Eyeball Engineering

[tacocat]

Those are very very nice

[Duuuuuuuude]

All done. Didn't like the polished look, so hit them all with a scotchbrite pad. 2.3oz vs the 1.4oz delrin versions. Most of the work was still done on the mill, and I found out my cool little bead groove cutter doesn't at all work on aluminum. I ended up modifying a parting tool and doing most of the work with it.

[JohnRobHolmes]

What was the deal with your groover in aluminum? Those suckers look really good

[Duuuuuuuude]

Chatter. Lots and lots of chatter. I don't think the lathe is stout enough for that wide of a cut.

[Lentsnh2012]

How wide of a groove are you cutting? Can you adjust the stick-out of the cutting tool or is it fixed?

[Duuuuuuuude]

About 1/8". It sticks out just a hair further than what I need to cut.

[Lentsnh2012]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

About 1/8". It sticks out just a hair further than what I need to cut.

Hmm, that's strange that you're getting chatter. Maybe the cross feed is vibrating?


It's better to use a HSS cut off tool anyway.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Could be. I'm slowly tweaking out all the unwanted movement in things, but there is still some that pops up.

A hss replacement is coming soon now that I got a wheel dresser for my bench grinder. Had to hit ebay for one since amazingly no one sells them locally. Hooray for big box stores!

[JohnRobHolmes]

I would also say the cross slide could be the issue. If you have a way to lock down any directions you aren't using during the cut, do so. An 1/8" cut shouldn't be so bad unless you have way too much back rake and it is grabbing and bouncing the tool tip, or of course some movement in your slides.

[gunder463]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

I even made a square thing round.

i love this statement,

[Lentsnh2012]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

Could be. I'm slowly tweaking out all the unwanted movement in things, but there is still some that pops up.

A hss replacement is coming soon now that I got a wheel dresser for my bench grinder. Had to hit ebay for one since amazingly no one sells them locally. Hooray for big box stores!

Maybe you should learn how to not clog up a grinding stone, ya newb!

I don't think that any of our LMS carry wheel dressers either, now that I think about it. We usually just go through Grainger or MSC anyway.

[BigSki]

Is your cutter centered on the center-line of the chuck? That can make for some chatters as well. Nice looking wheel, you're really getting good at this.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Originally Posted by Lentsnh2012

Maybe you should learn how to not clog up a grinding stone, ya newb!

I've been using the same stone for 5 years, and the new one I bought needed truing, so...

Originally Posted by BigSki

Is your cutter centered on the center-line of the chuck? That can make for some chatters as well. Nice looking wheel, you're really getting good at this.

Just a hair below. Initially I was getting really crappy cuts with everything even though I was setting them via the dead center in the tail stock, then through some careful investigation, realized the tail stock is a POS and is neither square, nor level, nor rigid. I banished it to a drawer and made a dead center for the chuck instead.

Truth be told, most of the wheel was made on the mill. A few operations were done on the lathe, but not many. The wheels did give me a chance to put JRH's mysterious green goo to work though, and it worked beautifully. A little really does go a long, long, long way.

[mudweaver]

I saw a few pics of fellow members posting there machines so I thought I would share mine. I havnt made many crawler parts yet but I also run RC boats and iv made ALOT of parts for my boats. both the mill and lathe are manual machines but are equipped with 3 axis DRO, making it esier to get accurate parts made.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Nothing too terribly interesting going on other than lots and lots and lots of wheels being carved out.

I did learn a new thing though...dividing by 7! I stepped up to help sponsor the cANZ Nats this year, and while fishing for ideas they suggested a 7 pointed design to represent all the Australian territories. 360/7 = 51.42*. Combing the internet gained me zero knowledge on translating this into a usable figure to find on the rotary table. I really wanted to make this happen, so I cranked my horrible math skills up to 11 and sorted it out.







In a separate, unrelated to rc note, I made windchimes for Christmas presents this year on the lathe. Some were copper, some were steel. Everything sourced from the local hardware stores. Kind of a cool thing to do, definitely want to try a ridiculously large set just for giggles. I opted for musical chimes, and they sounded way better than the junk I'd seen in the stores. Can't find any pics, but for anyone that wants to give it a shot, this site has everything you could ever want to know about making them. There are even tuning spreadsheets covering every material, diameter, and wall thickness you could ever hope to use. Easy DIY Design and Build a Tubular-Bell Wind Chime Set from Tubes, Pipes or Rods

[Szczerba]

Those last two sets look great. Those skinny finger spoked ones look tough to make.

And yea, you're dealing in cirlces, so the math is trigonometry, 7 is always divisible by pi radians.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Spokes are easier than they look. Time consuming though. The slotted ones were the real butt clencher.


I barely made it through algebra, so anything above that is no mans land for me. Been a long long time since I tackled it though, so maybe its time to try it again....

[OTHGbronco82]

You could always take some courses at the local community college as refresher courses. Or get a math book for cheap and do some studying. And those wheels look really good.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Books? Phfft. I have the internet. Khan Academy ftw.

[OTHGbronco82]

Yes books. They double as a level for tables too.