What did you do today? (2014)

[MuzzerParticipant @muzzer]

Just taken delivery of my X and Y ballscrews with double ballnuts for my BP clone CNC conversion. Took just over a week to arrive from China and cost $207 all in (inc carriage) – that's about 125 quid. That also included having the 3 ends machined with shoulders, keyways and threads to my drawings. Pleased to see that between my drawings and their machining, I have ended up with leadscrews that seem to be the right lengths and accept the intended bearings, pulleys etc. It may take a little longer for me to complete the machining of my mating brackets etc.

It's easy to slag off Chinese suppliers but for the likes of me, they have proven to be a very useful source for some of the critical parts of the puzzle – and they CAN provide viable parts. In the end, I will have sourced parts from the UK, China and North America. No single country or continent seems to have a comprehensive and affordable solution.

Murray

[John McNamaraParticipant @johnmcnamara74883]

Hi Muzzer

That looks like a reasonable deal…

When you have installed them it would be good to hear your thoughts on their performance particularly the backlash, Can the double nuts be preloaded?.

Would you mind posting a link to the supplier?

I am finally getting ready after a couple of years delay, to make My Epoxy composite V mill design.

Regards
John

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Posted by John McNamara on 10/06/2014 13:04:31:

Interesting Hopper….

I have an Asian drill press it is named Rexon. Nothing particularly special about it has a 2mt socket in the spindle and a round rotatable table which I like. I have had it for around 30 years it being my first workshop tool. The quill is still tight in the main casting and everything works the bearings are original. Actually quite a sweet machine with a nice light action. I guess it is the luck of the draw. Or maybe the factory that turned these out cared more than others.

Are other users of this brand happy or am I just lucky to get a well built one?

Regards
John

John, I think my Craftmaster is very similar design to the Rexon. They all seem to look much the same, a sort of universal design. But the execution seems to vary greatly from brand to brand, and era to era.
If yours is 30 years old, it was probably made in Taiwan. Seems like most stuff made in Taiwan was good quality, compared with the stuff now made in China.

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Posted by julian atkins on 11/06/2014 00:18:33:

i have a friend who has a Winfield lathe and it is far superior to the old Myfords.

so far as Winfields are concerned they are very good IMHO.

i think John is a bit too dismissive re same.

cheers,

julian

I am not dismissive they were crap when they were made and after 60 years they are even worse crap.

[Rik ShawParticipant @rikshaw]

Well not today but certainly in the very, very near future wife and I will be taking a three day break at a lovely place we have found near Wells. Have stayed here before and done the tourist thing – Cheddar Gorge, Wookey Hole etc. but would appreciate any tips for further places of interest in the vicinity especially if hobby related. I've looked at West Somerset Railway but for me it's a bit to far away from Wells (the older I get the less I like driving).

Any suggestions will of course be welcome.

Rik

[NJHParticipant @njh]

Well Rik

Not ME related but are you in any way interested in photography? If so then Wells Cathedral is a MUST! It is the most amazing place so, even if photography is not your thing, it's well worth a visit – if only to marvel at the architecture. It has such a contemporary feel that it is difficult to believe that it is so old.

Norman

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Posted by NJH on 11/06/2014 18:50:09:

Well Rik

Not ME related but … Wells Cathedral is a MUST!

.

I would say that the Clock is important [and wonderful] enough to qualify it as an ME related pilgrimage.

MichaelG.

[JAParticipant @ja]

Rik

If you are in Somerset on the first Sunday in the month visit Westonzoyland draining engine. It is a mid nineteenth century steam driven centrifugal pump and should be in use (demonstrated). The site also has a collection of small stationary steam engines.

Also Bristol Waterworks have a pumping engine (beam) at Blagdon reservoir which is run for the public on open days. Unfortunately I believe the boiler has gone and the engine is motored over by an electric motor.

JA

[nigel jones 5Participant @nigeljones5]

Went to work….same as every wednesday!!!!

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Swarf,

Rather ironic but today we visited a large machine tool company, they have some serious kit at this place.

Struggling a bit to get pics onto the web so may have to do a post when I get back. I'll try to email the pics to Neil and get him to add them. Watch this space.

Boring mills at this place can handle 180 tonnes on the table, lathes up to 400 tonnes, gear hobber can handle 16 metres in diameter, 52 feet. Again this company is making all their own machines for their other operations and selling the surplus on.

One CNC machining centre we saw which in the UK would be about the size of a large Haas and cost about 90K, they are building at the rate of 300 per year.

The ironic bit is that although they do a bit of subcontract work on wind turbines they are in the process of setting up a complete line for making these. Obviously been well planned as the new factory unit has got all the pits ready built into the floor to accept the new line. When we went outside there were a row of turbines in the mountains in the distance.

Majority of the machines are CNC and on some of the larger gantry mills they have rows of work setup on the bed so they just move from job to job. Even though these large machines are impressive, what is more impressive is the numbers of smaller but still large machines that they have built and are using. Over here a large company may have one, possibly two, these have many.

I have forgotten just how many slideway grinders i have seen in the last two days, some of these are capable of 40 metres in length.

[Nigel McBurney 1Participant @nigelmcburney1]

Where did you go to see these machines, I am very envious of your trip.

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

As you'll see from the post above, John Stevenson has gone on a mission behind the 'Bamboo Curtain' to see what Chinese machine tool factories are really like. He's sent back a set of photos and asked me to upload them all :-/

If I didn't know better I'd guess this was the worm from a very big rotary table.

Well perhaps not so big…

Ok, perhaps THAT big…

What next? I hope John isn't planning to build an AGR in his workshop.

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Next part… sure I saw this set in Terminator 3

There's a rotary table in that hole you could use as a loco turntable…

OK, I get the idea. they build big RTs in China.

Robotic welder?

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Can you guess what this is?

Yes, it's a big DS&G planer exported to Peking in 1878…

This will be the staff communal hot-tub and sauna.

Not sure if these are CNC stations or prefab holiday chalets.

Hopefully Mr S will be along to edit my captions and replace them with something meaningful.

Neil

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Can't see any of those machines on ARC's "new products" page yet

Edited By JasonB on 12/06/2014 20:53:35

[nigel jones 5Participant @nigeljones5]

thats just showing off!!!

[Clive HartlandParticipant @clivehartland94829]

Visited the Bees and found a large swarm out, It took me 20 minutes to extract it from the Holly tree. I had thought by now swarming was over! Got them into a cardboard box but had no frames or foundation to put them on. I had a Nuc. box and I placed them in front of it and they slowly marched in and I decided to go home get some frames I had ready and come back down. 20 minutes later i was back and as I watched, the bees marched out of the Nuc. box back into the cardboard and I could see they were agitated. I have seen this before and knew what was going to happen and a few moments later they all lifted off and disappeared! I have no idea which way they went or where to.

When a swarm emerges it settles in a quiet place and scout bees go off to find a new home, they return and using wiggle dance show where the possible home is. They say that the bees debate this and communicate and the decision is made and off they go. At that time I could not have stopped them as their mind was made up. Even if I had foundation in the box they may have still gone off. All I had left was a sting on my right shoulder.

Clive

[Rik ShawParticipant @rikshaw]

Not much at all yet, just sitting in conservatory enjoying early morning tea and this lovely sunshine. Will stir myself soon and make it up to the workshop before it gets to hot in there – they reckon its going to be a scorcher today. In the meantime have cut and pasted Clives latest bee post into my email client (wife likes reading your Apoidean posts Clive).

Rik

[Clive HartlandParticipant @clivehartland94829]

Hi Rik, I'm glad my Bee posts are interesting to some people. They are different to what is usually posted.

Even though I have been bee keeping for over 40 years the little gits still teach me something new every day. I carry out what is called, 'Leave alone bee keeping' that is as natural as possible to the way bees live and work. I have seen the bees of people who manipulate them on a daily basis and making them angry and ready to sting at any moment. I can walk about the hives with no bother as they fly back and forth. My beekeeping is purely Philanthropic, as long as I get enough honey to see me through the year with some for the family I am happy enough.

Clive

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

After uploading John's pics, I went out and took some pictures of Mars and Saturn, which are showing beautifully at the moment -easy to spot at dusk, as soon as the sky starts to darken Mars is orange and SSW, Saturn is fainter and SSE at about the same elevation about 15-20 minutes later.

Neil

[StovepipeParticipant @stovepipe]

When I see postings about photographing astronomical items, I'm reminded of the astrophysicist who for 40 years had been thrilled by the sight of them.

"Embraced by the vault of the heavens,

Entranced by the beauty of the stars"

Dennis

[Cornish JackParticipant @cornishjack]

I've just done a 'retake' on those photo's from JS … why?? Something seemed amiss and I couldn't place it. Second time round I realised what it was – NO MESS! Seen quite a few photo's of factories (UK) in the past and NEVER one as clean as in John's pics. Are they all like that over there or have they had a special clean-up for the 'sheriff of Nottingham'?

Rgds

Bill

[Gordon WParticipant @gordonw]

Just got in to my "posh" w/shop, the door was jammed. Looked about and one of the bricks that held up a corner post has disintegrated, Many winters and hard frosts I guess. So need to jack up and repair, tomorrow will do for that. Hope I won't need to re-level the lathe to much. Can't find a tongue in cheek smiley.

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Bill,

No the ones so far have all been clean or cleanish given the nature of the work but in all fairness most of these factories are less than 10 years old.

A lot of bigger companies who can afford to move from large built up areas have took the incentives of cheap land off the government and moved north of Beijing and started off big in size of factory and quality of product because they know they have to.

The sweat shops knocking out the crap stuff is still stuck in the south west but these have been working on low margins for so long they cannot afford to move.

One factory we visited which had workshops covering about 3acres had every roof covered in solar panels. They were that proud of these that the lift stopped at roof level so they could show them off. I'll post some pics to Neil

BTW that machine under Neils caption of a DSG planer is actually a 40 metre slideway grinder

[OuBallieParticipant @ouballie]

Used the pressure washer to blast the cr@p off of the Patio slabs.

After nearly slipping a couple of times this past winter, I realised that it was time.

Have left all the detritus to dry out, so making it easy to sweep up.

The muck that came of was an eye opener, and no wonder it was acting like a skating rink.

Looking so 'new' again.

Bonus points from you know who

Back into the Workshop to continue with my iteration of a Saddle locking mechanism. Just need to weld rod to bolt head and then post some photos.

Dont know about anyone here, but I cannot remember such humidity before.

I've been dripping, BUT, it may well be due to treatment.

Geoff – A cuppa of the stuff Neil doesn't much like, and some DIY Biltong.

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