I mentioned in one of the threads about welding that I was working on my
first milling project to learn some basic metal working skills and thought
I'd share it with the group.

I took an introduction to automotive machine shop class this summer at the
same community college (NOVA in Manassas VA) where I took my 6 welding
classes and I've been learning some basic milling machine operations for
the first time in my life.

Though the class had no formal projects, I made up my own project to create
a 3" square dice out of 6 pieces of 3/8" aluminum. Here's the finished
work:

http://www.newsreader.com/red_dice.jpg

Though you can't tell from the picture, all the sides also have rabbet
joints in them to make them interlock with each other. That added yet
another level of complexity to my project.

It's powder coated - which is something else I'm learning how to do this
summer by finding a old used oven on craigslist and running a 50 amp 220
volt circuit to my garage. I picked up the powder coat starter kit from
Eastwood after someone here mentioned it. Running the power to the garage
and adding a sub-panel to allow me to support more 220 power tool outlets
in my shop ended up costing 6 times what the oven itself cost!

The class was mostly an introduction to all the specialized machine tools
used for rebuilding engines, and only spent a few hours on the mill and
lathe but it had lots of lab time where we could play with anything we
wanted. My plan was to spend about half the class working with the mill
and half with the lathe (I've never used either before this class) but this
project I created took a lot more time than I expected and I ended up
spending it all on the mill. I've only got one class left now to start
playing with the lathe!

Now I've added a mill and lathe to my "must have some day soon" list.
Metal working is such fun. Like welding, I don't know why I waited until
so late in life to start learning it!

--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
http://NewsReader.Com/