What Did You Buy Today?

Just delivered! Thanks, @ycroosh. The fit and finish is excellent :applause:
I have Rustoleum V7400 Machine Tool Gray on the way, so I can finish cleaning up and assembling the Colchester. Then I need to measure and order scales for the Lagun FT-2S to replace the old ones, and add to the knee and quill to take advantage of the summing feature. I have the tablets and look forward to working with TouchDRO on both machines.

TouchDRO.jpg
 
Pictures, or it didn't happen! lol.

Been thinking of getting ER sets in R8 and a chuck for the lathe. 5C and R8 are ok, until you have a size you need but don't have!
I’ll post a picture. I also got a backplate mounted HHIP ER40 chuck for the lathe so it will hold long stock. It was love at first use. I went for a 23 piece set of collets and it’s already been worth it for the close fits of inbetweeners. The only time I mount a 3 or 4 jaw now is if the workpiece is bigger than 1”. I still need to get square and hex ER40 blocks for the mill.
 
Not exactly a tool, but necessary just the same. Today the local lumber company delivered the cedar decking and stringers for the new pier decking. I tried a few pieces from one of the big box lumber yards and was thoroughly disappointed in the quality of their product. Of the dozen boards i purchased to make prototypes 10 of them either warped or cupped to the point I couldn't pull them straight when attempting to make a 4' section of decking. The disappointing part is that 12 years ago when I made the last set all the lumber came from the same big box store. Since the pandemic the quality of their products has slipped.

I went to a local yard where we bought the lumber for our house and deck to see what they had. I was impressed with both the quality of the material and the attitudes of the people working there. The price was considerably higher than the big box stores, but the quality is on a whole different level. Hopefully I'll be able to make useable pier decking rather than more firewood. The original prototypes will have to be cut into firewood since there's no ungluing the stringers from the deck boards.

Is it decking in the raw, or firewood in the making.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_1851.jpg
    IMG_1851.jpg
    82.3 KB · Views: 23
  • IMG_1852.jpg
    IMG_1852.jpg
    165.8 KB · Views: 22
Cedar isn't cheap from what I remember! It was worth returning the last leftover board from my last project, and that was a few years ago now.

A lot of big box stores sell garbage materials. I've heard stories from so many people about getting junk, and having to redo the work with better materials that I go with a local building supply. I setup a contractor account (which gives a discount), and haven't looked back since.
 
Not exactly a tool, but necessary just the same. Today the local lumber company delivered the cedar decking and stringers for the new pier decking. I tried a few pieces from one of the big box lumber yards and was thoroughly disappointed in the quality of their product. Of the dozen boards i purchased to make prototypes 10 of them either warped or cupped to the point I couldn't pull them straight when attempting to make a 4' section of decking. The disappointing part is that 12 years ago when I made the last set all the lumber came from the same big box store. Since the pandemic the quality of their products has slipped.

I went to a local yard where we bought the lumber for our house and deck to see what they had. I was impressed with both the quality of the material and the attitudes of the people working there. The price was considerably higher than the big box stores, but the quality is on a whole different level. Hopefully I'll be able to make useable pier decking rather than more firewood. The original prototypes will have to be cut into firewood since there's no ungluing the stringers from the deck boards.

Is it decking in the raw, or firewood in the making.
wish my lumber yard hadn't turned against retail. I had been dealing with them for years, and they acted like I wasn't there the last couple of times I went to pick up lumber. I talked to a friend recently who said he won't go there anymore. So it wasn't just me.
They seem to only want to deal with contractors... same thing with the plumbing supply I stopped going to.

I buy a lot of my lumber for woodworking from guys with mills.. but there are always somethings I need quick, and also ply.
Glad your guys treat you well. I never had a problem until their attitude changed.
 
This came in last night. Sort of a belated Christmas present to myself. 275 amp MIG welder (Everlast Cyclone 262). Will replace a transformer based "Craftsman" unit. First job for it will be to weld together a cart to hold it and a gas cylinder.

This has the touchscreen with all the process features built in, just select the metal type and thickness and it is suppose to set itself up. Not sure how I will like that, I'm of the opinion that learning the raw settings is better for building welding skills. Manual mode (direct voltage and feed rate, etc) is an option, will just have to see what works best for me.
IMG_5291.JPG
 
Last edited:
I recently bought a batch of micrometers as I had the need for imperial measuring. In the batch I got some Moore and Wright mics. I did some research and according to the UK forums, Moore and Wright are the UK equivalent to Starrett in terms of quality and range, so when I saw a 0-25mm and 0-1 inch Moore and Wright going fairly cheaply on eBay, I decided to buy them. Checking them out today, they seem to have and extra level of precision by having another scale on them:

3f730bb63307a8ac092fe81ed539eea1.jpg


I assume this lets me accurately measure down to three decimal places.

The imperial mic has the same:

7a9ed082257b1e939c712e8721fef793.jpg


Really happy with these mics. They feel a whole lot nicer than the ones I started with.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I assume this lets me accurately measure down to three decimal places.

That extra scale, should be a vernier scale which would allow reading 1/10th of the scale on the thimble.

You'll want to read up on how to use that, or watch some videos. On my imperial mics they allow reading 0.0001" resolution.

A must have for a mic in my opinion!
 
Back
Top