Tips

When draw filing and emery clothing a surface to obtain a fine finish, do not be tempted to skip a file grade before starting with emery. If you do you are likely to produce the type of surface referred to sarcastically as “Highly polished—and deeply scratched!”

If you require a good quality hole but haven’t a reamer but do have a drill (preferably in ‘as new’ condition), stone matching radii or chamfers at the outer corners of the cutting edges and proceed as if it WERE a reamer, i.e. predrill slightly undersize, slow speed, slow and steady feed and retraction, plenty of cutting fluid to flush the swarf from in front of the drill. It may not have the excellence of a genuinely reamed hole but it shouldn’t be far off.

9. Paul - about drilling small holes in the lathe.

For any Club Members with internet broadband, here is a link to an item on Utube.

It is one man’s solution to drilling tiny holes in the lathe.

8. “Ex-Gunner” - about small screwdrivers.

Wilkinson’s Taunton sell sets of Jewellers screwdrivers for 99p. Buy two sets—one you retain and use as wee screwdrivers which could be better than some that you already have in your toolbox. With the second set, put the two largest in your toolbox as spares, but with the three smaller ones, remove the tapered section of the blade gently on the grinder, making sure that you do not get them too hot and then square up the ends. You now have three superb pin-punches. This is what Watchmakers do!

7. Stoker RN (Retired)—about turning small dia. steel.

When turning very, very, very small diameter steel, for the final cut, drop down a speed and use spit (saliva if you were brought up proper) as a lubricant (it works, I kid you not). It also works when drilling very, very, very small holes.

6. Fred - about boring bars.

Sometimes a boring bar, especially a slender one, will tend to vibrate and produce a poor surface. Press a lump of plasticene onto it at the cutting end; this will alter the system’s resonant frequency and stop it vibrating.

5. Fred - about hacksawing.

Some hacksaw frames, especially those with a wing nut for tensioning, tend to twist the blade after prolonged use, so check the blade’s straightness before using it. It is impossible to cut a straight line with a twisted blade. It’s probably time you splashed out on a decent hacksaw anyway.

4. Fred—about tapping a hole.

When tapping a hole, counter bore the tapping size hole one thread’s depth to the thread’s o/d. The tap will sit more upright at the beginning and any burr produced will be below the surface.

3. Stoker RN (Retired)—about tapping holes in plate.

When tapping holes in plate, and after the tap has cut through, clean the swarf off the flutes before unscrewing. If you are tapping a blind hole, give the item a tap on the bench to clear the swarf in the flutes down to the bottom of the hole. This will ease unscrewing the tap, give a cleaner thread, and save on breakages with the attendant problems of removing the broken tap.

2. “Algy”- about annealing aluminium.

Here is a tip I learned at school, good old Huish’s Grammar School in South Road. Aluminium sheet can be worked very much like copper. It is soft and malleable as my school ashtray project demonstrated to me. (I wonder where it is? I have not seen it for years but it will be around somewhere!) However, also like copper, it work hardens and must be annealed before it cracks. Also just like copper, this is done by heating and quenching but some care must be taken when heating. If you try to get it red hot, like copper, it will melt! The solution to this is to rub the metal with a piece of ordinary bathroom soap. When heated, the soap will, very conveniently, go black just at the right temperature. The sample can then be quenched and working can continue.

1. Noel - about Stainless Steel Balls and Springs.

Pump type household soap dispensers are a source of stainless steel balls and springs—the best found to date being the “Carex” brand which contain 1 x 1/8” and 1 x 3/16” balls and a spring of varying diameter. Other brands may provide better springs but the balls are often plastic.

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