Recommended books

DavidR8

DavidR8

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Is there a particular book that you good folks would recommend for a beginner machinist?



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Beg, borrow or steal the Machinist Bedside Reader book 1,2 and 3. Such cool books. Get yourself a Machinist Handbook! Read the Atlas lathe operations book and lastly grab the Starrett book for Machinist Apprentices. I’ve been learning too..... these are my “go to’s.


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I was a bit disappointed by the Machinist Bedside Reader. Sure, there's some good stuff in there, but a lot of it is out of date, or equivalent/better information on the topic can be found online, Wouldn't be so bad if the books weren't collectible, and instead were priced at 1/10 of their original price like so many other (and better) old machinist books.

Here are the books I probably got the most out of:
Technology of Machine Tools (978-0078307225) : textbook for a high school shop class. Find an old edition and use it to fill in the gaps. If you've already had shop class or equivalent experience, you won't need this book.
Machine Tool Operation, Parts I and II (9780070089617) : like the Moltrecht book (but cheaper!), only a little more applied and actually includes bench work which many books seem to consider beneath them.
Advanced Machine Work (978-0917914232) : Old, rather dated, but cheap. Has a sequence of operations for performing various machining operations, which is surprisingly helpful.

I read a bunch of the more recent ones like Machine Shop Trade Secrets, Machine Shop Essentials, Metalworking: Doing it Better, and the J Randolph Bulgin books. They're all good, but they're basically advice for someone who already knows the basics.

The "Shop Masters" series by Village Press is good, the Frank McLean and Philip Duclos stuff in particular.
 
There are tons of machining and machine shop text books on ebay. I like the older ones as I'm not really interested in CNC and I'm not working with any exotic materials so 1960s tech is plenty current for me. The old ones are "obsolete" so generally cheap.

In fact I just snagged the 2 volume set by Moltrcht mentioned in the post above for $20.

I'm taking an autoshop class and was chatting with the instructor and we got onto machining. I mentioned the little shop I'm building in my basement, so the next class he gave me a couple of his old high school metal shop textbooks from the 1960s.

I'm currently reading Machine Shop Operations and Setups. There are a couple on ebay right now under $20. I'm finding it useful as it covers the various machines and their uses. Since my only formal training came from shop classes in high school (1980s) and they spent a lot more time on oxy/fuel welding and sheet metal rather than machining I'm finding it a useful book.

Machine Shop Operations and Set Up
 
Lots of good video stuff on youtube.
Look for mrpete222, Abom79, Joe Pieczynski, This Old Tony, and many others.
 
Aaron_W said:
I'm currently reading Machine Shop Operations and Setups. There are a couple on ebay right now under $20.
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Looks pretty good - found an image of the TOC. Abe has it for like six bucks - almost can't afford not to give it a go.

The Moltrecht volumes are probably the first books I bought on machining. They're good, but I didn't get as much out of them as I did the others that I mentioned. Perhaps they have a higher requirement for background knowledge (like having read the shop class textbook) - I certainly find them more useful now than I did when I first read them.
 
ThinWoodsman said:
Looks pretty good - found an image of the TOC. Abe has it for like six bucks - almost can't afford not to give it a go.

The Moltrecht volumes are probably the first books I bought on machining. They're good, but I didn't get as much out of them as I did the others that I mentioned. Perhaps they have a higher requirement for background knowledge (like having read the shop class textbook) - I certainly find them more useful now than I did when I first read them.
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I got it free, so an even better deal.

It is a very introductory book aimed at somebody brand new to the metal shop. It covers everything from the very beginning. Measuring tools, what they are and how to use them, lathes, mills, shapers, cutting machines, grinders etc and all from a very basic level including what they are used for, and when there is overlap why you use one vs the other.

I'm not a machinist, and I've never worked in a machine shop. I graduated high school 33 years ago and my shop classes didn't get very deep into this stuff. I have a very basic knowledge of the core machines (lathe, mill, bandsaw) and literally don't know what I don't know so a book that assumes I know nothing is just about right.


There are many great youtubers, but there are somethings that you just can't beat a book for.
 
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