Anybody Ever Drilled And Tapped A Ball Bering?

[Andre]

I love that book, its amazing how anyone survived to produce offspring.
You would be locked up today if you tried half the things in it.
Have you see the "Boys book of Atomic experiments"?

I have not, but I did know about the toy kit that actually included some real plutonium!

 

[Billh50]

All I know is I played with Mercury many times when I was a kid. And my doctor says I'm just fine. Really I am.

 

[Farmboy1]

Another interesting tidbit is that more mercury is released into the environment in the burning of coal than all other sources combined.

As a worker in a coal fired power plant for the past over ten years I can say that yes there is mercury released from burning coal but at a rate of about 4litres per year burning about 6 million tons of coal a year, not to mention the mercury is the naturally occurring stuff that came out of the ground in the coal in the first place then we put in activated carbon injection systems that remove 98% of the mercury so it goes out cleaner than it came in. At least I go gome with only two eyeballs as far as I know!!!

 

[whitmore]

Believe it or not, aluminum is actually pretty toxic as well. So are the oxides from copper and brass.

I'll choose not to believe aluminum (something like eight percent of the Earth's crust
is aluminum, we grow all our food in it). The tailings,
though, from copper mining are a rather lifeless selection of landscapes.

For sure, keep copper-alloy swarf out of any cut...
The big hazard from aluminum, is that technically it's flammable
so the dust from sawing/grinding has to be kept in control. Titanium likewise, if you
ever grind something that exotic.

 

[whitmore]

A nice hardened steel ball CAN be drilled, with an EDM (or ultrasonic
tools with abrasive slurry). If I wanted one drilled and tapped, I'd
press a knurled threaded insert into an EDM'd hole.

 

[Vegemitesandwich]

I'll choose not to believe aluminum (something like eight percent of the Earth's crust
is aluminum, we grow all our food in it). The tailings,
though, from copper mining are a rather lifeless selection of landscapes.

For sure, keep copper-alloy swarf out of any cut...
The big hazard from aluminum, is that technically it's flammable
so the dust from sawing/grinding has to be kept in control. Titanium likewise, if you
ever grind something that exotic.

Dust from the porta-band is pretty fine. I have tried to light it to no avail even with cutting torch.

 

[Four Corners]

Yeah, I've drilled and shafted a few for a purely cosmetic use. These were from a assorted size bag of loose bearings I bought on Ebay.

As long as you don't care if it's hard or not, just heat it up until it's red, let it cool, chuck it up on the lathe and drill. Maybe you want to use a tool to put a flat spot for the drill.

Agreed. I've done this as well. The balls go black from the heating, but it can be cleaned off easily enough. I'm making some ball joints for a delta 3d printer using BBs. Don't even think about using HSS tools on the balls unless they have been softened. Money down the u-bend immediately. There's a discussion about using ball bearings in a vise to take up slop and account for odd shapes. I posted a link to a YouTube video in which the fellow has a very clever way of holding the balls in a lathe. I would post a link to that discussion, if I knew how to. Try to find the discussion and scroll down to the YouTube vid.

 

[samthedog]

I'll choose not to believe aluminum (something like eight percent of the Earth's crust
is aluminum, we grow all our food in it).

Not entirely correct. Some aluminium alloys are found but aluminium on it's own is quite rare. You are probably refering to bauxite which is plentiful. Aluminium can be dangerous in nano-particle size as it can pass through the blood-brain barrier via the olfactory nerve (the nerve that carries the signals responsible for your sense of smell to the brain) where it contributes to lesions in the brain causing alzheimers:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0946672X16303777

Aluminium is also bad for for DNA replication as it damages the DNA and this can be the result from ingested aluminium. Here is some more info:

https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/phs/phs.asp?id=1076&tid=34

I wouldn't read too much into the statement that it exists naturally - naturally it is very rare and it's a very technical process to extract it from bauxite:

http://aluminium.org.au/FAQRetrieve.aspx?ID=42259

And the by-product of which is sodium flouride which is highly toxic and interferes with calcium metabolism and as a result the heart and circulatory system (which could explain the higher rates of cardiac disease since sodium flouride's introduction into oral hygeine products).

It's increasingly found in nature, however science is apperently powerless to find out how it's getting there. The recent prevelance of aluminium is argued to be contributing to the skyrocketing rates of Alzheimers and it also seems to be a contributing factor in the demise of bees:

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0127665

 

[cathead]

I don't know about the rest of Hobby Machinist land but in northern Minnesota there are daily displays of chemtrails
spewing micro particles of aluminum and or barium and who knows what else.

As long as I'm off topic, if you mix 3 parts of iron oxide with one part of fine aluminum, you have a mixture that will burn
really hot and vigorously I might add. Temperatures can reach 4500 degrees Farenheit. The railroad uses this to weld
track sections together(Thermite). I havn't tried this yet but am considering it. You can fire it off with a sparkler...

 

[T Bredehoft]

Back to drilling holes....I have a 1" ball bearing on the end of a rod, as a handle to rotate my four-tool. I drilled through the hard skin with carbide, drilled a No. 7 in about half an inch, tapped it 1/4-20, and screwed my handle into it. This was back in the '70s.