim.

Even though that was a two year old post, what I do is put a cargo strap around the circumference of the tire and tighten it up. That seals it enough against the rim that it will take air and pop its bead into place.

 

[Firestopper]

LOL

HOBBIES GET EXPENSIVE SOME TIMES.

you got that right brother, It also provides "mad money" which ends up back in the shop hahah!

 

[TOOLMASTER]

kind of like ebay..sell something for 50. buy something for 100...

 

[HBilly1022]

Made some tapered bushings to get my home made line boring set up centered on the Bobtach, then made some pieces to attach the bearings and boring bar, drilled the boring bar for a cutting tool and locking screw, sort of broached the hole for the cutter then mounted the whole thing on the Bobtach. Set the cutter at a depth that would take a full cut and tried it out. Worked way better than expected and I now have some nice round holes to make bushings for and a new pin.

Tapered bushings pushed into ears to align the boring bar then weld on all the bearing supports and bolt the bearings on.


The cutting tool after the first cut (right side)



My first attempt at broaching. used a 1/8" HSS tool bit. It worked but I needed a larger bit and shorter protrusion.



Here it is all set up for boring operation.



A look inside after the boring. Apologize for the poor pic. The end result is 2 nice round holes that are 1.425" in diameter.


I also finished the basketball setup for the grandkids.



Note the use of highly specialized steel for the hoop.

 

[roadie33]

Nice job in the Hoop, but that rebar is going to scuff the ball pretty good.

 

[dave_r_1]

Squirt some starting fluid in the tire and toss a match in after it.. not a lot. . It will blow the tire back on the rim.

The Green Slime, a strap around the tire and taking out the air valve so I could shoot air in faster did the trick to get the tire to seal on the bead.

The other tire I fluked off blowing the tire onto the bead while cleaning the edge of the rim/tire with a air blow gun. I was just working my way around the tire, and tire just happened to pinch right as I shot air at the rim and boom, on the rim.

Even though that was a two year old post, what I do is put a cargo strap around the circumference of the tire and tighten it up. That seals it enough against the rim that it will take air and pop its bead into place.

A two-day old post... Yeah, I was also doing the strap thing as well. Depending on the strap, it may be worthwhile to wet it a bit so it can slid on the tire vs just compressing the tire around where the ratchet mechanism is.

So far, only one tire has foiled me. It's a new replacement tire for my zero turn, I can get it on the rim fine, but it seems to have been stored for a long time with something on top, the tire seems twisted when it's on the rim and I can't get the bead close enough to catch doing all these things.