Case holder for neck turning

[Doug Coulter]

Well, on a good day, there's sun power to spare and I feel ok enough to go play in the shop, even start a fire over there and wait for it to warm up a little bit.
I wanted a way to hold brass (for the 6.5x55 but this will do any ~ .470 base brass) really straight and no slip to turn the necks over a mandrel. I had the tool (I think I got it from Sinclair, but who knows, it's been around awhile),
and made a mandrel for it the right size - .002 under the caliber, and set the cutter for 12.5 mil thickness with a feeler gauge.

It's a done deal now.

So, since they don't actually make a collet like I wanted, I decided to modify a standard 3/8" ER 40 collet to put a little .472 step in it. That was a real job. I tried to soften the glass hard steel with my oxy acetylene torch, no go, though I melted some corners. It must air-quench and I didn't get the entire thing yellow hot, just a quarter inch around the part I wanted to cut.
Chucked a 3/8" blank in there to hold it all centered, sized, and tight for no chatter, and proceeded to knock the flutes off a cobalt drill. Oh well, put in a diamond wheel in my toolpost grinder (which should get its own thread).
Even at slow rpm and insanely low feed with lube - diamonds come off, not much metal.

I'd bought some cheapo little solid carbide endmills on Amazon, sold for woad carving (!) which is also where that spindle motor came from, and tried one of those, at 45k rpm and real slow feed.
Yep...this worked, but it ate yet another of those out of the pack of 5. Glad they're cheap ...

Those endmils are brittle even for carbide

Toolpost grinder using an upgrade kit from a cnc wood carver and a little adapter I made.

So, this thing lets me quickly chuck in brass to a known stop, and straight, so I can turn it over a mandrel I made that's the same size I use in the internal neck sizing die I also made, all perfectly straight and not too difficult.

Jut run it in with the tailstock....cut set with feeler gauge.

The surface finish is nice, and the precision is also very nice, I can set thickness easily to tenths accuracy.

TaDa!

Probably the most expensive in time and money tool ever used for this, depending on how all the tools and supplies are amortized, but a guy needs a hobby...

[Donovan Ready]

Sweet. Yes, please, a thread on your machine shop would be nice.

[Doug Coulter]

I fear a thread on my shop would quickly become a "do as they say, not as I slobbily do" or similar.

I have a 'system' kind of. I have a little list of things to do. It's dynamic as can be, constantly being reordered, things falling off or being added on. To be maximally productive, what I do is pick something near the top of the list in the morning. If it involves say, tools, and the first thing I do is stab myself, I re-examine the list for say, something physically safer like maybe programming and see if that "lights up". All of course modified by considerations like "momentum", health (don't try to chop trees or move propane when in chest pain already) and just what plain old seems like a good idea at the time.

You can see where others would be led horribly astray by this sort of thing. A hardcore work ethic is mandatory before even considering this type of system, as "lie around and/or only do the easy stuff" would always be the only thing realistically on the list.

I say that to preface the horrible lack of organization that is my shop, combined with sheer laziness in "correcting leaky roof when it ain't rainin". Any machinist would gasp in horror at the piles of chips or the tracked-in grunge. An electronics maker would gasp at using a woodstove top to reflow SMD components...but worst of all, is how in heck, with a very finite amount of space in two buildings, does one organize an almost infinite variety of almost every sort of thing there is? This includes of course, half done projects that I'll get around to someday (but see above - one of the things on the TODO list is always "assess if this is worth putting more effort in, vs scavenging the pieces, vs hanging onto it in a corner for awhile to re-assess).

Again, this often doesn't even work for ME. When it works, it's spectacular - I get up, something like a bright idea pops up, the stuff to do it is laying around due to the huge amount of junk I've hoarded (with help, Bill), and I do it. I also live in a bunch of stuff best described as organized so the last things I've worked on are nearest the top of the junkpile. Mostly. Some things are on top, but I've not touched them in ages (years or close, I just haven't needed that side of my table saw in awhile). You get the idea.

When it doesn't work, it's equally spectacular. Where's that thing I remember having that would fit today's play just so? I can't find it, did I give it away? Did I throw it away? I'll buy another, which of course guarantees I'll find the original just as the new one is delivered. Maybe it's luck I can no longer afford to do that as much, it's not like I have room to spare.

Perhaps as some sort of satirical comedy production? I just move things out of my way to do some job, then leave it all just as it was as I got done, because that way, the tools are still where I used them last and ready to go again on the off chance I'm going to do the same or something similar again...

A neatnick would die in horror in a puddle of their own vomit, clutching their chest in pain.

Maybe I'll just do a walk around and put it up unlisted except for embedded here....for posterity and all...someday. It's on that list.

[Donovan Ready]

You can see where others would be led horribly astray by this sort of thing.

Indeed, but that's part of the charm. Years ago, I was away from work for three days. When I got back, I chewed my boss's ass for meddling with my desk.

He thought I wouldn't notice, 'cause it was a mess. It took me two days to get my chaos back to the point I could deal with it. He never touched my stuff again.

[Doug Coulter]

[Bob Reite]

I sometimes think that's the way all engineers that actually build stuff are. I might need it. It might be just the thing to get somebody back on the air. And yes, the questions: "Did I sell it? Did I use the last one already?" I hate for things to go to a landfill if they have any value at all. At least recycle them somehow.

[Doug Coulter]

I think you're speaking what should be the last word on that.

Of course, the issue here is that it can get so out of hand you might as well not have all that stuff.
And still be buried in regrets you dumpstered that Xerox 820 with 8" floppy drives just before the museum contacted you to buy it.
The one with the source code for CPM, including a special driver I wrote to drive a dram card I wire-wrapped up to emulate one of those floppies.
Even a slow Z80 could fly, as it only displayed ascii->rom->video, didn't have the concept of a font and didn't draw little pictures of letters in any orientation and size.
Sigh.
What do to with those ultra rare german radar CRTs with the deflection rod in the center of the screen, as I have around 3 of the around 20 ever made?
Or obscure tektronix CRTs, or a Grass-Telefactor lie detector machine....
Or 66 matched 6au6 with tek serial numbers on them used in distributed vertical amps (along with a few thousand other tubes from 4 pin to loctal to...).
I'm about to need to "get my affairs in order".