Well I guess it is time I introduce myself. I registered more than eight years ago, and I have lurked quite a bit since. I am the one who sent Chris Rueby the link about the "Drag Box", and he shamed me into coming out of the shadows.
I am a retired scientist and I have worked with mechanical things my entire life. I lived on a farm with lots of machinery in my younger days. I worked some as an engineer on our family-owned tugboat. I have had a home workshop for more than 40 years.
I spent most of my working years in Texas and now live in SW Florida.
I currently have a Rong-Fu RF30 mill that I converted to full 4-axis CNC along with a Grizzly 12 inch lathe, still fully manual. And of course the usual collection of lesser tools.
Major projects include a Raritan locomotive (3.5 inch track gauge), a triple expansion engine based on the OB Bolton drawings, and I am currently working on a 1.5 inch to the foot Case 65 traction engine. I used a couple of castings for the Raritan, but none for the triple or the Case. The latter two make heavy use of CNC.
I use FreeCAD for design and CAM work.
My user name (one of many) came from the title of the book by Lyle Cummins about the history of internal combustion engines. When I first signed up for something on the internet, more than 30 years ago, the question came up about user name. I looked over at my bookshelves and saw the title of that book and decided that would make a good handle. Ironically, I greatly prefer steam engines to IC engines.
Gene
