I Need a 200-Pound “No Trespassing” Sign
January 28th, 2009Miami Manners Strike Again
Today I’m going weld again. I hope. My efforts to create a rolling base for my bandsaw produced poor results, to put it mildly, so I got another piece of angle iron, and I am psyching myself up to give it another shot.
I wish I knew of a good way to remove rust and scale without a lot of effort. I don’t have a sandblaster yet. Last time, I used a drill with a paint-removing wheel, and it does a great job, but it takes an eternity. Maybe I should use sandpaper this time.
The milling machine question keeps rolling around in my head. First I wanted a drill press. Then I wanted a Millrite, because it would take up roughly the same amount of room and do more things. Then I wanted a Bridgeport, because it was only a little bigger than the Millrite, and I knew there was no possibility that I would ever need anything bigger.
I am now tempted to go look at the Millrite the local dealer is selling. The compelling reasons for buying a big used mill were economic. Little mills cost as much or more and do less, and it’s hard to find good used ones, and the new ones cost more than big used mills. And if you resell a little mill you bought new, you can forget about getting your money back. Although a lot of Craigslist and Ebay dreamers don’t seem to realize that. “TAIWANESE MILL/DRILL! USED IN PRODUCTION SHOP FOR 5 YEARS! PAID $3000 NEW! WILL TAKE $2900!”
Yeah, okay. I’ll be in touch.
It amazes me that people who sell used tools think they can recover almost all of their money. Warranties and years of added use are very valuable; a buyer who isn’t getting these things is entitled to a huge discount. If you’re not saving a buyer a minimum of a third of the cost of a new machine, you’re overcharging. Really, half is the minimum.
Anyway, yesterday I realized that the Millrite will fit better in the space I have, it will almost certainly do everything I want for at least a couple of years, and when I get tired of it, I can sell it without taking a big hit. If I can get the price down a little. So it doesn’t really make sense to try to cram a bigger machine in there. I can get one later, at little or no added expense. I assume most of the junk that goes with it will work with a bigger mill.
The biggest job I can foresee at the moment is milling the heads from my Harley. They’re pretty small. I don’t mean shaving them down to increase the compression. I mean fixing the bad factory geometry that impedes gas flow. It’s a Harley; surely I don’t have to explain that the engineering is bad.
By the way, can anyone tell me what the lever settings on an aftermarket petcock mean? I had to replace the pathetic Harley unit, and the new one (Golan) points in three directions: back, sideways, and forward. The directions don’t say which means what.
The big mill question is, how do I evaluate the machine? I have received a lot of useful tips, ranging from, “If it runs, buy it, because nothing serious ever goes wrong with milling machines,” to, “If you can’t have it tested by MIT and NASA, you are almost certain to bring home a machine that is only valuable for scrap.”
I exaggerate, but not as badly as you think. People on forums literally say you can buy a machine that is so worthless it has to be scrapped.
A lot of old machines come from teaching environments. My best guess is that they would be better buys than industrial machines. Although I do have visions of Beavis and Butt-head in shop class, playing Rock ’em Sock ’em Robots with the equipment.
I got some pointers on checking machines out, but ultimately, a leap of faith will be required.
I also need to buy some rocks. There is a house going up across the street, and the folks working on it need gentle reminders not to park here. A cracked differential would fill the bill nicely, and a couple of big rocks are the way to achieve that goal. Miami is incredible; people will stand in your face and tell you they’re entitled to park in your yard (on your popup sprinklers) because the strip by the road belongs to the government. That isn’t true, and even if it were, that’s how trash acts. It’s not acceptable. In other words, it’s perfectly acceptable in Miami, but in a civilized area, it would get you shot, and there would be no possibility of an indictment. This is why rocks and concrete yard ornaments are such huge sellers here. They’re all over the place. In other parts of the country, they are unnecessary, because people know how to behave.
I spent some time yesterday Googling gorgeous homes in the middle of the state. Cheap. Huge. Not surrounded by contentious barbarians who are constantly at each other’s throats. Oh, yes. It WILL happen.
By the way, I did not delete my blogroll. It’s hosted at Blogrolling, and evidently, they are having problems. I can’t even log in to check on it. Hopefully it will come back to life soon.
January 28th, 2009 at 10:20 AM
We’re generally using ‘not new’ iron in our fabrications, so are used to dealing with rust and scale. There’s a 4″ cup-style wire brush on a 7″ air-powered angle grinder that never moves from the bench. It does a good job of cleaning things up, and paint covers a lot of sins.
You might want to consider a stick welder. Home Depot lists a Lincoln K1170 welder, which I believe is AC/DC, for $269.00. Get one of those and some 3/32″ 6011 rods and you’re good to go. If you can’t weld with that setup, you’ll never be able to weld anything. 🙂
If you’ve not yet installed that new petcock, you should be able to determine the postion/function by blowing through it. Usually, one position is ‘off’, one connects the outlet to a standpipe, which is the ‘normal’ setting, the other position connects the outlet to a hole right at the tank fitting, this is ‘reserve’.
January 28th, 2009 at 10:46 AM
Here’s a little Craigslist tip – you can go to http://www.CraigZoom.com , which will allow you to search ALL the classifieds in Craiglist, instead of searching city by city. Depending on what you are looking for, this can be a big time saver. I bet you can find someone who will sell it for less than $2900. 🙂
January 28th, 2009 at 11:32 AM
“In other parts of the country, they are unnecessary, because people know how to behave.”
Well, we have curbs to stop them too.
January 28th, 2009 at 12:13 PM
Blogrolling.com has been hosed for a couple months now, I think. All you can do is add links (if you have the “blogroll it” widget on your browser.)
.
I keep meaning to look for a replacement…. Maybe this week.
January 28th, 2009 at 12:14 PM
How does your city feel about fences?
The standard fence around here is 3″ welded steel pipe. You have a welder. Put up a low (3′ or so) single-rail steel pipe fence along the front of your property. Paint it white and plant something under it. The usual treatment is to weld caps on the posts; we can buy convex caps intended for that purpose at Home Depot. I don’t know if yours would stock them.
As jdunmyer hints, your next purchase needs to be an angle grinder, air driven. Get a cup-style wire brush and a relatively coarse grinding wheel. Use the wire brush to clean things up, and the grinding wheel to grind angles into the edges of the steel before welding, for better penetration.
Regards,
Ric
January 28th, 2009 at 1:21 PM
Machine your own firearms receivers.
Cough.
January 28th, 2009 at 1:44 PM
Golans are setup a little differently than most aftermarket petcocks.
Full forward is ON, full backward is RESERVE and 90 degrees from either is OFF. Not quite intuitive, to me. But then again, the Pingle units have very little movement between ON and RESERVE.
January 28th, 2009 at 2:35 PM
Something like this?
I’ve never used a pneumatic scaler, but it’s quite literally designed for removing rust and scale, so I imagine it ought to do it.
January 28th, 2009 at 3:46 PM
Mr. Oxyacetylene Torch is your friend for paint removal.
Caveat: Burning paint is not very lung-friendly.
He is also very useful for singing the hair off a pig prior to roasting it over a big hot fire.
Some say he can be used to welds and cut metal, but i usually wind up burning my thumb.
He is useful for breaking corroded parts apart and bending metal is a joy when Mr. Torch is helping.
January 28th, 2009 at 4:23 PM
Continuing jdunmyer’s comments, “off” on most valves has the handle perpendicular to the axis of the line outlet. Since there are two possible positions I’d bet that having the handle rotated parallel to the outlet axis through the centerline of the valve body would be the normal “on” positon, and the left over position would be the bypass flow setting.
More…I peeked at the website and their exploded drawing confirms what I said earlier. Looking down on the valve from the tank side, if the outlet fitting is at 12 o’clock, the lever at 9 o’clock would be off, 6 o’clock would be in the standpipe filter setting, and 3 o’clock would be the bypass through the lower opening in the body of the valve. Anybody agree with my read of the drawing?
January 28th, 2009 at 5:42 PM
I suppose I should have realized the scaler was a good bet. And I enjoy the sound so much, I can hardly wait to use it.
January 29th, 2009 at 11:43 AM
Scaler is good. Has an air chisel attachment also.
January 29th, 2009 at 11:46 AM
Maybe if you swept out your garage, nails and all, and it accidentally went into the lawn along the street, maybe they’d stop parking there.
January 30th, 2009 at 12:42 PM
Here is the link to the drawing:
http://www.golanproducts.com/fuel_valves.html
January 30th, 2009 at 4:56 PM
Middle part of Florida is decently nice.
At least so far. Just stay away from the Yankee Death Camps (retirement villages), and you’ll be fine.