Forum Projects and Articles by Our Members!

TLDR: Looking for advice and discussion for making small springy things - materials, techniques and experience for a small hobby shop. My primary interest at this point is designing and creating small "mechanicals" - think clock / music box / automata. I'd really like to be able to fabricate my own coil and sheet springy things. My attempts so far have been barely adequate due to lack of technique and poor choice of material. I'm sure I can learn how to wind coil springs on my SB9A lathe... Read more

TLDR: Looking for advice and discussion for making small springy things - materials, techniques and experience for a small hobby shop. My primary interest at this point is designing and creating small "mechanicals" - think clock / music box / automata. I'd really like to be able to fabricate my own coil and sheet springy things. My attempts so far have been barely adequate due to lack of technique and poor choice of material. I'm sure I can learn how to wind coil springs on my SB9A lathe... Read more

Its been good to me for 14yrs, but the other day it bit me. 2012 BX25 I brought brand new. Backstory, I have two favorite pairs of cargo shorts I wear whenever I don't need work pants on. When I say these are my favorites, I wouldn't wear anything but these that my wife brought home, and they had been patched so many times my wife tried throwing them out. It got to be a game between us where she would throw them out and I would keep showing up wearing them, holes, ripped, ass cheek and... Read more

I purchased a 6" adjustable chuck with a D1-4 mount and no longer have use for the chuck that came with my 1236-T lathe. If anyone is willing to pay the shipping you can have it for free.

I haven't run my surface grinder in a while, so I decided to check it out and clean it up, as I have a job coming up. I turned it on and it started right up and ran for a minute or two and just shut off, It, my mill and bandsaw run off the same RPC, a 5hp Phoenix that is about 10 years old. I turned on the mill and it wouldn't start. I climbed up into the rafters and checked the internal fuses. The L2 fuse was blown. The... Read more

Hi hobby machinists. I'm working on a Rong Fu 31 and the temptation to post pictures and converse is getting the better of me. I'm currently just a student, or beginner, or Xueto, but by the end of this thread I hope to become the Shaolin Rong Fu Master. I bought this beast from a gunsmith. It had baked in a storage unit in Texas for several years. Came with 2x off brand vices, a stand, & pretty much all the parts. The guy I bought it from was cool and threw in a pretty... Read more

Looking for any info on a Galaxy 16-1-8 mill/drill. Haven't looking at it yet. Guy wants $800, says he has some tooling. Just looking for info on how it would compare to other round column mills.

Looking for any info on a Galaxy 16-1-8 mill/drill. Haven't looking at it yet. Guy wants $800, says he has some tooling. Just looking for info on how it would compare to other round column mills.

I bought a second-hand G0602 lathe a few months ago. The previous owner installed high-quality spindle bearings to reduce runout, and the machine is working well. However, I hate ball oilers, and I don't feel confident in how much spindle oil is actually getting to the bearings versus squirting back out as soon as I remove the oil can. Is it a bad idea to pull the spindle apart, clean the bearings in mineral spirits and denatured alcohol, then pack them with some kind of high-quality bearing... Read more

Hello all, I posted a bit about this in my introduction post. Sorry for the long post. My question is about having enough lathe. I will be using it for my needs only in my home work space. Chambering barrels, threading muzzles, etc. No production work. I have my eye on Precision Mathews non Chinese lathes. I am wondering if the 1340 GT VS is enough lathe. I would really like the 1440 version but is the difference worth the price? Would the difference in price be better spent on tooling... Read more

Hello all, I posted a bit about this in my introduction post. Sorry for the long post. My question is about having enough lathe. I will be using it for my needs only in my home work space. Chambering barrels, threading muzzles, etc. No production work. I have my eye on Precision Mathews non Chinese lathes. I am wondering if the 1340 GT VS is enough lathe. I would really like the 1440 version but is the difference worth the price? Would the difference in price be better spent on tooling... Read more

I realize that this is a frequent occurrence, but this is really odd: I forget why, but a few months back I signed up with the VA. I get emails about once a week about things I already knew, along with the occasional text, which I ignore. I kept this one since it seemed to be a reasonable request that I should get around to, but when I came across it this afternoon while clearing out old texts (my wife never does this, so has texts from her sisters going back several... Read more