Third hand idea

[Mcgyver]

wanted to try something with pic's...here goes.

occasionally I have to silver solder something, and holding the parts in alignment is a real pain. the commercial product below is worse that useless - complete POS



so i made of the following. fairly simple, uses solid cotters







the ball on the last one is for to-be-built arms (one day) the work surfaces are AL so SS doesn't stick and are thin so as not to be heat sinks. the small V-block is angle milled thin and peened onto the shaft, there's also a large one not shown. the larger black spring paper clips (if that’s what there called) are good for clamping, although all manner of attachments could be made

[This message has been edited by Mcgyver (edited 08-04-2005).]

[gkman11]

I Like it. Nice work. How about a photo of it in action holding something?

[rockrat]

Yea, I agree with gkman11, it all clean and stuff. What are you soldering together?

[Mcgyver]

jeez tough crowd, i just made the damn thing. first job i'll be soldering flanges on copper tube for the tiple expansion i'm building. only bothered to post thinking the idea might help someone, it was sort of made to a quick and dirty standard figuring all will get all gummed up in due course

[Tony]

mac, nice job.
usually when i solder it goes something like this:
iron in right hand
solder in left hand
part#1 under my right armpit
part#2 held firmly between my chin and chest

don't know why, but when i move in with the iron, my two parts seem to move away from me, and i have to move in closer with my iron.. and they move further.. i have to chase myself around the shop for an hour to solder two parts together.

but there is nothing like hardheaded determination to get a job done.

[dvideo]

Mcgyver...

It is a tough crowd... You bump our interest off OCC and we want a whole episode.... :>

Nice work!!

--jr

[chipeater]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by knucklehead:
mac, nice job.
usually when i solder it goes something like this:
iron in right hand
solder in left hand
part#1 under my right armpit
part#2 held firmly between my chin and chest

don't know why, but when i move in with the iron, my two parts seem to move away from me, and i have to move in closer with my iron.. and they move further.. i have to chase myself around the shop for an hour to solder two parts together.</font>

ROFLMAO

Too funny - I've done the exact same thing myself.

BTW Mcgyver - Nice work. When I discovered cotters (split) I thought that they were the slickest thing since sliced bread.

[This message has been edited by chipeater (edited 08-05-2005).]

[This message has been edited by chipeater (edited 08-05-2005).]

[jburstein]

that's a great image. I can definitely see that. If I tried it, I'd be the crazy guy down in the burn unit with 3rd degree burns on 99% of his body. The doctors would all be standing around going "and he did it with a soldering iron!?!?"

-Justin

[jkilroy]

Very nice work. Once you said what you were building I understood how you were going to use it. Again, very nice.

[Wirecutter]

Mcgyver -
Nice work! I agree that the commercial product is a PITA. I usually wind up with a solution somewhere between yours and knuclehead's. I've made a few "one or two use" fixtures, but I've never just sat down and made a proper fixture. Gets me to thinking...

Oh yeah, and regarding that Other Thread - here we have solid evidence of Intelligent Design. (Sorry, couldn't resist)