Shop Made Tools

[Jack F]

That is a beautiful work of art, it will serve you a life time.

Jack.

[chip's]

Very nice work. Soft face hammers are so nice to have. When they have replaceable faces, it is even better.

[sasquatch]

Very nice, thanks for posting this.

[vpt]

Yes very nice mallet indeed!

I am curious is it stainless? It has the look of it to me but you never know. Is the handle solid or hollow? I often wonder about balance in a hammer/mallet and using a heavier handle opposed to using a light handled hammer/mallet. Most all store hammers/mallets have lighter handles it seems.

[Deus Machina]

I've never had an issue knurling. You may want to put some shims in the chuck jaws and knurl the grip portion, then chamfer the edges again. If not, grip-tape might work out perfectly if it's not something that gets overly oily.

Aside from my personal preference for knurling everything, the design looks great! None of my attempts have been anywhere near.

[goodscrap]

In preference to tape consider heat shrink tube, it doesn't leave a sticky mess, so when it's worn you can just cut it off and re-do it. You can get loads of different colours, by the meter length on eBay.

Or you could cut grooves and pop O-rings in, or light grooves and mill lengthways slots for a grip, for both those options I'd doٌa test piece first, that is a lovely job and be a shame to mess it up.

Brian

[ajl959]

Thanks guys, means a lot

It's all just 6082 aluminium. As much as it would have been nice to make a stainless one it would be a bit much for me on a mini lathe and mill I think.

Balance wise it's slightly top heavy, and obviously different side to side given the bronze and nylon but not excessive and feels ok to hold. The handle is solid and although I probably won't do anything with it, but I figured that if the balance bothered me I could either hollow out the end of the handle and press in something heavier (or just make an end cap for it) then drill some holes in the head behind the nylon face and do similar. Had considered putting bbs/shot in it but it's only going to be used for tapping things into place or alignment, not any heavy hitting.

Have knurled stuff in the past and result has been 'ok' but the small test I done the diameter just seems wrong and I wasn't brave enough to carry on any further.

Handlebar tape, like you'd use on a road bike, isn't sticky so there's no worry there. It just gets secured with some tape at either end but doesn't leave any mess Dad suggested heat shrink too, and he will have some lying out if that didn't work. I've seen some really cool grip patterns used on custom torches and do have access to a rotary table but I am now afraid to make a mess of it... and so the tape seems easiest and will revisit it later once I've more experience

[Tony]

First project for the surface grinder.
Gratuitously surface ground, of course

10* diamond angle. Has 3 positions, two for truing face and one for the side.

Not hardened.. and got a little scuffed up.

[dian]

how do you hold the diamonds? are they pressed in?

btw, i dont get why everybody makes the angled holes, when you can just offset a straight diamond.

[Toolguy]

If the wheel on the grinder turns clockwise like most do, you want that diamond pointing the other way and the tip a little to the left of center. Otherwise it might catch in the wheel and blow up the wheel.

[Tony]

oops, should have added, this is an english grinder (capco)
so the steering wheel is on the wrong side, and the wheel spins counterclockwise!

Toolguy is right on the money.

Diamonds are 7/16" shank, slip fit, with a small set screw (not in any of the views).

[mars-red]

Sorry for the poor picture quality, but here's a steel bench block I made for my brother as a Christmas present. It's just under 4" in diameter, made from some scrap steel I got from the local power plant's machine shop:

[flutedchamber]

Sorry for the poor picture quality, but here's a steel bench block I made for my brother as a Christmas present. It's just under 4" in diameter, made from some scrap steel I got from the local power plant's machine shop:

Excellent work. A present I am sure he will always treasure.

[dian]

so what exactly do you use that for? it doesnt go in a vice, right. why not?

[flutedchamber]

No, it sits on the bench. You use it as a backup to remove pins from something. You put the pinned piece over a corresponding hole and use a drift then pin punch to remove the pin.