Show us your machining projects.

[kazlx]

Figured I'd start a thread for maching projects.

I broke the bleeder valve off the Ramco 50 ton press I just got. Sooo, just made another one. Made it out of stainless. I think machining stainless on my lathe is one of my favorite things to do. When you get it right, it just peels off and looks beautiful. Need to make a bigger knob out of aluminum though for some leverage.

 

[lilredex]

Made these for my old Dodge truck. When it will no longer start in "park" or the transmission linkage feels it could jump out of "park" it is time for some new (torque shaft) bushings. Most will say....just buy them...but, that's easier said than done around here.

The blanks were cut out with a hole saw, then turned on a 1/2" mandrel (bolt) to size. The slits were cut with a rod saw (blade) in a hack saw. The material was a Nylon looking sheet, donated by a friend.


program for screenshots for windows


photo hosting

 

[NASTYZEN]

How about a little engraving?
Those who ski or snow board in the mountains should know this product.

The setup.
The parts get Anodized first.

Part done.

 

[Ign]

Figured I'd start a thread for maching projects.

I broke the bleeder valve off the Ramco 50 ton press I just got.

Wow, looks just like the two speed box on the HF 50 ton presses. I just sent one of those boxes to the scrap yard, got tired of seeing it lying on the shop floor. Fit a different hydraulic control after the box died.

 

[kazlx]

Wow, looks just like the two speed box on the HF 50 ton presses. I just sent one of those boxes to the scrap yard, got tired of seeing it lying on the shop floor. Fit a different hydraulic control after the box died.

What did you put on? I don't know much about hydraulics and was wondering if I could replace it with something...

 

[kazlx]

Replacement bracket for a table in my dad's RV. The factory one is cast and hollow and cracked.

Dimple die I made. Just CRS.

 

[Mario428]

Motorplates

Rocker arms and stands

Billet 2 pc front cover for an FE

 

[454ragtop]

Various parts made for the ragtop. Alt bracket and highly modified small block pulleys for the 454 FEAD. Brackets to adapt C5 Vette brakes to the Chevelle spindles. Center caps and retainers for the wheels. Love my hobby machine shop.
Jim

 

[Kevin54]

These are some of the tools I made when I worked at the shop. Some is showing some wear as far as stains, but these tools are also close to thirty years old. I always figured, why buy when you can make them cheaper. The angle plate is the very first thing I made back in 1981 when I started, and it has held it's squareness within .0001 in all of those years. The Sine plate was the second tool I made. I actually made two Sine plates and they would bolt together to make a Compound Sine Plate, but a friend that worked in the department needed a Sine Plate, so I gave one to him. The very last thing I made in the shop was two years ago, and it is the wide 5" Sine Bar. Dead nuts on the money. The other pics are just some Vee Blocks, Cylindrical Square, smaller Sine Bars, Angles in 45 degrees and 30-60-90 degrees, then a set of angles from 1 degree thru 4 degrees and then a 5 and 10 degree angle to make a set. I've probably more items but that was just a few pics right off I had in an album.

 

[mrpowderkeg]

I made a quick and dirty vacuum T on my lathe, I was in a hurry, heck the ribs were not even equal in number on each side. It just needed to not come off and hold boost pressure. I love and hate this T now, it doesn't leak and a hose will not come off, but when you need to remove a hose from it, you have to cut the hose off...

 

[NASTYZEN]

I made a quick and dirty vacuum T on my lathe, I was in a hurry, heck the ribs were not even equal in number on each side. It just needed to not come off and hold boost pressure. I love and hate this T now, it doesn't leak and a hose will not come off, but when you need to remove a hose from it, you have to cut the hose off...

Wow. This thread is starting off well. Nice work guys.

How did you weld up the fitting? Looks almost fused.

 

[kazlx]

Made this a while ago just for fun/practice.

 

[mrpowderkeg]

Wow. This thread is starting off well. Nice work guys.

How did you weld up the fitting? Looks almost fused.

I began by drilling each part on the lathe, on the longer part of the T, I made sure to leave enough metal in the middle for welding, and at the end of the short part I did not drill all the way through. Then I welded the two pieces with my tig welder, and then finished drilling the holes with a hand drill

 

[mrpowderkeg]

I made some spacers for adapting 8.8 inch disc brakes to a small bearing late 50s ford 9". The centering hub needed a spacer, as well as the axle bearing because of how the backing plate setup is different from the old drum to the newer disc setup.

I turned these spaces from 1/2 inch plate, I could not find a thick washer to turn down to work, so solid stock had to be machined

The disc for the 8.8 had a larger centering hole so I had to make some spacers for that as well

And just a quick check as to how everything centered up, the rotor is not all the way seated in the pic but it does fit perfectly

 

[nine4gmc]

good stuff, I hope to participate soon!

 

[deere2210]

Subscribed! Great stuff!

 

[rsanter]

about 20 years ago I made this aluminum head to convert a 2hp briggs to OHV
it ran good back when we were using it

View media item 30680View media item 30679View media item 30678View media item 30677
bob

 

[Kevin54]

This isn't mine, although I wish I could take credit for it. This thing is just the shits though. If you can, magnify the picture and look at the detail. It states that it is a Miller Welding project, but I don't know whether it is a collaboration of all of the students, or one individual. I've worked on projects at work that took awhile to finish. Heck, to me a month seems like a long time. But something like this had to take a few years to do. If anyone know anything about it, please post it up. I was going to start another separate thread but since this is machining projects, I figured I'd toss it in here. Look at it close as there are a lot of people standing in it. A welder or two, Oxy/Acet outfit, and Lord knows what everything else is.

 

[Kevin54]

Now these are my projects. The first one is a pair of Rotor Hats. One set for a member on here and another set for a friend of his. 7075 aluminum, which I really like the machining properties of.

This is just one of the many reflectors that we made at work. I made the tooling, then had to prove out the reflector. This ine hasn't been chem polished or anodized yet

This is another reflector prototype that I made. When it went into production it was made of of a cast aluminum. That was one good thing about working in the Toolroom and Model Shop......we got to work on the parts first.

This was some stainless steel latches I made for some light on a Boeing aircraft.

This is a quick adjusting riser block. You pull the "C" clip out, slide the inner part up or down, slip the "C" clip back in, then the screw adjustment is on top

This is an aluminum handle, or the start of an aluminum handle. It goes on a searchlight for a helicopter. The handle eventually gets knurled and welded on. If anyone has ever bent aluminum tubing in a bender, you will know that the pipe will deform some in the bend and become egg shaped. This pipe had to maintain it roundness within .005 throughout the length of the tube. This tube has already been cut to length on the short end. When I made the tooling, then formed the tube, the tube was within .002 throughout the entire length. How I did it was by using two blocks of O-1 Tool steel. In each half of the blocks, I made a groove through the blocks at .500 deep x .500 radius. The tube diameter is 1.000". The two halves were doweled together and clamped. Using some grease for lubrication purposes, I then use a hydraulic press and pushed the tube down through the blocks. The size of the grooves through the block kept the diameter of the tube in check, and the result was a wrinkle free, non egg-shaped tube, bent at the correct angle each and every time.

The last picture, you guys can take a guess on it. Every single surface is machined on a compound angle. The tolerances on the part were +/-.002 everywhere, and is dead nuts on.

I've made so many precision tools for work as I showed above in my previous post, such as the angle plates, Sine plates, vises, and so on. I've made thousands of rivet punches for Universal head rivets. My wife has some of those still. Then a lot of smaller personal tools like boring bars, fly cutters, saw arbors, vise stops, and the list goes on and on. Eventually, I hope to get some equipment for home so that I can make a few things when I feel up to it. I got a lead on a 2 axis CNC mill, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed on that.

 

[Graham08]

Here is one of my most recent projects, a set of steering arms for a supermodified.

Starting block of 6061, and after the 1st vise setup:



2nd vise setup, radiusing the top of the mounting lugs:



After the 2nd vise setup, with mounting lugs and the tie rod hole:






After two rotary table setups to get the final shape:







Installed on the spindle:



I also made the caliper brackets for this, but that wasn't nearly as involved.

 

[383 240z]

Kevin, What was the application for those rotor hats? Looks similar to a project on my to-do list. Keith

 

[NASTYZEN]

A bit of a brass bushing run. I make around 7000 of these every 6 weeks.
On my cnc lathe of course.

 

[Graham08]

A bit of a brass bushing run. I make around 7000 of these every 6 weeks.
On my cnc lathe of course.

Yeah, that's a few bushings alright. You mean you don't have some kid running a turret lathe?

 

[pepi]

Man I'm liking the front end parts, they are alum? Not knocking just asking, the Heim joint. It may be the picture and unable see the true scale, but they look thin. For a part that takes a good whack and substantial stress on occasions. SMs are prone to some crazy race action, the grade 8 hardware will handle it.

 

[kazlx]

Here is one of my most recent projects, a set of steering arms for a supermodified.

2nd vise setup, radiusing the top of the mounting lugs:

Badass. How did you radius the lugs in this pic?

 

[Kevin54]

Kevin, What was the application for those rotor hats? Looks similar to a project on my to-do list. Keith

You need to ask Fastkat that is a member on the site. He can explain it way better than I can. I understand them sorta, but I haven't seen them mounted up, so not really sure.

Fastkat will explain it all to you.

 

[Graham08]

Badass. How did you radius the lugs in this pic?

Thanks.

One name for it is "Kellering"...basically take a number of steps over and down using a ball end mill to approximate the radius. Then clean up with a file. It's basically the same way a CNC would cut this sort of a profile without a 4th or 5th axis.

Here's a link to Tom Lipton's blog. He explains it much better.

http://oxtool.blogspot.com/2013/04/pot-metal-prosthetic.html

 

[kazlx]

You use a DRO or no? I need to learn that. I'm still pretty fresh with the mill.

 

[Graham08]

Man I'm liking the front end parts, they are alum? Not knocking just asking, the Heim joint. It may be the picture and unable see the true scale, but they look thin. For a part that takes a good whack and substantial stress on occasions. SMs are prone to some crazy race action, the grade 8 hardware will handle it.

Thanks. The Heim joints are 1/2" x 5/8", alloy steel, so they're pretty beefy. Generally these don't break without hitting something pretty solid.

 

[Graham08]

You use a DRO or no? I need to learn that. I'm still pretty fresh with the mill.

I don't have a DRO. It would probably be easier with one, but it's not necessary.

 

[Kevin54]

You use a DRO or no? I need to learn that. I'm still pretty fresh with the mill.

You don't necessarily HAVE to use a ballnose end mill. If you have never done that before, and if you have a compass, scribe out your radius and using a standard flat bottom end mill, cut to the radius in increments. This is the way we used to make balls in a lathe for punches. It's easiest if you pick either the "Z" axis, or the "X" axis to use a common movement. For example.....You have a 2" block and want to put a 1" radius on the upper L.H. corner. Start with your end mill set at "Z" zero at the top of your part. Using only the "Z" axis raise the table in .050 increments, while you move your cutter into the scribed radius line in the "X" dimension.

If you are good with math you can figure up your points along the "X" axis radius at different intervals. Other than that, if you have good eyes, cut to the scribed line. Once you have your cuts made, you will now have steps. Then take a large sharpie and color in the ledges that you have cut into the part. You start filing until the black lines disappear. If you would like, I could go into a little more detail. The blue vertical lines showing, would be the edge of your end mill. If you can visualize it on the sketch, you can see the small triangles that would be left standing proud. Once you start filing it down, you will see how that everything that is covered with the sharpie is making lines smaller and smaller. Once you get down to where the lines are about the thickness of a hair, you cab really see where you need to file harder or not file as hard. We made punches in the lathe like that also. Although if doing a round piece in a lathe, or an odd radius, you need both coordinates, "X" & "Z". We've made some real close precision parts using this method.

In a mill, and even in a lathe, the reason that you want to use one standard coordinate is so you don't lose yourself where you're at in cutting the part. If you have a simple CAD program (I use DeltaCad), you can pick both coordinates and cut to those. The smaller the standard coordinate, the less filing, but also the more cutting. By smaller, I mean using a standard coordinate like .025 in lieu of .050.

 

[Graham08]

You don't necessarily HAVE to use a ballnose end mill.

Right. I think the ball mill makes for a little less filing in the end.

In my case, my step in y was 1/16" until I got toward the edge of the part and the depth of cut got pretty deep. When that happened, I reduced the step to 1/32". Had I been thinking I would have used 0.050" and 0.025" because they're nice round numbers on the dials.

This was my first stab at this, so there are definitely some things I would do differently in the future.

 

[A_Pmech]

A bit of a brass bushing run. I make around 7000 of these every 6 weeks.
On my cnc lathe of course.

You need to set up a Brownie in the back corner for that!

 

[Kevin54]

Right. I think the ball mill makes for a little less filing in the end.

In my case, my step in y was 1/16" until I got toward the edge of the part and the depth of cut got pretty deep. When that happened, I reduced the step to 1/32". Had I been thinking I would have used 0.050" and 0.025" because they're nice round numbers on the dials.

This was my first stab at this, so there are definitely some things I would do differently in the future.

That's true, it does make for less filing. In my case though, we had to have punches within .005, so with the way the Engineers would give us the "X" / "Y" coordinates, we had to use a sharp tool to cut the parts. That way, we would have a very sharp crisp line when we were close. If we used a ball nose end mill, there would have been way too much calculating because the center of the radius changes in every "X" or "Z" move. That's one nice thing about CNC's with the "Z" axis computer controlled. If you have the right program, it automatically figures in the compensation for using a ball nose.

 

[FastKat]

Those are a set of rotor hats for a Jaguar rear suspension with inboard brakes. I have some pictures - I'll let them do the explaining!

The original setup had solid rear rotors, which suffered from heat-related problems. I had a set of custom vented rotors made and used the hats to mount them to the stub axles. This setup runs cooler. The parts came out great - thanks Kevin! There were a few little things I forgot to put in the drawing, but it's all together now and I couldn't be happier.

You need to ask Fastkat that is a member on the site. He can explain it way better than I can. I understand them sorta, but I haven't seen them mounted up, so not really sure.

Fastkat will explain it all to you.

 

[Hafen_Kafer]

What material did you use? I want to make some but I don't know what material to use. Yours look cool

 

[Kevin54]

What material did you use? I want to make some but I don't know what material to use. Yours look cool

If you are talking about the Rotor Hats, those were or are 7075 aluminum.

 

[Gary Anderson]

Some of the things my oldest son does, gun barrel vise, controller for his trailer, Stanley Cup Championship Ring.
He does the World Series and Super Bowl ones too.
He does the ring stuff at his work.
That is him in the avatar, working in my garage.

Your Pal, Gary

 

[KMScott]

Just finished this custom pipe cutter. I was asked to design and build this cutter to cut the aluminum tubing used in copier machines that transfers the image to paper. They were cutting samples with a band saw and the heat was melting the coating. That is why they wanted this pipe cutter. Built this in my home shop. I do not own a lathe and have to rent one but having a surface grinder and a CNC goes far along with a Suburban Tool Master spin fixture for grinding in the special arbors used to support the tubing. I paid a CNC lathe guy to build the H-13 cutters.

I am teaching my son this dying trade and he is really enjoying building another fixture not as complicated as this one. My day job I work as a internet marketer and this is what I do at nights.

Kevin

 

[bobadame]

Really nice work there Kevin. That's a beautiful piece and cool that your teaching your son.