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**DocsMachine** · 10-06-2024, 11:39 PM

Winter is very nearly upon us, and as today was still relatively warm (high forties, F) I took a few minutes to whip up one of the secondary projects for this machine.

I mentioned before wanting to replace the collet tray that came with it:

The slides, judging from photos of other machines online, are factory, but the wood plate is some shop-made replacement. The factory one, I think, appears to hold 37 collets, and has a selection of smaller holes for things like allen wrenches and turret tooling.

I suspect the original got damaged years ago, and somebody swapped in this one- with fewer holes, which are too tight, and fewer of them. Between the tight holes, the slightly erratic spacing, and the too-thin wood, as well as the limited use of space, I've wanted to replace it since the thing rolled into the shop.

So, to use up one of the last reasonably warm days of the year- since I have to do some of this work outside- I got out a leftover chunk of some sanded cabinet ply I had laying about.

I cut a section the same width but a few inches longer than the old piece, and then did a little playing about with spacings to see how many collets I could jam in there.

Turns out, with a little luck, I was able to fully double the density of the old tray, and fit forty-eight collets in there. These I laboriously cut out with a holesaw- laboriously as I had to stop after each one and pry the waste disc out with a screwdriver.

Using a small-radius roundover bit on the router (the one that came as the spindle for my Shapeoko

) I smoothed up the edges of each hole, as well as the outer edges of the whole sheet. After that, I sanded everything thoroughly with 220 grit and blew it off with compressed air.

And finally- at least, it was all I could do this evening- I have it a quick wipe with some stain, and set it aside to dry.

When it's dry in the next day or two, I'll hit it with a couple coats of rattle-can poly clear. And once that's dry... that's pretty much it. It's done.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 10-09-2024, 03:40 PM

And check off another project on the 'finished' column!

After the stain had had a chance to dry, I hit it with two coats of spray gloss clear polyurethane, and let that dry:

Once that was done, it was a simple matter of bolting it back down, using the same screws I'd used on the original (which I replaced from the old beat-up flathead screws.)

And all that left was giving each of the collets a little cleaning...

And gathering some of the other collets from around the shop, to finally get them all into one location:

The two rows on the left are "factory" sizes, although a bunch of what came with this machine are kind of oddball, as I mentioned, with things like 27/64ths, 13/32", and at least one which was probably originally poorly laser-engraved, and the engraving has since been rubbed off. (And several of them need a deeper cleaning to scrub out the slots and internal threads- I may run some through the ultrasonic cleaner at some point.)

But, for the first time, I now have a small surplus of proper storage. I plan to add to that a bit, as I want a small rack that holds maybe six to eight each, at both the Omniturn and the little Hardinge, and I keep meaning to make one that holds maybe 14-16 at the Logan.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 10-18-2024, 04:55 AM

Finally- finally!- after an entirely-too damn hectic summer, I've finally gotten The List® pared down to the point I can finally start getting back to stuff I was working on months ago. One such was those two baskets of Trracer-Spacers:

For those that care, I have forty in .675" (or should be once anodized) and forty more in .680". (Ditto. They'll at least be within a thou or so.)

I have two other parts to finish up this weekend, and the whole batch, including a few parts some of you have been waiting entirely too patiently for, will finally go out Monday.

After those are off, I have over 200 other parts I need to finish up, and with a little luck, those too can be on their way within a week or so.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 10-20-2024, 09:27 PM

And they're off! The anno package, with parts for ant least three of you-lot's projects, is finally boxed and ready to ship out in the morning.

I have to sincerely apologize to those of you I've kept waiting, and thank you heavily for your patience. As per tradition- and I've actually managed it a few times

- I plan to have my benches completely cleared off by the end of the year. If for any reason you think I may have overlooked you- it's all too possible- by all means feel free to send me another PM or email or smoke signal, or personal, heartfelt message hand-delivered by a large Italian gentleman with a bad suit and a facial scar, with a kneebreaking hammer in his back pocket.

Along with your parts, I also have a just-completed batch of the above-mentioned Trracer-Spacers. Those, with any luck, should be back in time for Black Friday, and of course since you nutballs inspired it, you all get first crack at them.

And, we even have video!

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 10-24-2024, 03:12 AM

Little bit of today's production:

These are a couple more short runs of my "Bull" barrels. I just need to crank out the matching tips in the next day or two, and these too will be ready to head off to anno!

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 10-31-2024, 10:33 PM

Mister Video! No, not Captain Video, this was before he became a commissioned officer. :green:

There were complaints about my videos, that due to the gushing oil, you really couldn't see the actual cutting action. So, I picked up a lightly-used KoolMist sprayer assembly off eBay last week, which sprays a thin mist rather than a stream of liquid, and finally had a chance to try it out.

I was already in the middle of making a run of tips for the next batch of my "Bull" barrels, so here was an ideal time to try it. (Although I did use some scrap material in the video, as I didn't know how well it'd work or if the surface finish would change. The cutting action is the same, though.)

The base just clips to the headstock magnetically...

And the air line just needed a QD and an adapter. I couldn't find my inline regulator, but the mister can take anything from 60 to 120 PSI, and my air system is regulated to 90, so I just ran it straight for now.

The lightly-used kit I got came without the tank, so I needed a way to hold a little clean oil- I didn't want some of the smut in the main sump to clog the sprayer nozzle. Just as a trial unit, I took an old door-catch magnet and a soup can I usually used to sprinkle floor dry (washed out of course) and made a quickie little container.

That rests on the inner frame, and the magnet keeps it from tipping or spilling. At some point I'll come up with a proper tank, but this got me going for the moment- and, the mister will pretty much only be used for video demos rather than day-to-day production, so capacity isn't a real issue.

In this shot, you can just barely see the mist coming out the end of the nozzle.

I haven't played much with the various mixture settings, to start with I was just happy to see that it did, in fact, work with the cutting oil. I'd worried that it might be too thick for the venturi/siphon effect to be able to pull it up the hose.

Also for video clarity, I popped the regular oil lines off, and closed the valves- as well as deleting the pump-on command from the program.

So, without further ado, here's the result!

And while we're at it, I needed a new tool to be able to do that groove. Previously I'd used the parting tool, but that's a big, beefy assembly that takes up a lot of space on the tool slide. I needed something smaller just to groove, rather than part.

Luckily I had a chunk of 5/8" cold-rolled in the bins, and a slotting saw of just the right width:

I tried a much thinner saw to slot it deeper, but it really didn't like that, So I went ahead and drilled and tapped it for the clamping screw...

Cross-drilled it, finished the slot with a hacksaw, fitted it with one of the leftover MGMN200 inserts, and finished it off with a clamping screw out of the bins.

And that, to my entirely feigned surprise, worked perfectly.

That piece, by the way, was simply an accidental test part, as I did a couple cut-and-try cycles to get the tool zero just right. But, that test part kind of actually works.

That is, it lets you screw two classic Freak tips together, nose to nose.

Which, of course, serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever- it's like screwing a pistol to both ends of a silencer. But hey, I don't call myself a mad scientist for nothing!

That tomfoolery aside- hey, I gotta be allowed my fun- after several days of run time, I had a nice batch of the "Bull" tips in two different lengths, as well as a nice small run of what will become more of my Flashpoint tips.

Most of the 'Bull' stuff is already off to the anodizer, and with a little luck, and possibly a hefty bribe, I should be able to get those, above, parts and a few other things sent out by early next week.

Which damn near catches me up to where I was hoping to be... about last June.

Stand by, more in the way.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 11-01-2024, 12:42 AM

What does the setup look like when you finish the OD of these?

-I still do a lot of this stuff manually. I'm still a lot more old-fashioned machinist than I am modern production button-pusher.

(Remember I just rebuilt another old turret lathe.

)

In this case, I do the OD as a final step between centers on the Sheldon:

I've also done it on the Logan, and one of the first batches of these I did last year, I did in the Omni, with a chunk of scrap Freak barrel held in the collet. That usually took a quick grab from the strap wrench to loosen, though, so wasn't much of a time saver.

Doc.

**maggot** · 11-01-2024, 10:53 AM

You're an artist, Doc. Truly amazing talent. Got caught up on this thread today and it's phenomenal.

**DocsMachine** · 11-03-2024, 02:40 AM

One common accessory for both turret lathes and some of the conventional lathes, is a work stop. It's a fixed feature mounted in the spindle, or attached to a collet, etc. that lets you put a part into the machine, and holds it in a repeatable position.

That is, if you have, say, ten parts, and they all need to be faced off to the same length, you set up a stop. The part is put into the collet or chuck, butted up against that stop, so that if you take a cut to the same setting on each one, they all come out to the same dimension.

Things like 5C collets have internal threads, and you can screw an internal stop into it- so each part put into that collet, ends up in the same relative position.

I have a drawerful of such 5C stops (I have five machines that take 5C

) and have fitted both the Sheldon and the Omniturn with adjustable stops that fit in the drawtube. That way I can do longer parts than just what can fit inside the 5C.

Unfortunately, neither of those fit the new Rivett, and I had some nominally-12" pieces to drill and tap, so I had to take a few moments and make a new one.

I found out that, after removing the collet closer (I'll be using the 3-jaw for this) the bore of the end of the spindle was right at 1.500", with a slight step about half an inch in. I found a chunk of 1.5" aluminum round in the bins, pondered it a bit, and proceeded to stab it with spinny blades of death.

I needed two "clamping" features- expanding on one end to hold the bore, and the other contracting, to hold the stop-rod. The expanding part is tricky, but I've done a couple of these now- you use a setscrew, in an incomplete thread made with a taper plug tap. That way, as the setscrew is screwed into the hole, it wedges the parts outward to hold onto the bore.

I found a couple of stubby, coarse-thread 7/16" setscrews that looked like they wanted to join the party, marked off and drilled a couple of appropriate holes, and then ran the tap in 'til the screws were just flush before they started wedging.

I then used a slitting saw to strategically slice the part, so that the screws could actually move the material. The fit to the bore was pretty snug "at rest", so the required wedging movement is minimal.

The only trick being that you have to reach them from the outside- so there are passages drilled from the outer end to allow Allen wrench access, and you turn them counterclockwise, as if unscrewing.

Then, on the outer half, I bored the center to a close running fit to the aluminum rod, cross-drilled it to help allow a tiny but of flex, then drilled, counterbored and tapped it for two pinch bolts.

Et voilá!

She fits like so, and holds quite solidly. The rod can adjust basically the full length of the spindle, allowing parts- using the chuck- of almost two feet long if necessary.

Now, the trick with the rod is that we need a disc on the end, that's close to the diameter of the ID of the spindle. Sometimes parts are hollow, and a plain 1/2" rod wouldn't work. The disc allows it to contact any part, hollow or not, and being close to the bore size, helps keep it from "whipping" when spin fast.

So, I found a thick disc of aluminum in the bins- a core left from a holesaw- and drilled and tapped it to 1/2" coarse. I threaded the end of the stop rod to match, loctited the two together, and using the rod for an arbor, turned it to size and shape.

All that was left was to cut the excess off the rod and install it, set to accept the part I'm working on.

I just need to set the drills and tapping head in the turret, and chances are the actual job will take half as long as it took to make the tool.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 11-03-2024, 10:48 PM

One quick mod to yesterdays part stop; Since I was dealing with a long, thin part, I decided I'd make a second internal rod, this one with a concave coned end. That would help center the far end of the rod, hopefully letting it all run a little truer.

So I rooted through the scrap bin, and found the old shop-made ball handle that came on this lathe's speed control. It's not factory, the original one was typical black phenolic. Either that was broken or lost at some point, or some operator decided they wanted a bigger "shift knob". I swapped it back to a black phenolic ball during my 'rebuild', and dropped this in the bin for eventual reuse.

And, since it was plenty big and already drilled and tapped for 1/2" coarse, that eventual reuse was now.

It was a simple matter to turn it down to a cylinder, and then bore out a rough cone...

Then, just as before, I threaded the end of another chunk of 1/2" round aluminum, screwed the cone on with some loctite, then trued the OD to size, and smoothed up the cone to blend in with the rod.

It fit right into place, of course, and let me set up a center drill, tap drill, and the little releasing head, to make quick work of drilling and tapping two dozen 12" or so rods.

This is the exact part and situation I was concerned with that braking resistor, faulting the VFD when reversing to "unwind" the tap. Thankfully, it worked great; zero problems, zero faults, both the machine and the tapping head worked great.

And, as I predicted, making all the tooling took almost three times longer than it did to actually do the job.

BUT... that tooling made the job easier and the results more consistent, and, of course, I'll have it all ready for the next job.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 11-09-2024, 08:40 PM

The parts that at least three of you have been waiting for! Got the latest box of black anno back from the anodizers earlier this week, and finally had a chance to sit down and finish up the 'spacers. In this case, they of course needed to be laser engraved to mark the sizes. I have a laser, the typical K-40, with some tweaks, but I hadn't used it in a couple of years. So I had to refresh my memory, reload some software, and, y'know, read the f**kin' manual.

The base image- just a few numbers- was easy enough in a typical art program, and that got washed through another program called Inkscape, to scale it and convert it to the format the laser wants. I tested that on a piece of card stock to make sure the size was right- which it was.

I was doing some eighty parts, though, so I wanted a jig or fixture to hold each one repeatably. I was going to machine something, maybe just out of some scrap wood, when a brighter idea prevailed. One of the Starrett V-blocks, a chunk of broken donut magnet as a stop, and a couple chunks of masking tape to keep it from sliding anywhere, and [i[]voila![/i]

I have a power elevation table, so setting the focus with that was easy once the part was in place. I then used one of the unanodized prototypes, with a bit more masking tape, to line up the image. Once I was happy with that, I plunked a proper part in there and stabbed the go-button.

80mm/sec and 20% power (by the digital readout, I didn't look at the analog) bleached the dye nicely, without overtly damaging the anodizing itself.

It did the job admirably on all eighty pieces

The two sizes of part are now clearly and permanently marked, and that, Ladies and Gentlemen, means they're freakin' done!

Gimme a bit and I'll have these posted up in the For Sale section.

Doc.

**XNine** · 11-12-2024, 11:05 PM

This is really cool. I had the fortune of working for CaseLabs years ago (high end PC chassis), and have done IT for a couple of aerospace contractors. The only thing I don't miss is coming home smelling like aluminum, lol. But the tools and the things people make are just so fucking cool!

Thank you for the look inside your lab of mayhem!

**DocsMachine** · 11-13-2024, 04:55 AM

Didn't CaseLabs make a really fancy water-cooled tower called something like The Blade? Knife-motif features at each corner?

Lemme see if I can find a pic- That's the one I was thinking of.

I loved that, because the guy making it was posting a ton of in-progress photos, showing the parts he was milling (CNC and manual) how he was hand-fitting certain parts, etc. and had a ton of cool detail bits like the water conduits, fan mounts and so on.

Haven't read that build in years- I wonder if all the photos are still up, somewhere?

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 12-08-2024, 01:11 AM

Unscrapping a scrap 'Cocker!

I'm going to be doing some fairly extensive milling to a customer's AutoCocker body, and while I think I have the dimensions for this particular fairly complex design.... well, they're a bit cocktail-napkin-y.

So I've been remeasuring, cleaning up the numbers, and putting together a proper set of drawings. I believe I have those nicely sorted out, but I'm a bit of a pragmatist. I wanted to test and 'prove' my numbers before I start slicing away bits of a customer-supplied part.

So I rooted through my dusty old box of... well, more or less "scrap" 'Cocker bodies, for one I could chop up, and not be too concerned about if something went haywire.

In said dusty old box, I found the last few old bodies that I got, literally over twenty years ago, from a production shop that had mismachined them. They were just going to junk 'em, but I picked them up, since I could fix some of the issues and actually use them.

The main issue was the front-block bolt. The bodies were machined to accept 9/16" fine thread- except that's nominally 9/16"-18. The factory 'Cockers use an extra fine- 9/16"-24. The shop offered to make a run of bolts to fit, but the client declined to accept them- and not unreasonably.

The majority of the ones I sold, I cut off the front of the body, into what's called a "Mini" configuration, and rethreaded it to the proper extra fine thread.

Eventually most of them sold, but I saved a few aside to build a few of my own custom guns from, such as this one:

I never got around to using these last few, since they needed more work than the rest, and, well, I had other things to work on.

But it's perfect for this job. If all comes out well, I can actually use the body. If something goes wrong, no great loss. This is what I started with:

Nothing too terribly exciting, but even to just use it as is, would take some work. It's machined to take the old-style pre-2K vertical ASAs, the old-style non-threaded IVG it needs a feed neck pressed in, it takes the wrong front block thread and the old-style valves.

For the moment, though, that big billboard slab side is perfect for the purpose.

We start with a corner-rounding bit and get rid of that nasty lower body angle...

And then mark out a rough idea of what needs to go away.

The bandsaw then makes short work of that, saving quite a bit of milling time.

Two strategically-located holes are drilled...

And then everything in between is milled out into a slot.

The forward edge of the cut is supposed to have a nice, swoopy curve to it, and rather than getting out the rotary table, a mongo RotaBroach slices it out with ease.

You long-time 'Cocker freaks might start recognizing where we're going, 'bout now.

The 'wings' on either side of the breech threads are milled down, leaving a nice curve...

And then trimmed to match.

The lower edges of the pumprod slots get rounded over too...

And then the too-thin metal at the very bottom of what's left of the bolt bore, gets trimmed back.

The same happens at the front, as well as the bolt-pin slot so it can engage the hammer.

The "fangs" at the back of the body get narrowed, just for aesthetics...

And then milled off at an angle. This area will get more hand-sculpting later.

And finally- at least for today- the last of the sight rail boss behind where the feed neck goes, gets trimmed down too, also leaving a bit of a swoop to it.

Wiped down, blown off and lightly deburred, and there you have it:

Near as I can measure, my specs and drawings were spot-on, so I should have no difficulty with applying them to the customer's parts. This particular unit, with not a whole lot more work, can also be finished and used. I'll need to make some of the other pieces- bolt, pin, hammer, etc. - for said customer gun, so I'll probably make them for this body too.

All in all, not a bad way to spend a few hours.

Doc.

**DocsMachine** · 12-09-2024, 01:19 AM

Just a quickie eye patch: Csutomer had a late-model Evolution body that, like so many had been before, at some point got drilled for eyes. The fix is simple but tricky- the simple part is just making a couple aluminum plugs and seating them in the holes, with a dollop of red Loctite.

Things like that, by the way, are the ONLY times you should use red Loctite- on things that will not and are not ever meant to be removed.

The tricky part here is to try and trim them down without damaging the anno. I have no idea if the customer is planning to reanno, but the body is in pretty cherry shape otherwise, so I wasn't about to strip it down.

If the body is stripped, of course, one can file and sand the plugs to be perfectly flush with the surface. If not... well, the best we can do is get really, really close.

Set the body up in the mill, double-checking to be sure it's level, and then kick the mill head over a degree or so, so you don't have to worry about the opposite edge of the endmill possibly catching the surface.

And that's about as close as I dared get- they're only 'proud' by a thou or two.

Inside is not so lucky, since we can't, of course, directly observe the progress. I used a ball-end mill just smaller than the feed bore, and had to kind of "nibble" at it- and once I had the insides of the plugs perfectly flush, I'd shaved a tiny bit of the anno off.

Not visible when in use, of course, and there was really no other way to properly smooth up the inside faces- think of what it'd been like if I tried a Dremel or something.

The best time to do a repair like this, of course, is just before having it reanodized, but this is the next best thing.

Doc.

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