What Did You Do Today 2019

[Mark RandParticipant @markrand96270]

Posted by Robert Hurst 1 on 12/01/2019 17:53:11:

Spent the afternoon pottering about, did a bit more welding on the frame for the 47, sharpened a couple of drills and made a new head for my Thor hammer. Didn't have a suitable lump of copper, so wound one out of some earth strap.

Like a metallic version of the rawhide head .

[Jeff DaymanParticipant @jeffdayman43397]

Made me want to get a Chelsea bun!

[brickyParticipant @bricky]

Made a needle valve for a small carb,wanting it to be concentric with the 20deg inclusive angle which I ground with my toolpost grinder and then turned the needle down from .125" to .055"with a razor sharp eccentric tool this took a while with a depth of cut at 3000" and backed the tool out to take out the spring.This was buttock clenching and on completion I had a tot of rum.

A good new year to you all and thanks again to all the help I have received from members of the forum.

Frank

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

I'm not sure this is quite tea room relevant, but I was looking at gear cutters on eBay today. It was one of my 'Christmas list' items that didn't quite make the stocking.

I have no particular project for gear cutters, but feel certain that I need some!

The reason I think this worth a post is that my search turned up this item on eBay which purports to offer a 1 – 8 set for £12.80 including postage. As the next cheapest is about £37.00 I expect this is a bad entry, but felt it couldn't be ignored! So i've shelled out my £12.80 and hope that it comes through.

You will no doubt sneer at the quality of Hong Kong exports, but to be perfectly honest, that would be reasonable value if I just use them as coasters!

Iain

[Douglas JohnstonParticipant @douglasjohnston98463]

Iain, you have just cost me £12.80. I just could not stop my finger pressing the buy button for the set of cutters. Like you I do not have an immediate plan for them but have wanted to try gearcutting for years but never got round to it. At that price there is very little to lose and perhaps a lot to gain, so hears hoping they are at least usable.

Doug

Edited By Douglas Johnston on 13/01/2019 18:44:42

[Anonymous]

It'll be interesting to see how they perform. Also interesting to note that the pressure angle is 20 degrees, a lot of the far east cutters are 14.5 degrees. They seem to be missing depth of cut information, so some experimentation may be needed. One thing we can say for sure is that whoever was operating the engraving machine was imitating a newt.

Andrew

Edited By Andrew Johnston on 13/01/2019 18:52:32

[Philip RoweParticipant @philiprowe13116]

Finished fitting a tachometer to my Super7.

Interestingly the instructions state that the sensor will operate up to 10mm away from the magnet but in my case I had to close the gap to around 2 to 3mm before it would work.

Then mounted the display into an ABS project box which I'm also utilizing to mount the displays for my poor man's dros. To initially test the system I simply powered it with a 9volt battery (PP3) but I realise that the battery life would be a bit of a limitation so rummaged around in various places and found an old 12volt wall mounted power unit which is what is powering it in the photo. I did briefly consider powering the dro displays in a similar way but so far these have working for nearly three years on the original set of coin cells so I don't think I'll bother. I'm sure some of the purists on this site will wonder why I bothered but with a VFD driving the lathe motor it is difficult to to assess what the spindle speed is and anyway for around £8 it turned into an interesting project for a few afternoons.

Phil

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Phil, Do you know if the tacho also provides an output pulse that can be used by something else? Perhaps the sensitivity was specified for a magnet flat on and would improve with the sensor facing the magnet, not that it matters now it is working.

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

I have a nice note from the vendor of the £12.80 gear cutting set explaining that the batch they got in was poor quality (yeah, right). They offered no options, so I asked when they would get a good batch in….

You never know – I might just get something if I keep on. At least a refund…

[Ian ParkinParticipant @ianparkin39383]

Iain

They made a mistake on the listing for the sets and cancelled the listing relisted now with proper price for the sets

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

The next note tells me that they don't expect to get a replacement from the manufacturer and they have finally suggested a refund.Of course I've said yes….

Well, the outcome (nothing) was what I expected, but still worth a try..

Iain

[Ian PParticipant @ianp]

Posted by Bazyle on 14/01/2019 17:28:18:

Phil, Do you know if the tacho also provides an output pulse that can be used by something else? Perhaps the sensitivity was specified for a magnet flat on and would improve with the sensor facing the magnet, not that it matters now it is working.

I second the magnet orientation reducing the operating distance but as Bazyle says it working, so just leave it alone.

As installed the magnet is presenting the N & S poles equally to the sensor face so possibly have a cancelling out effect. There are lots of different sensor types and some which have an internal magnet might be upset with a moving magnet.

Ian P

[Douglas JohnstonParticipant @douglasjohnston98463]

Posted by Iain Downs on 14/01/2019 20:52:34:

I have a nice note from the vendor of the £12.80 gear cutting set explaining that the batch they got in was poor quality (yeah, right). They offered no options, so I asked when they would get a good batch in….

You never know – I might just get something if I keep on. At least a refund…

Just read my message from the vendor saying the same thing, might have known it was too good to be true. As an aside I saw and bought an item from Amazon a couple of weeks ago that was listed at £3.99 when it should have been £39.99. I fully expected to get a message saying the listing was wrong, but to my delight the item arrived a few days later and I only paid the £3.99.

Doug

[Philip RoweParticipant @philiprowe13116]

Posted by Bazyle on 14/01/2019 17:28:18:

Phil, Do you know if the tacho also provides an output pulse that can be used by something else? Perhaps the sensitivity was specified for a magnet flat on and would improve with the sensor facing the magnet, not that it matters now it is working.

Bazyle, there is an unused lead on the display but whether this is an input or output I have no idea, the Chinese data sheet that came with it tells me little except to confuse!! Also you are correct about the magnet, I have since tried the sensor at a right angle to the way it is shown in my photo and the sensitivity does in fact exceed the 10mm specified but as you say it hardly matters now as it is working.

Phil

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Douglas Johnston on 13/01/2019 18:43:27:

Iain, you have just cost me £12.80. I just could not stop my finger pressing the buy button for the set of cutters. Like you I do not have an immediate plan for them but have wanted to try gearcutting for years but never got round to it. At that price there is very little to lose and perhaps a lot to gain, so hears hoping they are at least usable.

Doug

Edited By Douglas Johnston on 13/01/2019 18:44:42

Looks like you are out of luck:

This listing was ended by the seller because there was an error in the listing.

N.

[Paul KempParticipant @paulkemp46892]

Posted by Douglas Johnston on 15/01/2019 09:14:42:

Posted by Iain Downs on 14/01/2019 20:52:34:

I have a nice note from the vendor of the £12.80 gear cutting set explaining that the batch they got in was poor quality (yeah, right). They offered no options, so I asked when they would get a good batch in….

You never know – I might just get something if I keep on. At least a refund…

Just read my message from the vendor saying the same thing, might have known it was too good to be true. As an aside I saw and bought an item from Amazon a couple of weeks ago that was listed at £3.99 when it should have been £39.99. I fully expected to get a message saying the listing was wrong, but to my delight the item arrived a few days later and I only paid the £3.99.

Doug

Hmmm, this rings a bell! When I got my mill I wanted to get it up and running, was on a tight budget, so looked to China for VFD's. I found one supplier on the rainforest marketing site that was offering what I needed for just over £20ea!! So I ordered two which including shipping came to around £48! I didn't expect the transaction to go through as the gear cutters but got order acknowledgement and then notification of shipping. Eight weeks later I noticed the tracking said they had been delivered! Checking they were apparently at the mail reception centre in Southampton! Vendor then advised they had been damaged in shipping and were being returned to them and offered a refund. I refused a refund and requested they send replacements, they said they couldn't send replacements until the originals were recieved back and after a bit of bouncing around they refunded the money anyway and refused to respond to any further contact. Luckily I have a friend who does a fair bit of business with China and he passed me a local contact to whom I explained the situation and copied the correspondence. He found the company and contacted them and apparently their MD was very rude to him, he got annoyed and referred them to the Chinese equivalent of trading standards, 3 weeks later I got my VFD's with a grovelling apology FOC! Real result. Not a normally achievable resolution but very pleasing, subsequently the supplier has contacted offering to supply a coat rack, shoes and other stuff FOC in return for a positive review! I have been waiting for the triads to knock on the door ever since!

Paul.

[Douglas JohnstonParticipant @douglasjohnston98463]

Got my refund for the gear cutters but was not impressed with the reason the vendor gave ebay for ending the sale. Apparently it was my fault for not wanting the item. What a cheek!

Doug

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Douglas Johnston on 16/01/2019 21:13:32:

Got my refund for the gear cutters but was not impressed with the reason the vendor gave ebay for ending the sale. Apparently it was my fault for not wanting the item. What a cheek!

Doug

Give them suitable feedback.

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

I'm fitting a new body to a guitar I 'made' in 1993 using a neck I found in a skip and various Frankenstein bits and bobs. My plywood bod weighed a ton, so I ordered a pre-shaped one. Its very light and the wood is a 'soft hardwood' after getting the dents out (it fell off a stool) with eth damp tissue and iron technique, I gave it several coats of dilute PVA to toughen it up a bit.

Tonight I've been airbrushing it with dilute caligraphy ink in an attempt to create a blue sunburst. This has highlighted a filled non-porous area that's in an annoyingly visible spot. I've painted it with neat ink and tried to blend it in. I think a third spray session will be needed, it won't be too bad for an amateur attempt!

Some minor trimming of the woodwork still to be done to make room for a Floyd Rose (copy) bridge and allow for the neck being Gibson scale length despite being strat shaped…

Then I will give it several coats of hard polyurethane varnish (I know it should be nitrocellulose, but this is a hack not a work of art) and wait for the scratchplate material to come.

Neil

[Ian HewsonParticipant @ianhewson99641]

Neil, you should be an archer with all the strings you have for your bow🤗

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

My own attempt at a stringed instrument was an electric bass guitar built in metalwork (and woodwork) at school.

Unlike Neil's it was pretty shit. the neck was a piece of square steel tube with quadrant glued either side of it and the body made up of bits of wood with a plywood top.

It did work, though.

The only real value it has in my history is that the frets were spaced according to the first useful computer program I ever wrote, running on the York University Computer (which was near the school).

Which appears to have set the stage for the rest of my career!

Iain

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Iain Downs on 17/01/2019 07:09:02:

Unlike Neil's…

I doubt it

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Just for entertainment, this is it with its old body. At least this will give Jason an opportunity to take the p*** again

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

There is no aspect of that instrument which is not 1,000,000 than on mine.

Mind you, then there's the player…

Most likely you can probably actually play the instrument whereas I…..

Iain

[brickyParticipant @bricky]

Finished making the carb, for the Brian Rupnow Rockerblock i/c engine.Just the fuel tank to make and set the cams and the ignition system.

Frank

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