Very true Dave!
Well, a few pictures of a few things. Not doing a blow by blow account here, because most of this is straightforward. I did run afoul of the higher load generated from form tools, and tool heights set too high, and inappropriate machining sequence on slender parts, as well as too much stickout, the combination of which made me scrap too many of my precious studs. Still, that's all worked out and I'm chunking through them.
I want to make custom studs because I want to locate the crank bearings and engine frame more closely than a regular machine screw will allow. So I am making studs with a shaft closely sized to the holes in said items (I didn't think of it at the start of the build or I would have reamed the holes to a more round size, but no matter).
I ground a form tool to radius the showing end of the studs for appearances sake.
Fairly pleased with that - I ground the radius using a small round bit in a dremel, and using a radius gauge as a template.
Anyway it works out OK, the studs for the caps are a close fit, so now I can finish machining the bearings.
Which I am doing here using a vice in a vice. I decided to copy a previous build here, and just clean up the angled faces of the bearings. I think this will look good. Here I am touching off on the casting in 3 spots to get the surface level.
Then skim over it:
A little hand blending is needed now on the castings to fettle the caps to the pillow blocks, and I also need to make studs for the pillow blocks to the base. Work in progress in the foreground.
It took a silly amount of time to figure out the studs - but hey ho, they are now coming out how I want them. I haven't documented the process because for most people it's rudimentary stuff that we've all done. I think.
Anyway, I also made a packing nut, from a piece of hex bar.
I am a big fan of the upside down threading tool approach, running the lathe in reverse and threading away from the headstock. It is very stress free.
Touching off on a sharpie mark to establish the OD:
This is a 1/2-20 thread. I tend to cheat on my single point threads and just use a nut to check how they are coming along. Since I'm not selling these parts I'm OK with that, but today, since I have a set of thread wires, I just felt like trying them - and actually they are easy to use. These ones have a little rubber device which holds the pair of wires for one side, and attaches them to the micrometer anvil, making taking the measurement a very simple job.
The maths is actually pretty straightforward. I'm not going to go into that because there are many many many sources on the net and youtube that explain it, but there is a handy dandy chart that comes with the wires to make it easy.
A simple part really, very therapeutic. It even fits the mating part.
Anyway, that's a few things I have been doing. As usual, when I write about it I wonder what took so long. Nearly finished on the bearing studs, then I just need to make some custom nuts and I can machine the crank shaft bearings. Something a bit more interesting - after that I will be onto the crankshaft I think.
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