By Tom Dominey
After the excesses of Christmas and the New Year, I decided that it was time to break out. My nearest and dearest informed me that we needed a new receptacle for keeping our fruit in, so in a weak moment, I sprang to the challenge and made my way to the woodworking shop where I selected some magnolia for the main part and a block of ash for a base. I cut up the magnolia into eighty pieces and made up five segmented rings, turned them to size and formed a spigot on one side and a register on the other. They were then glued and pressed together with the base to form the bowl. Next day, I finish turned, sanded and polished the result – a new fruit bowl and job done!
Fruit bowl
Spurred on by this, I decided to make a box to house my micrometers as their several boxes were becoming very tatty. I now have a box which holds four micrometers – 1” to 4” with two depth micrometers held in the lid.
Micrometer box
Collet attachment With the arrival of a collet closing nut from Arc Euro, I set about making an Erickson Collet Chuck for my Harrison L5 lathe. These nuts are made with an internal ring which releases the collet when it is unscrewed and are precision made and a bargain at only £9. The body was bored from a large piece of bar, then screw cut to 1 ½” Whitworth and finished off with a tap loaned to me by Andy Cooke. The end was faced and the internal bore sized to fit the spindle. The outside was finished on the machine and the nose reduced to 40mm and 1.5mm pitch thread cut to receive the closing nut. Cutting a metric thread on a lathe with an Imperial lead screw presents its challenges – i.e. the half-nuts cannot be disengaged until the thread is finished. This means that at the end of every cut, the lathe must be stopped, the cutter withdrawn and the lathe reversed. The thread was soon finished and the bore was opened out until it would pass a ¾” diameter boring bar with a ¼” round cutter with a nice sharp rounded nose. It is imperative when boring a precise taper that the tool is rigid and spot on centre height as otherwise a somewhat barrel shape taper will result. At the end of each cut, I withdrew the tool before winding back the top slide as this is no time for errors. I now have an Erickson 32 chuck with 2mm-20mm capacity.
Whilst I was searching through a box, I came across a pair of bevel gears that I bought some years previously and I felt that these must be used. Now my ancient Taylor Mill has a groove each side of the headstock with two 3/8” Whitworth holes on each side, obviously for an attachment. So I thought – “Why not a horizontal milling attachment?” So nothing daunted, I made a spindle to fit the internal bore of the mill and pressed on one bevel gear. I had two billets of alloy – 8”x 2 ¾” x ¾” which would make side plates and two ball races large enough for the cutter spindle. The plates were milled to produce a raised portion that would fit snugly into the slots in the mill headstock and the bearing holes were marked off. The plates could only be held by three jaws of the four-jaw chuck –something not for the nervous! When they were finished and the bearings pressed in, the plates were bolted to the mill and surprise, surprise, a dummy spindle passed straight through! The cutter spindle was then made which was all simple stuff. I used UNF threads on the ends with one being left-handed.
Milling Attachment
Yes, I have tried it out and yes it does work with it all being completed by the 7th March.
Boring Head Since the rains came, I have made the boring head shown in the picture and the over arm support for the milling frame.

After assembling all the bits for the photographs, I reflected on pearl of wisdom offered to me some years ago by Richard Beel. Richard, me and several others were working at the Creech Paper Mill, striving to do the impossible in a somewhat primitive workshop. Richard said, “If you stay here forever, you will not be a great engineer, but you could be an expert at making almost anything from practically nothing!”