02-17-2015, 03:42 PM
I got nuthin' done on this this week.
I bought a cheapo rotary table, and i've been making the clamping gear for it Instead.
I always saw and file the contact points on the falling and rolling block rifles, and I figured that a rotary table would do a better job at making those critical parts.
I also wanted to try my hand at making a barrel ring. The forearm for this rifle has to attach somehow, and I don't want to drill into the barrel that far up (it's a tapered barrel and gets thinner closer to the muzzle).
I set up my little cheapo rotary and cut out a round chunk with a leg hanging off of it. It worked great, and I didn't even screw it up. I was impressed, even if you aren't.
After cutting the outside mostly round, I chucked it into my lathe and turned the leg round.
I am now set up to bore the middle, and now is where I realize that I did this in the wrong order.
I wanted to use a center hole to clamp the workpiece to the rotary table. I threaded a slug Inot the center of my little rotary table, and tapped a hole so that I could put a screw through my part right in the center. This worked great.
The problem I have now is in boring the middle out. It's going to get pretty thin, and my four jaw is probably going to smush it.
What I should have done was bored the hole and then cut the outside on the rotary table.
I could have still used the center screw threads, by turning a plug that fit the bore of my part, and just screwing that down. I already had a clamp on the leg anyway, and I think this would have held everything so that I could mill the outside radius.
Oh well. I learned stuff, and got to play with my new toy.
Here's a pic of the hold down set I made. It's all made from rusty scrap metal, but at least that worked perfectly.
I bought a cheapo rotary table, and i've been making the clamping gear for it Instead.
I always saw and file the contact points on the falling and rolling block rifles, and I figured that a rotary table would do a better job at making those critical parts.
I also wanted to try my hand at making a barrel ring. The forearm for this rifle has to attach somehow, and I don't want to drill into the barrel that far up (it's a tapered barrel and gets thinner closer to the muzzle).
I set up my little cheapo rotary and cut out a round chunk with a leg hanging off of it. It worked great, and I didn't even screw it up. I was impressed, even if you aren't.
After cutting the outside mostly round, I chucked it into my lathe and turned the leg round.
I am now set up to bore the middle, and now is where I realize that I did this in the wrong order.
I wanted to use a center hole to clamp the workpiece to the rotary table. I threaded a slug Inot the center of my little rotary table, and tapped a hole so that I could put a screw through my part right in the center. This worked great.
The problem I have now is in boring the middle out. It's going to get pretty thin, and my four jaw is probably going to smush it.
What I should have done was bored the hole and then cut the outside on the rotary table.
I could have still used the center screw threads, by turning a plug that fit the bore of my part, and just screwing that down. I already had a clamp on the leg anyway, and I think this would have held everything so that I could mill the outside radius.
Oh well. I learned stuff, and got to play with my new toy.
Here's a pic of the hold down set I made. It's all made from rusty scrap metal, but at least that worked perfectly.