Is it my turn? Anything to do with lathes, mills and other shop tools

IMG_1745.jpg


Shot in the dark here: Grandson's buddy picked up this lathe, trying to identify it. Anybody?
 
Overhead line drive, that thing is ANCIENT. Just a guess Atlas is kinda famous for the flat ways type bed.
When I was a kid there was a machine shop in town that was still a line drive set up. Probably a remnant of circus wagon making days in Baraboo. 50' long shafts hung from the rafters with big pulleys and flat belts down to the machines. At the back of the shop large electric motors powered the overhead shafts. Probably a retrofit from steam. Building was too far from the river to have been water driven.
2020-01-11-09-13-fineartamerica.com.png
 
Last edited:
- - - At the back of the shop large electric motors powered the overhead shafts.
Probably a retrofit from steam. Building was too far from the river to have been water driven.
/QUOTE]
Hi Gary,
as the machine shop was in Baraboo perhaps it's lineshafts were originally powered by a 12-clown treadmill?
 
If you want to see a working display of a machine shop like that I would suggest a visit to Greenfield Village Museum and get to the
Armington & Sims Machine Shop there, it's part of the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn Michigan.

I was there many years ago and had an almost private tour by the guy working there other than my wife I think there was one other couple there and they only stayed for a few minutes. At that time they were still using many of the machines to make repair parts for the old cars and such they used around the museum. Could have spent a week there talking to the guy running the place!
 
Any of you lathe guys ever do anything like this? Back when I was in school , I took a metal shop class. I made a ball peen hammer on the lathe with a metal handle that had a knurled grip and it screwed into the head of the hammer, anyways...I wanted to polish the handle with a strip of emery cloth, while it was spinning in the lathe.
The instructor told me to hole the strip of emery cloth with two hands, one on each end of the strip.
Well of course I didn’t, I folded it over and pinched the two ends together with one hand and was running it back and forth on that spinning handle when suddenly that emery cloth bit and rolled up on that handle in a nano second, pulling my fingers in with it. It smashed my thumbnail so fast and made a huge blood blister under the nail.
All I got was a “ I told you not to do that! “ from the instructor. :laugh2:
 
Any of you lathe guys ever do anything like this? Back when I was in school , I took a metal shop class. I made a ball peen hammer on the lathe with a metal handle that had a knurled grip and it screwed into the head of the hammer, anyways...I wanted to polish the handle with a strip of emery cloth, while it was spinning in the lathe.
The instructor told me to hole the strip of emery cloth with two hands, one on each end of the strip.
Well of course I didn’t, I folded it over and pinched the two ends together with one hand and was running it back and forth on that spinning handle when suddenly that emery cloth bit and rolled up on that handle in a nano second, pulling my fingers in with it. It smashed my thumbnail so fast and made a huge blood blister under the nail.
All I got was a “ I told you not to do that! “ from the instructor. :laugh2:

Joe Pi did a very informative video on that very thing. As he explained it, in nice simple terms for people like me, the emery cloth acts just like a strap wrench. Myself I've only done the a time or three.
 
Ahhhh the good ole days. Don't know for sure, but I doubt they would even allow a lathe in shop class these days. Open moving parts with kids around. :yikes:

Yeah, I don’t know, that was my metal shop class in high school. I learned to weld and use a torch in that class , and do sheet metal work and of course the lathe.
Ive told the story before , so I won’t go into the whole thing, but one day three boys blew up the heat treating oven. :yikes: Scared everybody half to death.
 
During my jr high days, the boys did a semester of woodshop and a semester of either electronics, small engines, printing or machine shop. I wish I took the machine shop instead of printing and small engines.
 
Well if we are telling metal shop class stories:

We had a sheet metal sheer that you stomped on with your foot once you had the steel held to the right place for the cut. Well Scott decided he needed a thin strip of steel to make a ring out of and the piece of scrap he had was just a little too wide. Got it all positioned where he wanted it and stomped down on the foot lever.

Bet you know where the end his index finger was a second latter!

To make things worse shop class was the period just before lunch and on the menu that day was fish sticks with tomato catsup! Don't think any of the kids in shop class ate lunch that day.

They did try reattaching the end of finger but guess medical technology was not what it is these days and it did not take.

About 55 years latter I'm still pi$$ed at that school as they had me pegged as "college material" and I only got one semester each of wood and metal shop so nothing as advanced as welding or working with a torch. Those things were for the kids in the AG classes. Those classes they would have one student bring in an old tractor and they would more or less restore it as part of the class. But they said I was "too smart" for that stuff.

Spent just short of 45 years of my working life repairing and maintaining heavy equipment in a quarry and with help from friends and family built the hose I live in and never had a mortgage so I guess I showed them! But still have to wonder what I could have done if I had real training in those fields.
 
My high school counselor steered me into DECA ( distributive education clubs of America ) where students are taught about how business is run, and as part of that they help you get a job working retail that you earn school credit for. What’s not to love right? My first retail job in a dept. store , I earned a whopping $1.35 an hour!

Meanwhile, my buddy got steered into VICA ( vocational industrial clubs of America) where he was placed in the carpenters union as a working apprentice, making $10 an hour, which back in 1973 was a wage that a working man could support a family on! Plus he had a real adult job as soon as he graduated high school. Man was I envious!

I wound up paying for welding school after high school , out of my own pocket and I was working for the mines doing heavy equipment repair at age eighteen. I think my friend got the better deal! :laugh2:

I am happy to see here in Arizona that there are community colleges springing up all over that are geared towards vocational education, aircraft maintenance, automotive, carpentry, electrician, CAD design, medical technicians, machinists and on and on. It’s about time that we realize not every kid is cut out for University.
 
I am happy to see here in Arizona that there are community colleges springing up all over that are geared towards vocational education, aircraft maintenance, automotive, carpentry, electrician, CAD design, medical technicians, machinists and on and on. It’s about time that we realize not every kid is cut out for University.

Just hope the high school guidance counselors are better than those who "shafted me"! Kind of doubt some of those around here have learned much in the last 50 years. My brother actually was a principal at a Vocational Education School before he retired a few years ago and he was still fighting those counselors who used Vocational Schools as dumping grounds for the trouble makers in the schools.

One of his questions he would ask them was "Do you really want "Doper Bobby" fixing the brakes on your little girl's car while he's high on crack?" They would reply "NO!" "Well why do you send him here to our automotive trades class?"
 
- - - Spent just short of 45 years of my working life repairing and maintaining heavy equipment in a quarry and with help from friends and family built the hose I live in and never had a mortgage so I guess I showed them! But still have to wonder what I could have done if I had real training in those fields.

Hi Ken,
Joe was the farm's junior cowman until the new boss heard that Joe couldn't read or write and fired him.
So Joe started a little hauling business and several years later he's running an international shipping conglomerate
and telling an interviewer how he got started.
"And how much better would you have done if you could read and write?"
"I reckon I'd be head cowman by now."
 
20200115_145808.jpg
Since I'm not doin much on the XS while working, here are some pics of these darn tiny features with very tight tolerances that I can barely see anymore and work with daily :laughing:
20200115_124413.jpg
 

Attachments

  • 20200113_090446.jpg
    20200113_090446.jpg
    134.5 KB · Views: 166
  • 20200115_123329.jpg
    20200115_123329.jpg
    170.8 KB · Views: 155
  • 20200115_123607.jpg
    20200115_123607.jpg
    150.3 KB · Views: 113
  • 20200113_071006.jpg
    20200113_071006.jpg
    203.4 KB · Views: 155
  • 20200113_065000.jpg
    20200113_065000.jpg
    131.8 KB · Views: 152
  • 20200113_071942.jpg
    20200113_071942.jpg
    176.1 KB · Views: 135
  • 20200113_072403.jpg
    20200113_072403.jpg
    167.3 KB · Views: 126
  • 20200113_095436.jpg
    20200113_095436.jpg
    116.3 KB · Views: 154
  • 20200113_093837.jpg
    20200113_093837.jpg
    142 KB · Views: 138
  • 20200113_123022.jpg
    20200113_123022.jpg
    192.3 KB · Views: 131
  • 20200113_082536.jpg
    20200113_082536.jpg
    184.6 KB · Views: 110
  • 20200115_124449.jpg
    20200115_124449.jpg
    113.2 KB · Views: 116
Last edited:
"...Just use the CNC mill, it's easy..." Right. 3-1/2 weeks of programming later - nothing. :banghead: A couple hours with an angle grinder later, I had parts. They weren't "machine perfect" by any means, but I'm making progress. (I'm working on a GOTTRIKES tubing bender - see the Tech section. When it starts looking like a tubing bender, I'll post pics...)
 
Back
Top