Lathe parts, tooling and safety upgrades

[Joseph]

,Good afternoon,

I have been asked a few times recently about progress on various upgrades, repairs and parts for the 'dirty and dusty' end of the space. 

For the most part, the only thing stopping someone finishing the projects has been the fact that I have forgotten to order the parts, and given the sum of these goes over the small purchase limit, I'm emailing here to request that I am able to buy them.

I will briefly explain what I would like us to get, then put a list at the bottom with prices and the source.

For the belt sander, we still need an on-off switch. My suggestion is one from Arc, which happens to be the same as the main power switch of the lathe. It will prevent the sander turning on when initially plugged in (until the on button is pressed). It would cost £16.32.

There was some discussion about more tool holders for the lathe. I would suggest that we get another two, though this is a quality of life upgrade for projects that require lots of tools to be used (and to reduce the likelihood that someone has to change out tooling). Two new holders from Arc would cost £33.40.

I would also like to get some grease for some of the bearing surfaces on the lathe (mainly the handwheels and leadscrew bearings), and so that we have some in the space in general. I don't know very much about grease, but I am currently ering on the side of some lithium grease from Zoro, at £10.99 (for 500g, which should last us a long time). My main reason for suggesting something like this is that it will likely be used to lubricate the dead centre against a workpiece, which generates quite a lot of pressure and can get quite hot. As well as this, it should be fine for the spindle bearings, if the decision is made to change to tapered roller bearings when the current angular contact ones wear out.

We also have very few of the 'recommended' sizes of drill for tapping holes. Above about M6 it probably doesn't matter, but we also seem to have very few 'good' drill bits below 6mm in general (i.e. I'm not counting the titanium coated gold-coloured ones).

Therefore I suggest we get a few more HSS-Cobalt drills.
Below 6mm, I suggest we get 3 of each of the tapping drill sizes for the Metric Coarse threads (which we have a full set of taps for), along with the whole number sizes.
Above 6mm, I suggest we just get one of each of the tapping drill sizes, up to M12. This is because above 6mm they are far less likely to be snapped, will take longer to blunten to a state of uselessness, and larger drill bits are more expensive. The drill bits we have above 6mm seem to be in fairly good condition too, so I don't think we really need more of the whole number sizes for the time being.

This would cost around £56.

Switch: ArcEuroTrade (SC2-104) - £16.32

Tool Holder: ArcEuroTrade (090-070-00353) - £16.70 each (x2)

Grease: Zoro (ZT1002051S) - £10.99

Drills: ArcEuroTrade (060-021-00**3) ~£56

Joseph

[Joseph]

I have spoken to a few other members in person, and someone has donated enough grease to last us quite a while.

If no-one has any objections, I will get the switch, toolholders and the following sizes of drill bit when I have time to sort out the order.

Tapping drills:
2.5mm (M3)

3.3mm (M4)

4.2mm (M5)

5mm (M6)

6.8mm (M8) - At the request of another member

'Whole number' sizes:
2mm

3mm

4mm

We only have very cheap drill bits below 4mm, and they have a tendency to snap far more easily than they should when working on metal. 

They also have a tendency to permanently bend a little in some cases, so better drill bits of those sizes will probably be useful.

This will come, in total, to £75.48.

Joseph