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Yesterday I was struggling a little bit with getting a crisp engraving. Switched out my 4Flute 1/4" chamfer endmill for a 2Flute 1/4" Spot drill that I forgot I had and its a night and day difference! was finally able to work the speeds and feeds into a recipe I am pretty happy with. It is just slightly less useful than your project Shinyribs :lol3

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Shinyribs said:
Whoa, Danno. Kant's that big and long came from big trees! I'm pretty sure I've never even seen a cypress around here. Vast majority of the trees at my place are red, white and chestnut oak. Lots of tulip poplar. Pines and cedars are few and far between.

Productive evening in the shop. Cutting down box tubing and rewelding it in to smaller pieces of box tubing is so much fun....that's a lie. Telescoping adjustments for the bead breaker to account for different widths and diameters. Half past midnight, so final measurements will wait till I have a fresh brain. Looking like it might actually work, though. 😁 Being able to simply mill a slot in tubing is a joy. So far, got $24 invested in a duck head from eBay. 
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for $600 more you could have bought one .... But I like your style.


I have made a metric ton of tools over the years, and before each job I ask myself these basic questions....
  • Can I make it for less than I can buy it?
  • Do I have the time to make it? (i.e. do I need it right now?..)
  • Will I enjoy my time to make it? (i.e. Fiddling about for hours ...)
Please keep us up to date as this progresses...

AFWIW, Your Project is looking good !
 
Alan F. said:
Over on the Royal Enfield forums a question came up about chain breakers, there are some light units out there with bodies made of billet or cast aluminum but they're well over $100 and they're labeled light duty.

I've got the Harbor Freight model
HF chain breaker
image_16332.jpg

I'm thinking about making an aluminum handle for it and drilling some speed holes to cut down on weight.

Thoughts?
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one can trim a few oz from this as shown below. \


1685861394355.png



The set up and milling/lathe time , or grinding time, is then trivial... provided someone has the time to do it.

or just pack it as is, and eat one less hamburger.

I have been on a lot of long 7-10 day trips on a bike, and saving 4 oz here and there don't matter to me when I am packing 5g of fuel on the CRF450
 
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psykown said:
Yesterday I was struggling a little bit with getting a crisp engraving. Switched out my 4Flute 1/4" chamfer endmill for a 2Flute 1/4" Spot drill that I forgot I had and its a night and day difference! was finally able to work the speeds and feeds into a recipe I am pretty happy with. It is just slightly less useful than your project Shinyribs :lol3

nc_ohc=IENKNbb8Tb0AX8FflCV&_nc_ht=scontent.ftul2-1.jpg
LhyUF7lvf22JVsBrEvk6GufZ3U&_nc_ht=scontent.ftul2-1.jpg
Click to expand...
EuroMoto mentioned a while back about 2 flute mills being better for aluminum as 4 flutes crowds the chips and causes recutting ( at least that was my understanding) and it really seemed to make a difference for me as well.

I dunno if anything will be useful or not, but yours is certainly more technologically advanced 😁

You know, if you could add a couple nubs on the backside you could turn out some pretty cool moto style belt buckles there.
 
MVI said:
for $600 more you could have bought one .... But I like your style.


I have made a metric ton of tools over the years, and before each job I ask myself these basic questions....
  • Can I make it for less than I can buy it?
  • Do I have the time to make it? (i.e. do I need it right now?..)
  • Will I enjoy my time to make it? (i.e. Fiddling about for hours ...)
Please keep us up to date as this progresses...

AFWIW, Your Project is looking good !
Click to expand...
I started building one a couple years ago and got waylayed. Probably should've just bought one ( I don't need it now), but it's high time I break myself of my procrastination habits 😁
 
Ya the logs are the deciding factor for beams. Thankfully I hope we never go over 16x16 and more likely 12x12 or 14x14 on 20 plus feet. Also the oak slabs from the stub end can be a little dangerous. Cypress is bad enough. The stub can be trimmed down. Then the log is rotated and the piece falls into the pit. Alot safer than a flimsy long piece with 300 lbs at the end flying off the mill. The crazy part is watching one person handle beams if the leverage is right and the person weighs enough. I watched my smaller coworker ride the beam with his feet off the ground in the pivot swing move. Same technigue is used to get the live edge planks to the edger.

I am lazy and wanted to build a bead breaker for years.
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I used a ratchet strap with no hooks and a block of wood in a pinch. The block could be modified with handle and a cam like profile. Coat hanger retrieved the last of the valve stem with out dropping it.
 
Shinyribs said:
EuroMoto mentioned a while back about 2 flute mills being better for aluminum as 4 flutes crowds the chips and causes recutting ( at least that was my understanding) and it really seemed to make a difference for me as well.

I dunno if anything will be useful or not, but yours is certainly more technologically advanced 😁

You know, if you could add a couple nubs on the backside you could turn out some pretty cool moto style belt buckles there.
Click to expand...
Yeah I should have gotten a 2 flute to begin with but with this 4 Flute Ive gotten great results with chamfers so I hadnt needed to look for better. Now that I have run the 2 flute though I think its my go to for anything engraved/spot drilled/ chamfered, it cuts clean and fast
 
psykown said:
Yesterday I was struggling a little bit with getting a crisp engraving. Switched out my 4Flute 1/4" chamfer endmill for a 2Flute 1/4" Spot drill that I forgot I had and its a night and day difference! was finally able to work the speeds and feeds into a recipe I am pretty happy with. It is just slightly less useful than your project Shinyribs :lol3

nc_ohc=IENKNbb8Tb0AX8FflCV&_nc_ht=scontent.ftul2-1.jpg
LhyUF7lvf22JVsBrEvk6GufZ3U&_nc_ht=scontent.ftul2-1.jpg
Click to expand...
We use a 1/16" ballnose. Go about .003 deep and it will look titts. Some programs will vary the depth to make the lines fatter or skinnier. Makes cursive look real nice.
 
I do need to try that for some cursive, I think my smallest ballmill at the moment is a 1/8 and it was just to chunky for what I was looking for. Some of the guys on the Tormach group were saying some crazy small (to me) ballmills that they use, Right now I like my bigger harder to break endmills :lol3
 
Somehow I spent two hours down the rabbit hole of converting my tiny HF mill to belt drive. Lots of forum posts about broken plastic drive gears led me to a kit that's still available. I bookmarked it.
It's a bit pricey but it's a well engineered finished product.
 
ZoomerP said:
I know a guy with a similarly upgraded mill I'd like to own, but I need to stop buying kayaks first. :photog
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If you stop buying kayaks long enough you can afford a mill to build you own kayaks! :lol3

This Tormach 440 is just barely on the spectrum of being a real mill tbh but its been a great stepstone into learning how to operate them. With a little luck I can make some money with it now to finish paying for itself and start saving for the downpayment on a fullsize.

If anyone wants a set of heavy duty stunt style rearsets for their 04 ZX6R it'll help fund tooling and eventually said new machine :lol3
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My shop has a wooden floor and I didn't trust it to hold a Bridgeport. I'm happy with my tabletop mill. It's got more capabilities then I've got skill, but being a very simple machine does make some jobs very fiddly.
 
I assume it is adjustable for various diameters
 
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