The Bucket Foundry

[Ocean1]

so then what are the glass fibre petrol tanks made from unless they were ducati they hold most of their petrol

Dunno, you'd have to ask Mr Ducati. I did a Montessa Cota tank repair once, using plain old polyester resin and last I heard it was good. Tends not to see much alcohol though, and ethanol in particular has tiny wee molecules that penetrate the resin matrix, (especially where fibres haven't been fully wetted out) and eats one of the related, un-attached resin additives.

I suspect that today's NZ petrol contains enough ethanol to be a problem for polyester. It might cause problems for vinyl ester too, but based on slightly dated industry advice it's less likely.

[F5 Dave]

Epoxy you dildos.
I'm having a bad night

[F5 Dave]

My wife lost her job today so excuse me for being grumpy. She means everything to me.

[Flettner]

Another Saturday, another cast. Top case of the sleeve / FOS engine and top case of the Heat Ranger engine ( 700 twin ). Should have been two Heat Ranger top cases but I didn't melt enough alloy. I'll have another cast tomorrow to get the other case poured as well. Off to Heat Treatments on Monday to turn these castings into T6 temper. These castings used a core to make the reed housing hollow. Would have taken photos of mould assembly but camera was out of power.

[F5 Dave]

Stella work Neil

[Flettner]

Back from Heat Treatments, CC601 in T6 state, ready to machine. Cylinders are cast in LM13 and are still at Heat Treatments, should see them tomorrow ish.

[Flettner]

Sleeve cylinder fits crank case now.

[Yow Ling]

Great work Neil.

Heres something interesting , homebuilt CNC lathe/grinder 1 micron accuracy, he isn't your normal home builder !

[WilDun]

Yow Ling,
That guy has to be a pretty keen machine builder all right! - wonder if that was just a retirement hobby or did he make a living from it.

Flettner. I see you're making a lot of progress - will be watching with interest. Are you likely to be making your own castings (ie for your "bread & butter" gearboxes)?
How is the furnace lining standing up? - then, I guess you can easily replace it any time you like!.

Think I'll try your method of construction, as I dropped the lid from mine and smashed it (replaced it with a saucer from a plant pot, sawed a hole in it, threw on a layer of wool - a lot easier and lighter.
May try and do a melt this weekend ie so long as I don't get swamped by a cyclone!

[F5 Dave]

Ahh beardy weirdy. My lathe is easily accurate to within a mm.

[Yow Ling]

Ahh beardy weirdy. My lathe is easily accurate to within a mm.

Roughly accurate to a mm ?

[Yow Ling]

Yow Ling,
That guy has to be a pretty keen machine builder all right! - wonder if that was just a retirement hobby or did he make a living from it.

He is retired, but he made his living in optics, the company he founded was sold to Kodak for 1 billion Us$, they made computer to plate machines for the printing industry, as well as imagesetters and some spy camera stuff. his other videos could be worth a look

[F5 Dave]

Don't you go dissing my Sheldon. It was made in Chickcargo. Illinoise. Actualy I should probably say to within a 32nd to be in keeping.

[Grumph]

Yow Ling,
That guy has to be a pretty keen machine builder all right! - wonder if that was just a retirement hobby or did he make a living from it.

machine tool building is a whole subset of weird on it's own.

Some years back, i had the dubious pleasure of helping move the collection belonging to the father of a guy who rode my bikes. A jeweller by trade and a machine tool builder as a hobby. The son had spent a large part of his engineering apprenticeship machining acme threads on leadscrews in his lunch hours...
I'd have to say I've never seen more innovative uses for Suzuki A50 gearboxes. Among the stuff was a family of shapers, smallest about 3 foot bed, biggest about 10 foot long...Vertical lathe,boring machines, you name it.
I think my father may have met him - every time I asked the old man where i could find an exotic part or similar (usually for an old brit bike) his favourite reply was "any good jeweller should have that...."

[Ocean1]

Don't you go dissing my Sheldon. It was made in Chickcargo. Illinoise. Actualy I should probably say to within a 32nd to be in keeping.

A mate has one. Does yours have a big planetary gear drive?

Some years back, i had the dubious pleasure of helping move the collection belonging to the father of a guy who rode my bikes.

There's some danger I might end up with a similar collection. I should know better, but I've just bought a distant cousin of Dave's lathe, A Monarch M50.