Alba 1A Shaper Graduated Dials?

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Alba 1A Shaper Graduated Dials?

This topic has 15 replies, 10 voices, and was last updated 30 January 2012 at 20:15 by Michael Gilligan.

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18 January 2012 at 20:45 #82406
_Paul_
Participant
@_paul_
I have a late 30’s Alba Shaper (an early type with no box support).

The machine currently has small plain unmarked collars making accurate work difficult so I would like to add graduated dials to both the topslide and crossfeed.

Sounds reasonably simple so far, (i’m not that lucky) my problem arises with the machines screws which are all 6 T.P.I.

This means that one revolution of either feed produces a (measured) movement of 0.16666 therefore (working in thousandths) giving a dial calibrated with an unusual amount of divisions.

I did then start to think that it may be calibrated in 64ths as some really old machines are, this dosent seem to produce any kind of meaningful number of divisions either.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Regards

Paul
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18 January 2012 at 20:45 #11882
_Paul_
Participant
@_paul_
18 January 2012 at 20:54 #82407
David Clark 13
Participant
@davidclark13
Hi There

Near as dammit 4.25 (4.233333) mm

I would divide it into 34 and use that.

You are unlikly to want any closer measurement on a shaper I would think.

regards David
18 January 2012 at 22:27 #82417
John Stevenson 1
Participant
@johnstevenson1
Chop a cheap digital caliper up for the top slide and use one of the horizontal DRO bars for the cross feed, probably a lot quicker than making and graduating odd sock dials.

John S.
18 January 2012 at 23:39 #82420
Ady1
Participant
@ady1
A $15 DRO will sort all your problems.

Something I haven’t really seen anywhere is profiling with a laser.

Attach a $2 laser to the head of the shaper, put a ball point pen picture of the shape you want on the opposite wall, or a freestanding markerboard, and profile the shape.

edit:Not many shaper users left nowadays though.

Edited By Ady1 on 18/01/2012 23:50:23
19 January 2012 at 00:30 #82421
alan frost
Participant
@alanfrost17805
Don’t you believe it ,Ady. Even the venerable editor is pushing his luck with a comment like ,and I quote, “..unlikely to want any closer measurement on a shaper”. Some of us use a shaper to pare off layers of atoms and the really hot guys can even remove selected electrons. I can think of a website not a million miles removed where new members have been advised “watch out for the shaper boys “. Certainly no one on that site would be rash enough to make these sort of statements.

Like the laser profiling idea–Try that with a mill, if you get any spare time from sorting out the rough finish !!!

Edited By alan frost on 19/01/2012 00:31:54
19 January 2012 at 01:38 #82424
Ady1
Participant
@ady1
Like the laser profiling idea–Try that with a mill, if you get any spare time from sorting out the rough finish !!!

ooh…nasty…lol

It also occurred to me that it might be possible to finish off bores for bushes and perhaps even model engines with a shaper, with a rounded tooltip on a rotary table, although the highly skilled engine guys do talk about a slight tapering when they hand finish the bore.

Even by hand, with no graduated dials on a shaper, you can skim minute amounts of material from a piece of metal.

As soon as an endmill/slotdrill touches something it vibrates.

Edited By Ady1 on 19/01/2012 01:45:12
19 January 2012 at 09:03 #82437
John Olsen
Participant
@johnolsen79199
Seems to have been traditional to use odd threads on shaper feeds. I have a six inch Ammco which came with a half inch Sellers thread on the downfeed, eg 13 tpi, and a V form thread at that. Somebody had put a little dial with 62.5 calibrations around it, which might have been some use had the thread been 16 tpi. I scavenged a nice 10 tpi thread leadscrew and nut from an old lathe cross slide, peace at last. I have four shapers, the others all came with calibrated dials and sensible threads. So either change the thread or put the digital readout on, the latter might be easiest and gives you metric as well.

regards

John
19 January 2012 at 17:28 #82465
_Paul_
Participant
@_paul_
Thanks to one and all for your replys & advice, sounds like it will be having a cheap digital caliper grafted onto it.

Has anyone done this with a shaper? any design ideas would be gratefully recieved.

Another thought gripped me before I started this thread which was what about a CNC shaper? has this been done I wonder

Regards

Paul
19 January 2012 at 19:29 #82468
Bazyle
Participant
@bazyle
The Boxford tailstock screw is 12tpi so I have thought of a 42 division dial but since the usual adjustment is a ‘tad’ or ‘smidgin’ why get obsessed with a subdivision of a distance that was imprecisely chosen a few centuries ago.

If it is reasonable to divide a foot by 12 then the next division is logically 6 or 12, or some multiple thereof so 42 is on the cards for the next stage.

Anyway counting in base 10 is just a passing fad of a couple of thousand years and we will revert to base 60 again in time.
19 January 2012 at 21:15 #82479
Sub Mandrel
Participant
@submandrel
Bazyle,

We need to redefine the centimetre as 2.56 to the inch.

Work out the implications.

Neil
20 January 2012 at 23:33 #82600
Michael Gilligan
Participant
@michaelgilligan61133
Neil,

Agreed; it would be wonderful … bringing instant convergence of Metric, Imperial, and Binary.

On a practical level [as I’m sure you realise]; we can often get away with the approximation …
“Quarter Scale, Metricated” is a favourite of mine.

i.e. One Inch at QSM is 25.6/4mm = 6.4mm
One sixty-fourth is then a very convenient 0.1mm

Makes scaling-down from old drawings very simple!

MichaelG.
23 January 2012 at 16:53 #82802
alan frost
Participant
@alanfrost17805
We’ve got Napoleon to thank for 2.54. Bloody French, what can you expect !!

I expect his thoughts at the time were. “Vell, the bloody English fink they rule the world-ve vill see. I vill metricate and the world will follow. Now eet would be sensible to make the centimetre 2.56 to ze eench, but ve vill make eet 2.54. Eet suits me and I have ze beegest army in Europe. Ze Eengleesh will be so busy making 127 teeth gears France vill be number one for years”

What the basket forgot was we had the only universal language and once Le hotdog and Le computer were invented the French were on the slide.
24 January 2012 at 18:19 #82881
Sub Mandrel
Participant
@submandrel
I suppose we should be grateful they standardised at 2.54 – for a long while it was 2.54and a load of tiddly bits on the end.

Neil
30 January 2012 at 13:22 #83451
Nobby
Participant
@nobby
Hi

I read once that the Congress of the USA stated that The inch Should be 2.54 What year I can’t remember. Having said that I found it easy to program machines in metric . also a 127 m.m sine bar can be very useful !!!!!

Nobby
30 January 2012 at 20:15 #83487
Michael Gilligan
Participant
@michaelgilligan61133
For info …

http://www.npl.co.uk/reference/faqs/on-what-basis-is-one-inch-exactly-equal-to-25.4-mm-has-the-imperial-inch-been-adjusted-to-give-this-exact-fit-and-if-so-when-(faq-length)

MichaelG.
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