Thread: What are you working on?

Originally Posted by RezDog

I have also wondered about using them for crucible steel.

I mentioned that.....Was deathly quiet. Oh! I think Tim liked the idea!

I dont know how to do any of that stuff but cutting them up and melting down sounds like it would be better for getting it all together better.

Crucible steel is a little more complicated and requires some things that not a lot of people have. Hopefully in time I will make it there.

A little explanation first: when I made the greyhound pattern I screwed up in two ways. I didn’t design it so that the pinning areas would be blank, and when I sent in the two-up design, I rotated the second image instead of mirror imaging it. That made the read side design read wrong. To continue screwing up, when I fixed this, the die I ordered was about 1/8” smaller than the original. I haven’t checked this, but I’m sure it was my fault. So I have not put any of these together, because they didn’t match and I needed to mill a spot out of the design for the collars. I finally decided to soldier on, and throw caution to the wind.
I drilled the holes in the same areas of the design on each of the two dissimilar pieces and then aligned them using the holes and glued them together with rubber cement. All this time I am obsessed with the LENGTH being able to be averaged out. I was ignoring the inherent difference in the WIDTH of the two pieces, and this little factor would bedevil me later.

So I worked on averaging the length, and once semi-satisfied, I took them apart (still not noticing width problem, duh) and using a Dremel mill end, flattened the four areas of the design using the holes as the centers.
Now the real fun began. I was making the wedge from an old 4 Franc French coin, and only burned my finger a couple of times. Everything was fine until Mr. Myopia didn’t mark the center and just eyeballed the hole. Well, let’s regrind that flat again! Ok, I have just enough extra to barely fit the wedge in with some to match with. Slightly cup the wedge, and here we go. Cut my NS rod. It doesn’t want to go into the stainless collars I was mistaking for NS. I get the NS collars and it is a really tight fit. So I finally get the wedge end together and now I notice the problem of the width. I ignore it for the moment. Now at the pivot end, after struggling with the collars, the rod doesn’t want to go through the washers. I ream them to 3/32” by hand and thumb. In my rush, I forget to file the pin flat before starting to peen. Oh, well.

I start to grind the excess wedge to match. Can I find a new 1000 grit belt? No, I have no idea where I have organized those belts to. Ok, old belt. NOW the width problem rears its ugly head. I can only remove so much before I’m into the design, and the angles are a bit different on the two pieces. I get it close and stop for a polish out to see where I’m going to have to do hand filing or sanding. It’s not too awful to the untrained eye (me). And the peens aren’t too awful either, but hardly optimum. So here’s where I’m at, and will probably stay for a while. Oh, and getting compound out of the design is a real pain. I was using Lemon Oil and Q tips for this photo, but will have to toothbrush it if I take serious photos, and I’ll only do that if I can get it more presentable. The blade still needs a little work too. The next one will be better because the sides match on its design. A pitted Frances Dewsnap blade is going into them, but I’m going to have to calm down after this disaster before starting that.

You may not feel you have achieved perfection, but what I see does not look as bad as what you are describing. We are our own worst critics. Nice scales. I can understand what makes them so tricky to work with. It is a giant project. It has me in awe. Good work.

Originally Posted by RezDog

You may not feel you have achieved perfection, but what I see does not look as bad as what you are describing. We are our own worst critics. Nice scales. I can understand what makes them so tricky to work with. It is a giant project. It has me in awe. Good work.

I have a real project going on at the same time. I am designing some new dies that will try to mimic the designs from the past instead of being just geometric. It requires a lot of trial and error and a bit of expense, so it will be a while before I know if I'm whistling in the wind, but I do learn from past mistakes....no design where the pins go! I have to imagine my two dimensional designs swelling into the die cavities and becoming 3D. Fortunately I have a filter that gives me a bas-relief preview to some degree. I think my cornucopia will work, but the liberty bust is a conundrum so far.

Okay that's pretty awesome! Too hard on yourself.
What size of press did you use?
Any chance to see pics of the jig? Or the process?
*On complicated projects a thoroughly developed check-list is necessary.
*For some people (like me), a thorough check-list may be necessary for even simple projects like making breakfast!
Time to take the family to IHOP!
EDIT: I just remembered that you had already posted a while back with more pics, sorry I forget things, have some memory issues.

What you see as a problem, I see see as way better than anything I’ve been able to do so far with much less ambitious scale attempts.

Pretty damn fine work.

Originally Posted by MikeT

Okay that's pretty awesome! Too hard on yourself.
What size of press did you use?
Any chance to see pics of the jig? Or the process?
*On complicated projects a thoroughly developed check-list is necessary.
*For some people (like me), a thorough check-list may be necessary for even simple projects like making breakfast!
Time to take the family to IHOP!
EDIT: I just remembered that you had already posted a while back with more pics, sorry I forget things, have some memory issues.

https://straightrazorpalace.com/work...sing-horn.html

I really like the geometric pattern.