"J. Nielsen" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 21 May 2005 18:28:50 -0500, "Morris Dovey" wrote:

Heh heh! And of course, there's the "handedness" of the spirals...

Bingo!!

We got the a blank spindle & a huge bronze guide bushing with the helix
already EDM'ed through it. This was a couple of weeks before the "pigtail"
arrived, so I just ground the helix to match the bushing, and we shipped
them
both back.

A week later another spindle & and bushing arrived...

You know, Morris, I think we can get a good "metal man" out of you. All you
have to do, to switch from wood to metal, is mentally adding another zero to
the right of the decimal point on the drawings. g

Thanks for the good thoughts - but but I don't think my 3-axis router was
really designed to handle metal. Replacing it with a CNC mill to handle
metal projects would probably add at least another zero to the /left/ of the
decimal point - and I already can't afford the 5-axis router I really
wanted!

I'm working on three new CNC machines - built mostly of wood (with some
aluminum and plastic parts). Two of them are for metalworking and one is for
woodworking. Building useful machinery with wood poses some interesting
challenges but does allow me to go fast and cheap - and will provide me with
tooling that I couldn't buy even if I won the lottery.

I'm starting to enjoy building the tools more than I enjoy using 'em - and
I'm not sure that's a completely Good Thing.

Anyway, I enjoy the kind of challenge you presented. I enjoy seeing what
people here have done with metal. And I feel privileged to be able to learn
from people who've spent entire careers doing what I'm trying to learn about

--
Morris