Posts by David Haywood
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to ,
Many thanks for that information, Steven! I hadn't been aware of that at all, and it could actually be a really good course for Bob in the fullness of time. Stupid question: but it wasn't entirely clear to me whether students actually attend in person -- or is it online?
And wow, those circuit boards are totally impressive, Steven. I so hate etching with acid -- and my experience with sending one-offs to PCB makers (a few years ago now, admittedly, I haven't tried OshPark) was not great in terms of cost and waiting time. That looks like a bloody wonderful alternative.
Some (probably annoying) questions:
1. What mini-mill are you using?
2. Do you have problems with flatness of the blank boards?
3. Do you use up a lot of cutters (I imagine sharpening them could be tricky) on the copper?Thanks for posting such interesting (to me, at any rate) information!
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to ,
This photo from yesterday shows what happens to people who don’t go to school, Bob!
Wow, Bob & Polly very impressed and now both vowing they won't go to school any more so they can build huge steel things like you! (I'm bloody impressed too!)
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to JonathanM,
Thanks, Johnathan M! But, oh dear, that surface planer doesn’t reflect well on Machinery House at all – no springs under the knives is quite a few cost-cutting steps too far (and I bloody hate it when fences move); I may have to rescind my previous kind words.
On the subject of surface planers, my grandfather’s last technical advice to me was regarding a buzzer (as he called a surface planer). I had stupidly pinged a hard-to-see brad in a piece of recycled timber, and put a nick in the knives. My grandfather pointed out that you can de-align the knives, i.e. put one knife slightly (more than half the width of the nick) leftward and the other knife rightward by the same amount, so that the nicks are no longer lined up, and hence each knife cancels out the effect of the nick from the other. Worked amazingly well! Just passing the knowledge on…
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to Moz,
The youtube stuff is strangely engaging, something about a small boy with clear diction who obviously understands what he’s doing.
Thanks, Moz, hopefully Bob’s enthusiasm comes across, if nothing else!
I was paying $250/year just for tank rental for one small tank of gas for my welder.
I feel your pain, Moz! My super-useful oxy-acetylene kit had to be farewelled a decade or so ago because the cylinder rental just became ridiculous. A reasonable stick welder is now far less money than a year’s rental on cylinders, but of course the oxy-acetylene kit was indispensable for cutting and heating/bending. Bob and I saw someone who’d built a little portable charcoal forge out of a large SS oven-dish and had done some amazing work with it, so we’ll probably build something along those lines to replace that particular functionality of the oxy-acetylene kit. Plasma-cutters are also very cheap now, and since we already have a compressor I guess one of those will replace the cutting function of the oxy-acetylene kit as funds allow.
It beats buying the cheapest, crappiest tool from Bunnings and hoping it lasts through the whole job
Have you tried the AEG tools from Bunnings? I had an appalling Makitapocalypse incident (four tools in a fortnight), and was talked into replacing them with AEG on the basis of the six-year warranty. I’ve given them hell nearly every day for three years and they still work brilliantly on original batteries. They’re sort of lower-middle-range trade quality but very reasonably priced.
The $50/day usage charge seems high until you start pricing even the basic gear.
That sounds very reasonable for things like access to a lathe, milling machine, surface grinder, etc. For a table-saw, band-saw, drill-press, etc. I have been amazed at the quality vs. price of some of the tools coming from China. Have you checked out Machinery House? I bought Bob & Polly’s scrollsaw from there and it’s honestly much better than my granddad’s old 60s scrollsaw at an absolute fraction of the purchase price. Mind you, you’ve got to have somewhere to put everything, of course…
Makerspace is struggling a little to come to terms with the fact that there are some people who are not safe around tools, full stop. Not for hostile people, but for thoughtless people.
Yes, I’ve come across those people even in proper tool rooms. From annoying stuff such as leaving a bandsaw table at 89deg instead of 90deg, to a wonderful incident where someone left a chuck key in the back of a lathe-chuck. High excitement ensued (though no-one hurt).
My dad used to be in charge of safety at Fletchers many years ago, and he is a fan of starting people young. He reckons the scariest thing he’s ever seen was a class of fine art students let loose in a carpentry workshop (this from a man who was recently resuscitated back from a flatline)…
Edit: Not to knock the fine artists, of course. I saw a nice sculpture by fine arts graduate Lynda Earle and thought she was a pretty darned good welder…
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to kiwicmc,
Can I just say I for one really enjoyed the building post…
Gosh, well I'm certainly delighted that someone liked it -- thank you! My son keeps suggested that I should move into video format for my building/engineering work, which I can see would be a much more effective means of communicating (for these subjects). But I'm not sure how comfortable/watchable I'd be in moving pictures. And also I'd hate to turn Public Address into TV3. I'm still mulling over this as a possibility, though...
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Bless you for being a subscriber to Bob's YouTube channel, Lilith, he's always so delighted whenever that (very infrequently) occurs! Bob and I had a lot of off-camera discussion about cyclones and did a few rough experiments. Maybe we should go back and do a more in-depth explanation; cyclones are such a staple of mech. eng. that perhaps I hadn't appreciated that there might be interest in some nitty-gritty information on them.
Crikey Russell you of all people shouldn't ever feel inadequate about parenting. Ever. I've often reminded myself of your calmness under fire when I've been dealing with Bob & Polly in their more (ahem) challenging moments. (I think you saw one of those moments with Bob when we visited the diary-allergy-sufferer-hating Dunsandel Store at one point).
Thank you Jane for your kind words. I think what you say about a community here is very true. (Take a bow Russell Brown).
Your message has certainly given me a lot to think about Ben. I am an admirer of your analysis (recently honed even further by all those uber customers) and I shall certainly be contemplating upon your observations.
I have definitely found myself grieving for Christchurch. I try to avoid visiting the central city because I do find it so upsetting that it's all gone. Our former neighbourhood is now all fenced off with many of my favourite trees inexplicably felled (I'd love to know what they found so objectionable about our big maple tree and gorgeously-scented wintersweet). I don't think I've ever paid a visit to Christchurch (even after all these years) and not felt sad & depressed by what has gone -- but especially by the lost opportunity to rebuild something amazing (what they're getting in Christchurch is essentially a city built for the challenges of the 1960s). It's an absolute tragedy.
Conrad it's great to hear from you! And so glad that the tonne or two of paving stones that you cleaned hasn't deterred you from another visit. We'd love to see you! (I shall be sure to get in more paving stones in time for your arrival).
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Thank you Jolisa, Rob, Pohutukawa, ’Big’ Bob, Moz, Bart & Alfie for your very kind thoughts!
Steven Crawford wrote:
it just occurred to me to ask if you and Bob are counting in sixtys on your hands during engineering day
I’ve asked Bob and he is aware of Base 60, but not the counting on your fingers trick. We shall investigate!
David Hood wrote:
I endorse building a linear magnetic accelerator with ones child
Very cool, David, thanks for the suggestion. That looks like a great idea!
Russell Brown wrote:
Can I say, in the nicest possible way, that I had no trouble imagining this?
Alas, no-one else who knows me has seemed to have been at all surprised by this either (also in the nicest possible way)…
Tristan wrote:
You should take all of the kids in your sons year for one day a week!
That’s a very kind suggestion, Tristan. I have wondered if this approach might also be helpful to other children (essentially extending university Engineering School down into the primers) – it would be interesting to experiment. Safety is probably a difficult issue for some other parents; I’m comfortable with the idea that starting with tools early makes you safer in the long run, but I note that some of Bob’s viewers outside NZ have strongly disagreed with me on this, and indeed one has well-meaningly asserted that I would be prosecuted in the UK for letting an eight-year-old use a drill press, table-saw, bandsaw, table-router, etc, etc. But I was using most of these tools at around Bob’s age – without the modern safety guards – and I still have all my fingers. My only (mildly) serious accident was being knocked unconscious as an adult due to safety glasses fogging up. [Touches every wooden object in sight!]. P.S. You’ll note from the videos that Bob only wears safety equipment when there is an actual hazard, e.g noise, flying particulates, etc. However we’ve lately discovered an anti-fogging spray for our safety glasses that actually works, and so I’m now instituting a policy of always getting Bob to wear safety glasses while in the workshop (just to save anyone the trouble of emailing me about this).
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Southerly: I Fell Down, in reply to Graeme Haywood,
Yes, it is bloody gloomy.
My (hopefully) next piece has the title “Høstens Vemod”, which Norwegian speakers will recognize as promising much more cheerfulness & bonhomie…
P.S. Thanks for your kind thoughts, Brent…
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Thank you so much, Raymond -- and very reassuring that an actual qualified person thinks that our Engineering Day has some merit!
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Crikey, that certainly puts any current difficulties of my own into perspective -- using Windows OS to run software for controlling robots [once did this myself and still recovering psychologically (mind you, it finally convinced me to fully move to linux)]. Sounds like some bloody interesting projects there, Steven...