A 19th Century Machine Shop Diorama

[J.L.]

Thanks Bill.

Hello Søften - Denmark. Greetings from Canada.

You are right. The space is dwindling. This is the sixth and last machine that will appear on the floor of the shop.

John

[mklotz]

This is the sixth and last machine that will appear on the floor of the shop.

Until PMR brings out that irresistible working model of an antique planer.

[crueby]

Are there going to be little carts with whatever product the shop makes, in various stages of completion?

An incredible project!

[J.L.]

Good thoughts gentlemen. I will definitely be looking for those little extras now to complete the shop 'look'.

Mounting the bed and getting it running is now the goal. In the first photo, you can see the end of the threaded feed screw.

The second photo shows the business end of that threaded screw - the power feed clutch assembly.

[J.L.]

The bed can be manually moved from left to right with the crank shown being worked up here.

[b.lindsey]

That little crank handle is just too cute John!!  The realism of the whole project is mindblowing!!

Bill

[J.L.]

Hi Bill.
Your positive, appreciative comments are motivating!  Thank you.

Remember that universal joint? Well today it comes into play. On the end of m finger is the telescopic brass tube fixed to 1/2 of the universal.

[J.L.]

And here is the other half with the worm gear and mounting bracket.

[J.L.]

So here we are with the temporary power feed hookup. You will see my earlier mistake of drilling the holes in the bracket before this test placement. The hole will have to be plugged before drilling the location of the new bolt into the bed. The hole under the clamp should be okay.

The trick now will be to take everything apart and drill that hole under the clamp without losing the register of its location. 

Things have gone well this morning with these steps taken in real time.

John

[J.L.]

While the plugged hole was hardening, attention turned to making a t-nut and a push rod for the clutch mechanism. The size of the little nut bordered on the ridiculous. A lot was going to asked of it. It holds a push or feed rod that connects to the clutch assembly.

Painting the t-slot was not a good idea. It, along with the side of the bed had to be stripped of paint. Some of these pictures are not pretty, but you get the idea of the scale involved here.

[J.L.]

Here is an attempt to make the functioning of the clutch more understandable.
The first two photos show the gear out and proud of the bed boss so that the action of the pin can be seen with regard to the notch in the brass gear boss.
The third photo shows the push rod. It is what will be later moving the clutch in and out.
The last two photos show the clutch in and out.

[J.L.]

This milling machine is nearing completion. It will soon be possible to permanently connect the universal and put some belts on the pulleys.

[b.lindsey]

Thanks for the update John. It will definitely add to the machine shop, once in place and hooked up to the line shaft.

Bill

[Chipswitheverything]

This is a most attractive and interesting miniature milling machine John, and your very fine build photographs ( of fine work on the construction ) have been most enjoyable   -  thank you.      Dave

[ddmckee54]

John:

You need to forget about all these light duty machines.  Buy the property next door, knock out a couple of walls, expand the shop and get yourself some heavy duty machine tools, the kind they use to build locomotives.  Then your shop will make some real money because that's the wave of the future.  Building bigger and better steam railroad locomotives, you'll see John, you'll see.

Don