Feb 2020

approach whereby as the cutter rotates and moves

forward, the cutting edges come in over the side of

the workpiece rather than leaving over the side. The

latter tends to push metal over the edge to create a

burr whereas coming in over the side does not.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JH3frgVpGY

It looked as if he was doing the machining on a CNC

mill and what he did not get into is that you can

program these machines to go around the edges with

a de-burring tool and do a way better (and quicker)

job than you can ever do by hand.

He also shows how to set up a rotary table to do

sequential machining operations on a single part.

This involves mounting a machine vise on the rotary

table and going through some fairly elaborate set-up

procedures.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EJiz5zK-JQ

Some general discussion followed and one item that

came up (Stu Brownlow) was about steel manufacture

in Sheffield, England. There is now a museum in the

city that sets out to cover some of that history.

http://www.simt.co.uk/kelham-island-museum/

I lived in Sheffield for a year and I don’t think the

museum was there back then, but another was; the

Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet.

http://www.simt.co.uk/abbeydale-industrial-hamlet

This was where crucible steel was produced early on.

Melting steel requires a very high temperature and

this was achieved using coke fired, natural draft

furnaces. They had occasional accidents with

crucibles breaking and the results were horrific.

Show and Tell

Kasey has been busy making electronic circuits.

These are in conjunction with a tramway system he is

building and the circuit is to make the tram go

backwards and forwards. (Some lights are also

involved.) He started using the classic breadboarding

approach which allows you to plug components into a

special base and connect them up without using

solder. This makes it easy to change things around

until the circuit works the way you want it to. Having

done this he made up the proper circuit board – but

unfortunately that does not work. Go figure – even

the best laid plans occasionally let you down.

flange motor and the outer part clamps to the column

of the sump pump.

Bruce has continued work on his 4 ½” Howitzer and

now the barrel and breech block are complete. Very

nice job Bruce. One has to appreciate that all this is

done starting with limited information and producing

all his own drawings.

I won’t get into why I needed it but I had to produce a

piece of aluminum 1/8” x 3/16”. The closest I had was

1/8” x ½” so I used the technique Bruce mentioned a

few months ago - the picture is largely self

explanatory.

Having been away for a couple of weeks towards the

end of January progress on my Sealion ground to a

halt. However, I have been working on adapting a

sump pump to take a decent quality 3ph motor with

inverter drive. The standard cheapie, single phase,

capacitor start motors that come with these have

been failing on me too frequently so I am trying to

arrive at something that will be more dependable.

Having worked in the chemical industry, the concept

of using stuff that will run reliably 24/7 for a long

period of time, becomes rather ingrained.

I forgot to get a picture of the finished adaptor piece

but here it is in the lathe for the final machining

operations. The flange part connects with a 56C

I did not put this in the version that goes out to those who do not have internet access and receive the paper

version of the newsletter (because it would be difficult to make use of) but Nick Jonkman sent me a PDF file

containing pictures of the Ford Rouge River Plant in 1917. The file is 5MB and larger than I really want to send

out. However, here is a (rather long) link that brings it up:

https://mailattachment.

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In fact, a couple of Christmases ago I was given a book entitled "Fordlandia". This was primarily about Henry

Ford trying to set up a rubber plantation in Brazil (that ultimately failed) to supply all the rubber he needed in his

cars. However, it also includes quite a lot of commentary on the running of the Rouge River Plant where the T

types were made. The pictures brought up by the link really show how amazing the place was. What they do not

show is just how dire the working conditions were. Basically, Henry just kept upping the speed of the production

lines to increase output and a lot of the employees just could not take it and had to quit. However, he could

always find more to take their place. Suppression of labour unrest was also brutal and someone named Bennett

was in charge of the “goons” who took care of this.