What Did You Buy Today?

[DavidR8]

Hey David. I used Island Scanning just last year for some GPR on a concrete over wood floor. Very nice guy (whose name escapes me at the moment, of course!) but I think he’s pretty much a one man show anyway. He has a couple GPR units depending on what you’re after. I think he may do other methods as well but may be mistaken. Prior to him and quite some years ago now I had Terrascan Geophysics for terrain GPR and electric resistance mapping. Also Levelton for pachometer mapping again on a concrete floor but they’re long gone I think.

I like the idea of having a small handheld unit to play with though, sometimes you find things that get missed. A lot of the success can come from knowing your instrument and dedicating the time to a thorough approach.

-f

Thanks Frank, we live on a lot that was previously a dairy farm. In the process of renovating the yard we've excavated (by hand no less) about 2 tons of concrete and asphalt that was buried about 8-10" under the surface. It would be great to know what other surprises await us

 

[JRaut]

I got two new machines delivered today!!

One is a Rose Engine and the other is a Straight Line Engine (pardon the messy garage).

Both were made by F. A. Hall in Providence, RI. No dates or anything, but some internet sleuthing and some of the serials numbers I've preliminarily found on the machines suggest they were made in about 1905.

They're sort of esoteric machines, nearly lost to time. They almost never come up for sale, so I jumped at the opportunity. Didn't get 'you suck' pricing, but I got a decent deal. I bought them in Massachusetts and had them crated up and shipped to me in Minneapolis. That wasn't cheap.

Anyway, I've been interested in these machines for a number of years now. They're primarily used to decorate / guilloche watch dials, and somewhat in clockmaking. I, quite frankly, haven't all that much interest in making watch dials. But I find the machines themselves super interesting.

So I suspect what I'll end up doing with them is:
(1) strip them down and clean them up really well,
(2) repair / replace broken parts and pieces,
(3) paint and finish them off,
(4) play around with them for a while, and
(5) eventually sell them off to someone who plans on using them.

This'll no doubt take a good few years; maybe half a decade.

Maybe I'll make a separate restoration thread for them.

Anyone have a Rose Engine or Straight Line Engine? A quick search on H-M.com pegged a few folks with some interest.

 

[Badabinski]

Got these nifty drawer organizers off of McMaster. They're a bit expensive, but I'm a terribly disorganized person so they'll be really nice. Plus, they work like a lego set so that's pretty cool.

 

[francist]

One is a Rose Engine and the other is a Straight Line Engine

Yup, you’ve got yourself a nice challenge there. I certainly don’t have either although I’ve seen one or two videos on them working. Fascinating alright. Hope you do put up some separate posts on them when you get there, and good luck with the project.

-frank

 

[hman]

Anyone have a Rose Engine or Straight Line Engine? A quick search on H-M.com pegged a few folks with some interest.

I used to live in Oregon, went "snowbirding" to Arizona in 2008 soon after I retired, got reacquainted with a woodturner friend in Phoenix, whom I'd known from years previous in Oregon. She'd heard about a rose engine "kit" that Jon Magill (of Whidbey Island, WA) was selling, and she asked me if I'd like to build one up for her. This project was what led me buy my very first machine tools (HF mini-mill and Grizzly 9x20 lathe)!

After building (and adding a bunch of new features to) her rose engine, I got requests for two more, which I built up and sold a year later. Photo below. Interested in the genre, I found several articles and descriptions of early rose engines. Many of them are absolutely fantastic works of art! I'm a metalworker/tinkerer ... by no means a woodturner or wood artist. But I sincerely admire the craft. The second photo below is a test piece I did on the completed rose engine, just to show myself what could be done with the two basic rosettes (cams, to all you machinists) that were included with Magill's kit.

 

[erikmannie]

One foot of 10” Schedule 40 black pipe for only $43 out the door!

They didn’t have a remnant so they had to use the forklift to bring a full length to cut off just a foot.

 

[Papa Charlie]

@erikmannie

Interesting purchase, what is the project?

 

[erikmannie]

@erikmannie

Interesting purchase, what is the project?

Pipe welding coupons. Two of my favorite things to do are working on a lathe and stick welding.

I have also been curious what the size limitations of my 16 X 60 lathe are. I found one yesterday: chucking up a 10.75” OD workpiece will interfere with the cross slide by 3/16” so I had to extend out my compound all the way AND I would need extended tool holders (see photos) to part to lengths greater than 2.8”.



I had thought that the type of extended tool holder shown below would help with this, but it would not.





Maybe one day I will fab a mirror image of that, but it wouldn’t be so rigid with a parting tool way at the end.

I suppose at some point we part pipe or tubing from the inside. That ought to go really smoothly when the part pops of and wants to fall on the boring bar.

 

[GreatOldOne]

Stuff that's arrived in the last couple of weeks:

Nippy vise (already rebuilt)

An actual real-life Noga indicator holder - they seem to be rare beasts over here in the UK. It's only a little one though, but ye gods it's so much better than the cheapo 'import' stuff I've been using (technically it being Israeli, It's an import as well. )

A Tesa 40-50mm bore mic to round out my collection (all the way from the US of A)

A Noga reverse countersink tool (Had to have one after seeing one on blondiehacks)

And a Mitutoyo mic stand.

 

[ChrisAttebery]

I picked up a B+S BesTest .0001 DTI in really nice shape with the original leather box and a few accessories