16 Apr '16 19:19>
Yep, get that old lathe running, cut a piece with the milling machine, lathe it down, spiral chips building up, nothing like it.
Originally posted by moonbusSS is a bitch no doubt. I hate to drill it, cut it, dremel it, anything.
I found brass the most fun to cut on machine tools, stainless steel the least.
Originally posted by Ghost of a DukeOne of the most challenging things to do on a lathe is to cut internal threads in a tube (not with a tap, I mean). Challenging because one could not see where the cutting tool was; one had to position the cutting tool by turning cranks and then read the cutting depth off the dials--no cnc in my day as an apprentice, but I had two journeymen machinists to learn from.
Am so out of my depth in this thread, but am learning something.
Originally posted by moonbusOnce I had to build a small air pressure switch, and decided to design and build it from a piece of aluminum. What it was actually, a piece of 100% pure aluminum. To my dismay I found even drilling into that little slab distorted the whole piece. I took it as a challenge however and persisted, reshaping it after every machining affront to the piece. Eventually I succeeded in making my little pressure switch and it worked perfectly but I vowed never to build anything like that again with pure aluminum. I learned my lesson well🙂 It was like trying to build something with chewing gum🙂
Aluminum is lovely to mill and tap, but not to file. It tends to load the file very quickly and you spend half your time just brushing the file clean again.