Three, Three, Three Projects In One.

[Troutsqueezer]

Guess you have to be kind of old to remember that commercial, and live in the States. Anyhow...

I started an Upshur Hit and Miss build thread some time ago. It's lost in the archives now and I'm not going to revive it even though I'm still working on it. Instead, I'm going to post progress on three engines I'm building simultaneously. It's fun making a part for one, then making a part for the next, another part for the third and back to the first engine again. Keeps my mind from obsessing over a single build. While I'm waiting for parts or tooling for one engine, I can work on the other two.

As mentioned, the first engine is the Upshur build which I have referenced to in earlier posts. The second is Elmer's #4 Beam - it's small and cute. Third is Monsieur Bog's Paddleducks, lots of little parts to make for that one and it looks like fun. My wife liked it when she saw a picture so it's as much for her as for me.

Here is a pic of all three. As you can see, I've got the engine block for the Upshur nearly finished. The cylinder in the foreground is cast iron and is part of the Paddleducks build. The flywheel and base is Elmer's Beam.

I tried to be fancy with the finish on the cast iron block. I used a Dremel grinding wheel trying for that swirly effect. It took on a different character than what I was shooting for but it looks good enough.

Close up shot of the flywheel for Elmer's Beam. I had an experimental brass flywheel hanging around but it was too small for the engine. I turned a piece of aluminum to get the desired diameter. The brass adds weight and the aluminum adds size and together they look happy, so it came out well.

I don't think this will be a build thread per se, as I don't plan on documenting all the steps I take. I'll just post some progress pics from time to time. Thanks for looking guys.

-Trout

 

[bentprop]

Love that flywheel,Trout,the different materials really make it stand out.
Re the "bogster" block,I hope you didn't do that on the mating surfaces.Could give you some sealing problems :-\.

 

[cidrontmg]

I´ve done a number of such two-metal flywheels, but always with an aluminium hub and bronze/brass rim. An alu rim won´t add much to the inertia of a flywheel, a lead rim would ;D But it wouldn´t look as nice.

 

[zeeprogrammer]

3 nice projects to watch! Yay!

Guess you have to be kind of old to remember that commercial, and live in the States.

I remember.

I don't think this will be a build thread per se, as I don't plan on documenting all the steps I take. I'll just post some progress pics from time to time.

Now I'm disappointed.

 

[Troutsqueezer]

bentprop - I've considered the possibility of leakage on any sealing surfaces for the Paddleducks block and will take the necessary steps to avoid that if the problem presents itself but I appreciate the heads up.

cidrontmg - Elmer stated that any metal could be used for the flywheel so I figured a percentage of brass coupled to some aluminum would offer more momentum than aluminum alone. Don't have any brass nor steel in 2.5" diameter hanging around so had to make do. If anyone wants to send me some large diameter brass, I'm open to it. ;D

Zee - you know how much work it is to document setups for an engine build and I've already done two in the last 9 months. I'll fully document my 50% scale Big Boy locomotive when I get started on that. Besides, I'm no Metal Butcher (where is he, anyway?) I'm lazy this year. More drinking, less documenting. *beer*

 

[zeeprogrammer]

I'll just post some progress pics from time to time.

stickpoke stickpoke

;D

 

[Troutsqueezer]

OK.... I get it! ;D

I am pretty proud of my Upshur Hit-N-Miss cylinder I made last weekend. I'll take a pic tonight.

 

[b.lindsey]

It driving me crazy Trout....I am old enough and grew up here in the States, and I can hear the jingle in my head but can't for the life of me remember the product? Help me out please before i fry my brain... :big:

Bill

BTW...all three projects look great !!

 

[Lakc]

It driving me crazy Trout....I am old enough and grew up here in the States, and I can hear the jingle in my head but can't for the life of me remember the product? Help me out please before i fry my brain... :big:

Bill

BTW...all three projects look great !!

It slices, dices, and makes Julienne potatoes. ???

 

[rleete]

It was for a breath mint, b.lindsey. Can't recall the brand, but I remember it well. One of the first commercials I got sick of seeing. It played for weeks and seemed to be on all the time.

 

[Troutsqueezer]

But it wasn't just a breath mint! It was three, three, three mints in one! It's a breath mint! It's a candy mint! Its a... its a... what was the third one? Must have been a sore throat mint but that doesn't have the right jingle.

I forget the brand name too but rleete is right, it played so often that 40 years later it's still in my brain (or what's left of it). I think there was a famous set of good- looking triplet gals doing the pitching. It played around the same time as Katie with her Ice Blue Secret commercials.

 

[b.lindsey]

Google to the rescue...maybe.... See if this is what you were referring to...though it was only "two mints in one" instead of three, but hey 40 years will do that to ya. :big:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8zwnXjIjPM[/ame]

 

[mklotz]

Damn, one can find anything on the net...and therein lies the problem. There's a huge number of things that one should never be able to find again.

 

[Troutsqueezer]

Progress is slow but steady. Got the cylinder for the Upshur Hit & Miss made. It's not pushed all the way into the block yet. Need to sand the sleeve down a teeny bit to get a good fit.

Also made the column for Elmer's Beam. It's going to be a dainty little engine. Still need to round off the tabs and drill a couple of holes.

 

[zeeprogrammer]

Awesome looking cylinder. It's just missing one tiny little thing.
How about a quick description of how you made it? Especially those 'slots' (?) going down the side. I'm particularly interested in knowing how you cleaned them up.

I saw in another thread that you've been at this hobby for just about a year. (Did I get that right?) Your work is pretty amazing. I may need to come out your way for tips and techniques. (That or a flatbed that I can put your shop on.)

Remind me again what your lathe and mill is. I think we have the same X2 mill (HF).

 

[Troutsqueezer]

Gonna make me work, huh Zee? OK, fair enough. I have to type fast because the wife and I are about to take a trip down to the bay area (San Francisco) to look at a Kubota tractor I've had my eye on. Now that's my idea of something fun to do! Been wanting to buy one for twenty years and I may get that chance today.

For the cylinder, I started with a 1.5" aluminum rod about 5 inches long. I milled the slots first about half the length of the rod. I held it in the vice to do this just as you would squeeze anything in a vice. Rotating it 180 degrees to mill the opposing side was easy because the rod would center itself on the first slot as it rested on the bottom of the vice. You and I have the same mill but I have added the $40 air spring kit and DRO's on all axes.

From there it went into the lathe and again, mine is the same as yours, complete with crappy tailstock alignment. I ground a bit especially for the grooves. I'll post a pic later today or tomorrow but suffice to say it is kind of a wedge-shaped device. I took it slow and easy, using a weld magnet (what else?) jury rigged with a dial indicator to track the carriage movement as I incremented over .094" from groove to space to groove. If you look close at the pic you can see I was pretty sloppy with that process as some of the fins are thicker than others. For depth control I cut the first groove to the same depth as the horizontal slots and was lazy for the remaining grooves/slots and put a light behind the workpiece and eyeballed each slot to match the depth of the previous slot. I'm using the terms slot and groove interchangeably here but I am talking about the fins. I knew the depth wasn't a critical dimension. After that I drilled a hole for the piston down the center starting with a .25" drill working my way up to a .5" drill. Then I set the lathe up for boring and bored out to fit the steel sleeve. I went the easy route on the sleeve and ordered the correct size tube from Metals On Line for a mere $2.49 or something like that. I used the sleeve to gauge the bore as I got closer to the finished size. For cleaning up the slots I ran some fine sandpaper between the slots as it turned on the lathe and followed up with Scotchbrite. That did the job as there were few, if any, sharp overhanging edges to clear out.

I started this hobby around August last year. Have you noticed that when you see parts others have made on this forum that they usually look very nice and everything looks to be precision made? I think it is because of the nature of machining and the close tolerances compared to other hobbies. When I look at the parts you've made, Zee, I think your parts look pretty amazing as I do with most members here. But then, just to put things back into perspective I look at Cedge's website and George B's stuff and other folks' stuff and I realize I've only scratched the paint off the surface.

 

[zeeprogrammer]

Well I thought we had the same lathe and mill (I do have the extension and belt drive...but no DRO).

So...same equipment but far different results! I appreciate your compliment of my work but there's no comparison to your excellent results.

Interesting you have the same tailstock issue. How are you able to get good cylinders/piston fits? Am I off-base to be thinking that I 'must' do something about mine? Or maybe mine is in even more off. I'm hoping it's that I'm just not being precise enough (he says hoping it's an easier problem to take care of than grinding the base of the tailstock). Still, I'm in the process of tweaking/adjusting the lathe anyway.

Thanks for the description of what you did. That helps a lot.

Yes...Cedge and George are in an entirely different class. You look to graduate far sooner than I can hope to for myself. :big:

 

[Troutsqueezer]

I can take my tailstock and even tho it's tightened to the ways, I can twist the darn thing ever so slightly and see it move. So I twist it to align the live center or bit or whatever I have in the tailstock to the center of the workpiece. There is usually a small circle or sliver sticking out from the workpiece after I 've done some facing on it to reference to. I can see Dean and Marv cringing as I write this. :big: But hey, that's what you do with Harbor Freight lathes. Ha.

I also have a boring head and will bore on the mill for most of my cylinders.

As for graduating sooner than yourself, I don't think so. You ask the right questions. I just blunder along. Where do you think I've picked up a lot of advice from? Your 65 page threads, my friend.

-Trout

 

[doubletop]

Oh Damn; so all us new guys have been watching each others threads expecting them to contain good advice?

Just think what we might achieve if we all knew what we were doing? ;D

Pete

 

[Troutsqueezer]

Come to think of it, maybe this is why I've gone to showing the finished parts now instead of documenting the setups. ;D

Good advice and Troutsqueezer posts don't belong in the same sentence unless it's someone giving me the advice.