What Did You Do Today 2025

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Removed

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Coda to previous…

I subsequently realised an alternative way to make a banjo union (or Tee-piece or valve) body:

Ssilver-braze the blank spigot right through the body, having centre-drilled both of its ends. Cut the thread between-centres, with a rod through a pilot hole in the body as dog.

Bore through, trim the “back” to match the body.

I set this down as a drawing, discovering in the process how to edit an existing Alibre file under a new name, to keep the title etc.

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Completed the body of the banjo connection for the pressure-gauge, as drawn a few posts back, from round bronze bar.

I was surprised when I totted it up, how many separate operations / methods such an apparently simple, small part takes:

Turning including Screw-cutting and making a simple mandrel to hold it for:

Milling using a Dividing-head, Boring and Facing Head, and Rotary Table fitted with simple block drilled to act as a retainer.

Took it to the club this evening to test for fit on the locomotive – small modification to the bolt needed.

 

Then joined the rest of the crew for a Stationary Engine evening, the models including a Southworth Pump, and an Edwardian style Steam Launch.

The boat, of about 18 or so inches length and propelled by a Vee-twin oscillating engine with reversing valve, is fitted with two separate radio systems. One is the normal throttle and rudder controller. The other transmits signals from boilder temperature and water-level transducers, the latter being simple resistance probes giving high, middle and low levels. This system also monitors the main battery charge.

[DalboyParticipant @dalboy]

Got back onto the cylinders of the Rob Roy as I stuffed up some measurements on the first set.

Put in the mill vice and all I have achieved is to rough out some surfaces so that I have some reference flats to work from. They are still oversize at this stage but have got one squared up ready for some serious milling. I have used a small bit and light cuts as I am holding them on rough castings to start with, which you can see by the one in the vice.

At least I will have some nice clean surfaces to work from and get a decent grip on so I can use a fly cutter for a better finish

[Ian HewsonParticipant @ianhewson99641]

Hi Dalboy

Just wondering, did you get your Farmboy running?

Ian

[Ian Hewson]

On Ian Hewson Said:

Hi Dalboy

Just wondering, did you get your Farmboy running?

Ian

Not yet I must bet around to it as everything is in place. I do need a good day as I will run this outside for the first few runs

[Ian HewsonParticipant @ianhewson99641]

Hope it goes well, I found they can be a bit sensitive on the. Needle valve, but once the right setting is found and the engine run in the. Will fire up on the first flick.

I did find that changing the o ring on the piston after the first few runs was a big help.

mine runs on ethanol, run it in the shed with the door open.

Ian

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

More what I didn’t do. Tring to make some pins 3/8 long, 1/16 dia with a 12 ba thread 1/8 long on the end. Much to my surprise I can reliably turn the end down to 1.28 mm diameter, but getting a thread on is defeating me. I’ve got a sliding die holder, suspect the die.

They are or the 24hr wheel of a master clock bell ringer, so the plan was to make 20 off (I’ve got 4) so that one would pass every hour. Change of plan, I’ll use 2 of the ones I’ve got at 1:00 and 13:00 to synch the bell ringer to the clock, then count one second pulses in between. Currently I synch it with a push button on the stroke of 1, which is OK but very occasionally the cooker hub igniter sends out enough airborne spikes to derange it.

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, not what I did, but what I got delivered today, I’ve a feeling the packaging was a bit OTT. So much for the adverts saying they are reducing their amount of packaging.

Regards Nick.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

They have, normally you would have got it in a box about 1ft cubed!!

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

I went old shcool today and broke out the vertical slide just to illustrate that a mill is not needed for my V-Twin build. The small rear bearing block was all done on the vertical slide and seems to have gone together OK and a nice fit on some silversteel.

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi JasonB, ah! yes, they probably cut one of those big boxes across the one corner to the opposite one, and folded the sides down to make two big envelops. Silly me, not thinking of that in the first place.

Regards Nick.

[cedric 1Participant @cedric]

A bit of fun today trepanning two 100mm diameter aluminium discs to make a Jan Ridders coffee cup Stirling engine. It’s like parting off, but on a curve, so can be a bit nerve-racking, even in aluminium which can be a bit “sticky ” . WD40 to the rescue, once again. Plus moving the tool to one side to create a bit of extra clearance ad things progress.

All a lot of fun on a lathe (ML7) as ancient as I am.

[cedric 1Participant @cedric]

1. 

A bit more progress on the coffee cup Stirling engine. A piece of brass bar-end from the scrap box turned into the power cylinder with fins and all. Drilled, bored and reamed to 13mm ready for a graphite piston.

I hate tapping those little 2mm threads with my heavy machinery fitter’s hands. Always nerve racking. So I modified Jan Ridders’ design so the 6 stainless spacers are drilled 2.5mm right through with one long screw and a nut through each, instead of tapped 2mm both ends to hold two short screws each. Came up looking okay I think.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Have you noticed today that even the BBC are pronouncing storm Claudia as Cloudier. Don’t know anyone of that name that would appreciate being referred to like that, or is it deliberately to avoid people of that name being associated with the damage from the storm? Perhaps someone threatened to sue them for defamation.

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Got a hydraulic test on a boiler today. Unlike the usual performance I had plugged all the holes and given it a preliminary test at 1* pressure to make sure no plugs leaked. Even took it to club full of water, so connect to certified gauge/pump, 4 strokes of pump with a couple of minutes between, then wait for a bit and its all hunky dory. A good day!

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

Finally got the valve gear (to my own design) assembled on one of my engines:

Initial tests indicate that all works as intended and that in the forward direction the steam lead varies from around 2 thou at 80% cutoff to 25 thou at 20% cutoff, as designed. Steam lead is also symmetric at each end of the slide valve stroke. So it seems that the equation given by Ashton to slightly lengthen the eccentric rods for equality of steam lead works. The extra length needed on my 12″ long eccentric rods was 3.9 thou.

Julie

[Bazyle]

On Bazyle Said:

Have you noticed today that even the BBC are pronouncing storm Claudia as Cloudier. Don’t know anyone of that name that would appreciate being referred to like that […]

Perhaps you move in the wrong circles [?]
.

 

[Michael Gilligan]

On Michael Gilligan Said:

On Bazyle Said:

Have you noticed today that even the BBC are pronouncing storm Claudia as Cloudier. Don’t know anyone of that name that would appreciate being referred to like that […]

Perhaps you move in the wrong circles [?]

When I started grammar school aged 11, my Latin Master would have given you a whack around the head with his copy of “De Bello Gallico” if you had pronounced it any other way than “Cloudier”.  But then that was 67 years ago, when corporal punishment was positively encouraged!

As a result, I tend to move in concentric circles these days.

John

 

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Foreigners don’t count. Radio 4 10pm news last night got it right so someone else must have been complaining.

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

A nation that can pronounce Featherstonehaugh as Fanshaw should comment on foreigners pronunciation of names

[duncan webster 1]

On duncan webster 1 Said:

A nation that can pronounce Featherstonehaugh as Fanshaw should comment on foreigners pronunciation of names

Quite agree, as the storm was actually named by the Spanish Met Service who are we change their pronunciation.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Just filled in a survey from the Office for National Statistics as my civic duty and I’ll get a £10 voucher. Interestingly my next Google search was totally distorted (and wrong) by a piece of information I had given in that survey and not used in any other computer interaction for years. It implies that the survey forms text entry was saved and readable after the event by some part of the google search process.
Should I be paranoid?

[John Hinkley]

On John Hinkley Said:

On Michael Gilligan Said:

On Bazyle Said:

Have you noticed today that even the BBC are pronouncing storm Claudia as Cloudier. Don’t know anyone of that name that would appreciate being referred to like that […]

Perhaps you move in the wrong circles [?]

When I started grammar school aged 11, my Latin Master would have given you a whack around the head with his copy of “De Bello Gallico” if you had pronounced it any other way than “Cloudier”.  But then that was 67 years ago, when corporal punishment was positively encouraged!

As a result, I tend to move in concentric circles these days.

John

 

To go completely off topic, when many years ago we were given a whole term’s homework to translate Caesars Gallic Wars from Latin to English, my scores went through the roof. How? Go to the public library and get an English translation, then just swap the English around a bit. I do consider the three years I spent learning Latin to have been totally wasted, you don’t meet that many ancient Romans walking the streets of Cheshire.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

I and many people I have met are really glad to have learned Latin as it shows the roots of many English words. I wish I had learned Greek too. But not the pronunciation. We have English pronunciations of many words that may not align with those of other countries. A critical example is the famous character Don Quixote. The English pronunciation links to ‘quixotic’ not to ‘chaotic’ for a reason.

[Author]

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