SHED MATTERS 2

[Stanley]

Despite promising myself I'd take it easy today after all the exercise yesterday and also the fact that I didn't do my finger any favours, it has been aching.... I was in the shed by 07:00. The pile of cutters is shrinking and my first instinct was to get straight into grinding, but then I remembered something....



Down at the side of the grinder is where one of my non ferocious treasure boxes lives together with the brass ends and underneath it was a box with odd pieces of stock in it but when I took everything out to move the grinder I realised that there was another box underneath with useful pieces of larger stock in it that I had forgotten. So first thing this morning I sorted out the two boxes and made them more accessible. Well worth doing!



But then I cracked on with the cutters. I'll not bore you with lots of pics but here's one cutter that caught my attention. I think it's lived in a puddle for a long time! But it's still a good piece of HSS so I treated it the same as the others. When I tested it it cut beautifully, well worth the effort!



The reason why this pic is here is that this 4" X 1/32" slitting saw was, on first viewing, a lost cause. It hardly had any teeth left. But a saw this thin would be very useful for slitting bearings so I decided that it was worth the challenge. It wasn't easy but the results were fine, this may be it's last incarnation but it's a useful cutter. Here it is doing a good job....



Here's where I ended up, about eight cutters rescued and the next one ready for shaving. In case you're wondering, the motor got hot this morning but that's usual, it's rated as continuous but these Hoover motors run quite warm and need watching. I think the oil has got into the bearings now, no squeal at all and running quieter that it did. I think I may have got away with it! A good morning....we're making progress!

[chinatyke]

Down at the side of the grinder is where one of my non ferocious treasure boxes lives together with the brass ends and underneath it was a box with odd pieces of stock in it but when I took everything out to move the grinder I realised that there was another box underneath with useful pieces of larger stock in it that I had forgotten. So first thing this morning I sorted out the two boxes and made them more accessible. Well worth doing!

Another rabbit pulled out of the magicians hat!

[Stanley]

No end to them China, that's what comes of being a pack rat!
I was in the shed early and knocked of the remaining few 4" cutters in quick time, all except one were the same set up. The last one was a bit of a problem. It started life as a special cutter and I had to grind off a tooth extension by hand and go round it twice before I got it to cut.



Here's where I was at about 08:30, time to get on to the 5" cutters! I discovered that the two 6" cutters ate the bottom were for a 7/8" mandrel so I scrapped them. I didn't fancy them anyway, too many teeth!



Here's the first in the grinder, an entirely different setup and I had to alter the tooth rest again by extending the fixing hole. Then I ground and tested it and it was fine. I have just remembered a tip I was going to give you, something I have learned in the last few days. When you have a set-up and are adjusting the depth of the grind, start with one tooth and then rotate the cutter 180 degrees and see if the opposite side is the same depth and make any adjustments that are necessary. Nothing worse than getting half way round and finding you need more depth.



By 09:30 I had got to this stage, just three 5" cutters to do and the slabbing cutters which of course will need an entirely different set up as I shall have to go into spiral milling. We'll get to that.
Now for the give away. I have ten good big cutters for an inch and a quarter mandrel. New one would cost a fortune and they are all good ones with plenty of life in them. If anyone can find a home for them get in touch, email below, they are up for grabs. Otherwise they get scrapped!

[Stanley]

The last three 5" cutters were the most challenging but I persevered and sharpened them all and tested them. Bad to set up but worth it in the end.



Here's the result, a box full of good sharp cutters. Well worth all the effort. I think I originally paid £600 for the grinder and if you reckon up what it would cost to buy these cutters I reckon it's earned its corn. Now we can play out......



Something entirely different, spiral grinding. Different set up and that took a bit of time, getting properly geared up. As things turned out this slabbing cutter needed a lot of meat taking out of it to get the angle.



Here it is after three heavy passes which have warmed it up considerably so this was a good place to stop so it can cool down. Tomorrow I'll check the angle again. If I have it right all it needs now is a light final cut to get the actual cutting edge. We'll see, if not, another full pass to take more meat off it. It will cut OK when I've finished!

[Stanley]

I tested the slabbing cutter but I hadn't got it quite right so I put it back in the grinder and altered the setting a touch to grind a more aggressive primary angle on it.



Then I tested it again and got good chips. Much better!



This is the last cutter, a smaller slabbing mill. I ground it on exactly the same setting as the 3" cutter and it cut fine!



Now for something entirely different. These end mills all have centre holes at each end so I can sharpen the flutes and make them into good side cutters. At the moment they are all dull.



Here's the set up. A bit of a fiddle getting them right but in the end I got there.



Only one way to test them and it was useless! I started again after a rethink. The problem is they are a different angle than horizontal mill cutters. In the end I realised that the angle was OK all I had to do was take a more adventurous grind!



That did the trick! Good splinter like chips flying off and a cool cutter. I did the other end mills and tested them all and decided that was enough for this morning. I shall have a good clean up and putting away session tomorrow. I can stop grinding for a while now!

[Stanley]

There will be no shed today Kids. Cooking and washing will be enough for me. I had a big shock yesterday, found my credit card had been scammed over Xmas. A horrible violation of my world! So I am looking after myself....

[Stanley]

Don't expect any tree to be torn up but I was back in the shed this morning. First thing I did was to clean the T&C grinder, put it back in end mill grinding mode and put all the accessories I have been using away in their proper place. I shall do a complete check on the set up before I grind my first end mill. I also put all the sharpened cutters away in their drawer and separated the ones I am giving away. Remember, anyone who wants some good inch and a quarter mandrel cutters, get on to me!



The last turning job I did on the lathe produced a nest of nasty stringy stainless steel swarf so I got rid of all that and gave Mrs Harrison a good clean down.



Then I had a good vacuum out, as much to pick up grinding dust up as anything else. To the same end my shed coat is in the washer as I write. We are looking for a straight edge.
What I really want to do now is order the steam hammer castings but I'm not going to do that until I have the new card and also made sure the fraudulent transactions have been cleared. So I will have to find something to keep me busy! Main thing I have drawn a line under the grinding marathon.

[Super_7b]

Hi Stanley,

Bad news about the credit card. I hope you are able to sort it all out.

Do you know how it happened? Is it something we need to be on the lookout for? This sort of thing is a right bugger.

Best wishes for the rest of the New Year.

Mick (in Hoyland)

[Stanley]

Morning Mick, thanks for the sympathy. No, I don't know how it happened beyond the fact that it wasn't anything I have done. My suspicion is a rogue worker somewhere selling data.
I shall be writing articles for a couple of days, Time to build the stockpile again! As soon as I get my new card and am sure the credits are on it I shall order the steam hammer castings from Stuarts......

[Stanley]

I wrote two articles yesterday and will be doing the same today..... Still, I have a nice clean tidy shed!

[Stanley]

More articles Kids but my new card has arrived. I shall check the balance today and if all is well I shall order the castings!

[Stanley]

It's been a busy morning. Main news is that I have checked my credit card balance and it's straight again, the fraudulent payments have been credited so I felt safe enough to spend £328.80 on the castings for the steam hammer.
I shall go in the shed and have a potter but nothing serious. One thing I'll do is check the settings of my T&C grinder and sharpen an end mill and test it as that is the job I do most frequently. Then a bit of a survey to see whether anything else needs tidying up. I've finished article writing and it will be nice to get back to normal! So no pics, but we are moving again!
A bit later..... That was all right. I checked the set up and ground a cutter, perfectly acceptable. Then a bit of tidying up and while I was doing that I realised that there was a nest of end mills that I had forgotten and bless me there were a couple with centre holes in each end that I could have sharpened the flutes on while I was in spiral milling mode.... Sod's Law is alive and well! But I have enough sharpened side flutes to keep me going, it's not worth the trouble to set up again. I shall simply bear them in mind. Not much but that will do for this morning!

[Stanley]

Sorry lads but I have been busy, the shed is off the boil at the moment and won't really come on line until I get my castings. This should be early in the week. Once they arrive it will be full steam ahead again!

[Stanley]

Good news lads! The castings are here for the steam hammer. Now we can get back to normal.....

[Bodger]

Stanley, you wouldn't want to have the shake in your hand using these , 0.3 mm is the smallest tap and die !!
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipP ... hPNTZYNlRR

[Stanley]

I have drills and taps smaller than that Bodge. They don't get out to play often but I have never broken one yet. Sheer luck I think!

[Stanley]

The drought is over. First day back in the shed so I did just a couple of hours, I know my limits! First job was to unpack the parts from the well made blister packs. Then find a plastic container big enough to keep all the parts in that aren't being worked on.



Everything checked and in it's right place! I had to find a bigger container.



Next read the destructions! Easy, because there aren't any beyond how to put the hammer together when you've made all the parts. I shall have to use my head! Still, an essential step.



Fairly obvious where we have to start. The base plate is the foundation of the structure so the first thing to do is get it right. Some people just straighten the bottom out with a flat file but the way I see it, the more accurate this is the better all the subsequent steps are! It took 3 light passes round the casting to get this straight, there was quite a tilt in it. It wasn't wasted time setting the T&C grinder up again and sharpening this cutter. It's doing a lovely job.



Clean the chips up and turn the casting over and machine the mating surface with the standard, notice that because the register is the flat base you don't need to do any complicated measuring. Within the limits of the mill, this has to be dead parallel with the base. That's what we are looking for.



A change of clamping technique and the next job is to clean the ends up because these have to be drilled for the holding down bolts. Once more, dead parallel with the base!



Another change of clamp position and do the same to the other end. Notice how I have dropped the head of the mill to get it as near the workpiece as possible. This means you are getting maximum accuracy and stiffness in the setup. Important when you have an El Cheapo mill! I never altered the height of the cutter when I cut the other end so this end is exactly the same thickness without measuring.



Here's where I finished up, a clean table and ready to square up the faces on the pillar of the hammer. If I get the base right and clamp it down on the other casting I can get an accurate register on the right angled face that will carry the cylinder, the most important relationship in the hammer. The only measuring I have done is to make sure the ledges at each end are half an inch wide.
Nice morning, all went well, the metal is good quality and some nice progress. Looking forwards to tomorrow. One last thing, the drawings specify 1 1/4" for the distance between the surface of the base casting and the flat base for the pillar but I didn't worry about this because it won't make any difference.

[Stanley]

A word about my attitude to castings before we get into this morning. Many people enjoy spending a lot of time on making the overall finish as good as possible (or think that this is essential), all I can say is go and look at a full size engine and you'll find that the old engineers never wasted time on this, the shiny bits are where a finish was essential in order to make it run. So all I do is put the finish on where it's needed and the rest just gets a good wire brushing. The rest is limited to getting rid of rough edges and the casting's equivalent of 'flash'.
So, today..... I want to get the base and the piston face of the standard ready for further work and fitting. It's not an easy piece to mill and here is how I decided to do it because there are some advantages, we'll come to that in a minute. The first thing to do was to get hold of the casting securely and get the base as near vertical as possible. You've got to do a bit of guessing here because you aren't starting from accurate faces or registers, that's what we want to create.



I won't be able to cut the whole of the face at one go but this 3/32" slitting saw is my best bet. Notice that I have moved the support bearing as near to the cut as I can get it for a stiffer setup. It took two passes to get a decent cut. It helped having a sharp cutter.



This was what I meant by the advantage. I haven't altered the grip on the standard but have rotated it 90 degrees so I can take a cut with the slabbing cutter. It has got to be square with the base and at 90 degrees because of the setup. Two cuts to get a full cut and the flange to the right thickness.



Here's the result, I have my two registers, now I need to extend the cut across the base. Another setup needed....



Here's the idea. The piston face is flat on the bed and the end packed up so that the cut is vertical. The square gets it as near square as possible.



The milling cutter is one of the ones I sharpened when I was spiral grinding. Cuts nicely.... Very light cuts, slowly does it until the cuts coincide.



As you can see I got close but not quite perfect. The cure was an 18" flat file and a bit of draw filing until I was satisfied.





A quick check on the surface plate, it'll do me! More work on the castings tomorrow, lots to do yet but we have the basics in place.....

[Stanley]

This is nothing to do with the castings but it's been on my list for a while. This plate had abrasive sheet glued to it. It's been quite useful but the abrasive is worn out and the glue has been attracting water and causing rust so I took the 4 jaw off, put the big 3 jaw SC on and set it up for a skimming cut across the face. I set it on on a low speed traverse and let it get on with it's job while I addressed the castings.



I wasn't quite satisfied with the base, you can see a slight ledge in the finish so a bit more work with big flat files until I was sure I had it as good as I could get it.



After telling you to do as little as possible to the castings here he is doing more but what I did was clean up the edges of the castings, straighten up the apertures in the casting for the valve rod and the valve lever, put a clean square face on the bosses for the valve lever and the holding down bolts. I used the Dremel for some of this and got all the holes in the standard that are important square and well finished.



The lathe had been running quietly away and reached the end of the cut. A big improvement!



I'm pleased with the improvements on the standard, I think that will do for the time being. It feels like a slow time-wasting job but it isn't, it will make all the difference when I get round to fitting.



The next job is to start the job of getting the anvil so that it will fit in the aperture in the base. It's mounted independently on the base board and fit isn't important beyond being tidy. The anvil casting is lousy! It's not a good shape at all and is going to take a bit of fettling! So, I made a start by cleaning up the aperture and making it square. I can adjust the size later if necessary.



Now for the anvil. As I said, it's not a good casting and there is nothing regular about it. The sides aren't parallel and so it's a hit and miss job grabbing hold of it. In other words, until I get one surface on it as a register all I can do is guess. I've set it up as near flat as I can using a level but as it has an uneven surface this can only be guesswork. The aim is to get a flat surface so that we can make some decisions about the rest of it. I gave the HM a bit of a shock because I ran the cutter at 450rpm. I don't think I have ever reached that speed before! I think it did it good actually as it ran very smooth and relatively quiet. Very light repetitive cuts because I daren't put any load on the grip I have on it.



Some time later after what I call high risk milling! No problems actually, just time consuming and I am sure I could have taken more than 15 thou on each cut but better safe then sorry! It sits flat on the surface plate now and tomorrow I can make some decisions about it..... I finished by cleaning Mrs Harrison and vacuuming up the CI dust from milling and filing. Nice morning, good work and no cock-ups! That'll do me.....

[Stanley]

Today I want to turn this pig's ear of a casting into an anvil for the hammer. Can you see the shape of a dovetail cast into the head? This is to represent the original construction which was a detachable anvil that mounted on the body. Different shapes could be fitted for different forging operations. I want to enhance this and preserve it and this will almost certainly be hand work. But first I want to get some shape into the casting so that it will be accurate and fit under the base.



We have a flat base so it was easy to mount the casting and square the top face.



Next job was to square the edges.



I squared the ends and here we have an improved casting! I measured the height from the base to the face and found I needed to take another 16th of an inch off.



So back under the slabbing cutter and two 30 thou cuts taken off. That does it!



Then a set up under the VM to finish the faces of the pads for the foundation bolts and skim the sides so it will fit in the aperture in the base.



Here we are at knocking off time. The sides fit the aperture but the ends need reducing to a fit. I think I might do that with a file but I'll have a look at the rabbit tomorrow. Not a bad hour and a half's worth! It's good progress.
Just one sad report..... I was congratulating myself earlier this morning for the big discovery of 2017, disposable vinyl gloves. However, they have one drawback, you don't have quite as good a grip as with bare fingers and this morning I dropped my old Powershot camera.... It's terminal, something has broken in the lens mount so I have had to ditch it and go onto the more modern Powershot. Pity but it's done good service.

[Stanley]

I didn't quite level with you yesterday. When I was skimming this side off I started too deep and left a bit of a scar. But not much will show once it's installed under the bed, not terminal! Today I want to get the anvil to fit in the base and finish it off....



I said yesterday I might size the anvil with the file but I'm enjoying using the HM so much that I popped it under the slabbing cutter. I didn't take a lot off and then turned it over and did the other end at the same setting so I know it's square and symmetrical. I'm so glad I spent the time to get the HM back into use. It's a good tool and of course has the advantage of the power feed on the table. I only have two gears for this, you adjust the speed by changing the gearing, but the ones I have are for the lowest speed and that's what I would be using anyway.



It fits and the scar is almost hidden so that's nice. Now I have to get the anvil top to the right size and finished preserving the dovetail.



Into the VM and one cut across the anvil side, then, again, without altering the setting I turned the casting over and did the other side on the same setting. Square and symmetrical again.



Looking good. Then into the vice and some cosmetic buffing and filing. I didn't do too much but got it looking like a separate piece dovetailing in. Eventually I shall paint the castings black but will leave the anvil top natural finish so that it will have some contrast.



We have three more castings to deal with. I think we'll go on size and I'll start with the cylinder.



Once again, we need a plane surface as a register. Using the Newton principle, grab hold of the casting as best you can and get the rough surface as square as you can. It's always a guess but if you use your head it will be OK. No measurements at this stage, nothing to measure off, that comes later. I haven't got a very firm hold on it so light slow cuts until you have good edges and a flat surface.



Knocking off time. I shall look at the drawings tomorrow and get the relationship of the bore and this face right. I expect we shall have to take a bit more off this face but that's for tomorrow.

[Stanley]

The shed is going to suffer today lads. I'm up to my neck in cooking, washing and house cleaning! Someone has to do it! Free leccy of course.....

[Big Kev]

Stanley, I have a request; do you have a piece of 1" round steel, about 8" long, I could borrow for 3 to 4 months? I have to do some physio on a damaged tendon, the physiotherapist suggested something around the same weight and size as a claw hammer but it's not the most practical thing to carry around in my laptop bag

[Stanley]

Of course I have Kev, pop round, you know when I'm in.....



This morning is all about getting some dimensions and squareness into the castings. One is missing, the valve block.



First I found the centre of the face on the standard and marked it for cutting to the correct width.



Not the easiest casting to grab hold of so a bit unorthodox and perhaps dodgy! But it's square, so some small careful cuts down to the mark. Only one side needed adjusting.



Next the valve block. No width or length specified on the drawings I had to work it out but the main thing was to get it to match the cylinder casting.



Next for shaving was the cylinder casting. I have a face so some careful measurement and I found the centre and reduced both ends until I had 3".



Next I found what looked like a square cut on the gland section that fits on the bottom of the cylinder. As always, the first cut is pure guesswork.



I realised while I was making that cut that my cutter was showing signs of wear, all the cuts I have been making are through the casting skin, the hardest part of the metal. So, I popped it into the T&C grinder and touched it up a bit.



That did the trick, a better face..... More to be done on this casting tomorrow. Once I have all these basic dimensions and relationships correct I can address the essential matter of the distance from the base and the centre of the bore on all the castings.

[PanBiker]

Kev, I have a set of hand weights. Plastic covered and three different weights if they might suit.