On Aug 26, 1:26 am, "Roger Mills" wrote:
In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
Matty F wrote:



On Aug 25, 8:21 pm, "Roger Mills" wrote:
In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
Matty F wrote:

I was making a clamp to match an old one that holds the lid on a
large electric motor.
The finished clamp in place on the motor:
http://i26.tinypic.com/n6f3o0.jpg

It still needs to be painted black. What a pity!
The patent date on the motor is Oct 9, 1888

The finished clamp together with the original that had to be copied:
http://i32.tinypic.com/fwhsgz.jpg

To save cutting a huge block of steel, an extension was welded on
the handle. The weld was tidied up with an angle grinder!
http://i25.tinypic.com/eiqmr.jpg

I tried my hand at forging this rusty old bolt by heating it up red
hot and flattening the head with a big hammer. I cut the thread much
further:
http://i25.tinypic.com/2qmes9l.jpg

Halfway through chopping up the big block of steel, in case you
missed the earlier discussion:
http://i25.tinypic.com/27yuxz6.jpg

Brilliant! I only wish that I had the equipment and skills to be
able to make things like that.

The only expensive machine that I used was a metal bandsaw. It would
be possible to use a hand hacksaw but that would be hard work.
Otherwise an angle grinder could do most of it. I used a sandpaper
flapper disk in the grinder for finishing work.
I used a drill press for 4 holes but a portable drill would have done
instead.

And the welding?

I'm not that good at welding, but I knew we had an expert welder
available. Otherwise I would have used a longer bit of steel in the
first place.

I think it would have been almost imposible to saw accurately enough with a
hand-held hacksaw - they wander off the line too easily!

I don't think I could have done that much hacksawing by hand, even
though it didn't have to be that accurate since I knew I'd be doing a
lot of grinding.
But I design jobs to suit the tools available. The metal bandsaw is
rather wonderful.
I'd like a small hand-held grinder. Perhaps a Dremel, but I have never
seen one. It's not clear from their website whether it will grind
steel.