TOPIC:

Back in the good old D-day, right Jonny? You're quite an engineer I see. You have my respect doing such an awesome job, where do you find all the energy and patience restoring that beautiful tool? I'm looking forward to all those round objects you will be producing later, perhaps even some new model handgun (?), I'd test it for you.

You will also be needing some suction hose to go under the thing, to collect all the debris.

Machinists chest parts taped together to check my maths ... I'll be relying on waxing the sliding surfaces here, this is not really any more than basic crate making here...




Heavier parts for Unimat stage/storage held up by gravity ATM:




Working on the chest drawers (glue & pin construction):




Outer shell of the chest at the back, Unimat drawers left, stage front ... clamps are where the ply has split, despite pre-drilling:

uncletom wrote:

...where do you find all the energy and patience restoring that beautiful tool? ...

I don't have much of either ... I really can't do much on any given day so I do try to make it count ... 8 weeks of doing bits & bobs here and there and relying on other people for the lifting/moving about has been a bit wearing TBH ...

uncletom wrote:

...I'm looking forward to all those round objects you will be producing later, perhaps even some new model handgun (?), I'd test it for you...

No chance of that, regulations here ban all handguns to members of the public, with the exception of long barrelled revolvers (10"+ IIRC) with non-removable braces to make them longer yet. Possesion of "pressure bearing" parts is also illegal, so even making any trigger mechanism part, let alone a barrel or reloading mech part is potentially an issue. Spring, air or CO2 power is ok up to 6ft/lbs, but TBH I've no interest in building my own or even finding out how I could do so.

That said, I did once build a card version of the M-41A Pulse Rifle from Aliens, it would be quite nice to have a slightly more solid and "functional" version - full auto is OK up to 0.2ft/lbs with plastic BBs, so that sort of mechanism built into a styrene shell with some sort of recoil simulator would be a nice project (plus the ability to rack the launcher and cycle fake ammunition through it)... I guess one could get around the "pressure bearing" problem by using aluminium or something similar for the barrel(s)

uncletom wrote:

... ...You will also be needing some suction hose to go under the thing, to collect all the debris.

Honestly I'm thing gravel tray & a brush

oldwilly wrote:

...I like the remote mount on the starting capacitor, very nice bit of bodging I would say...

I wasn't clear why that was necessary - it's upposed to be screwed to the top of the motor & you can see where it's been ... someone can strip/clean/repaint that lathe & make a bench/toolholders but is scared of fitting a thread inserts? (I'm assuming stripped threads?)

Almost complete, stained with various Tamiya acyrlic colours & two coats of sanding sealer ... still needs some rubber feet:




Ditto for the Unimat unit, plus isolating spacers & the lathe on top:

Nice!

Looks good man!
I never considered using Tamiya paints for this but why not, they are excellent quality acrylics, some of the best. Thanks for the idea!

oldwilly wrote:

Looks good man!
I never considered using Tamiya paints for this but why not, they are excellent quality acrylics, some of the best. Thanks for the idea!

They were also heavily thinned: 50:50 for the sky blue, 33.3% paint/66.6% thinner for the blue & green; 25/75 on the Unimat stage, one quick coat brushed on

oldwilly wrote:

Looks good man!
I never considered using Tamiya paints for this but why not, they are excellent quality acrylics, some of the best. Thanks for the idea!

A friend of mine painted his 1:1 82 corvette with tamiya paints and tamiya air brush.

oldwilly wrote:

... I like the look of those machinist's tool chests too but it's the same story of not holding what I want them too and fitting in the allotted space....

I actually saw a Clarke brand machinist chest this morning & it pretty much confirmed my thinking - it looks quite nice but it feels a bit lightweight for the price (c.120 GBP) & though the dividers in some of the drawers would be nice for storing individual cutters, none of the drawers look big enough for my Jacobs tailstock chuck or DTI, let alone putting a whole chuck in ...

I'm quite happy with what I've done, though in hindsight I should have made one of the drawers full width so I could fit files & small hammers in without having to go diagonal. The easiest fix for that (I think) is going to be an additional open tray on top.

oldwilly wrote:

... I took a look at that ebay listing, nice setup and does that answer your headstock taper question?? ...

Yes and no ... obviously now I know it's a 5C fitting, what I don't know is whether I'll ever have a need for work holding in a collet, if so which sizes, and/or whether I need the "nose protector" to help with the clamping on the collet. So a lot more "no"s than "yes"es

I think the way forward will be to get a cheap but useful sized (maybe 1/2"?) single collet & try it out ... If I have to make a nose protector I'd do it in aluminium rather than steel, thinking that 2", 7pi thread would be a nightmare to cut otherwise. 60 to 80 GBP for a used tap really puts me off though...