Thursday, May 7, 2015

Instrument Makers Vices

On the HSM forum, RobWilson posted about the instrument makers vices he made: Here are a set of instrument makers vices I made a wile back.









Great for holding wee parts wile there being worked on .
These are nicely made and look like they would be perfect for holding smaller parts.

Wednesday, September 3, 2014

Low profile milling clamps

stefang posted on the HSM forum about his low profile milling clamps:

Arthur.Marks later posted in response to a question about the source of the design that it seemed to be from:
"AMF - a German workholding company. They have a number of other unique, low-profile designs. Peruse here for convenience."
stefang's work seems to be based on No. 6492. No. 6490 also seems like a nice design, although perhaps harder to make.

Thursday, May 15, 2014

Speed Vise

gdavis2265 posted to the HSM forum about his speed vise for the drill press. It looks like a very nice design:
"Here is a speed vise that I made - it can be used vertical / horizontal or flipped to the opposite side - it works really well, and was cheap to make. It pivots at the end and slides fast to locate the part under the drill - the all-thread clamps tightly locking the part in place, and you only need to hold the handle with the left hand while drilling to keep it in place. I milled some steps in the jaws to act as quick parallels. I used it on the DP for a while until I bought a 8" Heinrich vise (love that thing) and now this has been re-pourpused to bandsaw duty, as it works really well for holding / pushing / and guiding parts on the vertical bandsaw.




Speed vise being used with circle cutting jig on vertical bandsaw.


Just some layout I did to show the capacity of the vise."



Something he didn't specifically point out were the notches milled into the edges of the jaws, great for holding thin plates. And the drilled and tapped holes are another thoughtful addition. Great work!

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Belt Grinder

gdavis2265 posted to the HSM forum about his belt grinder. It looks like a very nice design. Very configurable, but sturdy, and without a lot of extra 'fluff':
"My 2 x 72 Belt Grinder - 3HP


I designed it to be somewhat universal - Using a flat platten, having the big wheel out, little wheel out, etc...
The table is a dog-bone design built with ball bearings joined with a rod. The table can move any angle at any location, as well as moved to be used in the vertical position.
This unit has to live on my grinder bench and room is getting real tight, so I designed the unit to have a motor overhead (keeps grinding dust out of the motor) and uses a cross shaft to drive the pulley on the opposite side.


In response to a question about the tool rest:
No keys, just two ball bearing joined (welded) to a round rod - ie... dogbone. I believe I used 3/8" flatbar with holes drilled for the balls to engage. These need to be thick so as not to deflect; I reef-down on that capscrew fairly tight, as the hardened chrome balls can slip. I also put a fairly large chamber on each hole to help provide more surface area for grip.
I'll try and snap a couple detailed pics of the table. No keys, just two ball bearing joined (welded) to a round rod - ie... dogbone. I believe I used 3/8" flatbar with holes drilled for the balls to engage. These need to be thick so as not to deflect; I reef-down on that capscrew fairly tight, as the hardened chrome balls can slip. I also put a fairly large chamber on each hole to help provide more surface area for grip. But once tightened down, it really holds very well What's not evident from the design photos below is that the magenta colored piece that welds to the under side of the table actually has a ball welded into the hole and centered. Like I mentioned, I'll try to snap some detailed photos for ya a bit later. I snapped a couple screen shots of my table design - hope this helps some."
In response to a question about whether the driver and idler wheels are crowned, and asking about the speed:
"Both are crowned - As for speed, I think I designed it to run at the recommended speed for alum oxide belts (4200 sfpm???????) - can't remember.
I've been using it for about a year or so now and seems to work great.
I mainly use it for general purpose fab and works great - I build maybe one to two knifes a year, so having it at the proper speed is not much an issue for me."
"I see that I designed it for about 4800 sfpm, isn't that about the correct speed for AO? "

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Finger plate

mariolucchini posted on the HMEM forum about his beautiful finger plate and storage box:

One of the most gratifying tasks we modelers can undertake, is the construction of our own tools....at least this is my personal way of seeing things....

A long caressed project from way back then, was the design & building of a finger plate....I just made the decision of making one for my use....since I used one of a friend of mine, I now wonder how I did without it....

I made a thorough search in the web, not finding much, but what little I learned I added to my personal needs....so here we go....

I started with the base, which I produced from a discarded PC aluminium heat sink, from which I hacksawed the fins and made a long and boring flycutting sesion....

Here it is, finally sanded and polished....the four sides are at exact 90ยบ from each other so it can be used in my milling table and in the miniature table saw....





Notice that the upper face of the base has 3 milled "V" ways for holding different size round material...also there are 8 threaded holes which are mighty useful for holding the most used screws or bolts I mostly use in my models....these are from the smaller up....1.2 mm, 1.4 mm, 1.7 mm, 2 mm, 3 mm, 4 mm, 5 mm and 6 mm.

The bottom face of the base....





If you should want to use the finger plate on the vise, a screwed bar was devised which is applied via countersunk brass screws from below...





The pillar, made from BMS and threaded M6, the lower threaded portion is made in such a way that you can fix it to the base with just finger pressure....I intend to make a wooden box in a time to come to keep the whole safe & sound.... so the pillar must be removable...besides I love making special wooden boxes!!!!



The pillar in place on the base...................





The clamp, made from 4 mm thick brass.......the lower ends are slightly angled so they can rest parallel to the base when in use....







The clamping knob & the special washer.............





The special washer that goes under the clamping knob, is rounded on the undernath so that it gives good grabbing power at any angle......



The adjuster screw...........Made from an M 4 bolt, with a heavily knurled brass knob, has the added finesse of using an acrylic point so as not to marr the plate's surface when tightening it..........





Here's an image of the threaded holes being occupied with an example of each bolt of different dimensions....



The parts of the ensemble, including a special screwdriver to screw in the special base for using it in the vise....



The finger plate assembled showing some of its infinite uses.....

A brass bar in one of the "V" ways, ready to be crossdrilled....



The same brass bar in one of the corner "V" ways, ready to be filed or rectified via a grinder....



A small hinge to be filed......the clamping action of the finger plate is really powerful, when it bites.....well........





The finished box with all its inlettings.....



The box with its contents....





The closed box.............by the way, the box was made entirely in 3 mm thick plywood....





Another homemade tool for the collection............