Boring customs

[Dodgy Loner]

Wow, Larry - I can't believe you did that (but I'm grateful that you did!). PM sent .

Ernie - I'm afraid I'm getting everyone's hopes up for a product that is more groundbreaking than what it really is :D. You will probably all roll your eyes when I let the cat out of the bag, but I guess you can say that I had a "vision" while lying in bed one night, and it involves as much marketing as substance. The product might not blow you away, but my hope is that the marketing will ;D

Dan, Danny, and Jake - this is the best place on the internet, isn't it?

[westyswoods]

May be a little late on topic, although several (many) years ago my father and I were boring out birch blanks for bird houses. Used both a vertical mill and lathe. The vertical mill worked great had plenty of power and great variable speed for both feed and bit RPM. The trick was holding blanks, Dad was great at figuring this stuff out.  Lathe also worked albeit slower with more fiddling around.

[Larry]

I heat treated the bit this afternoon.  Left it really hard...hope that's not a mistake.  Cleaned it up and sharpened.  The finish improved along with the ease of drilling.

I'll drop it off at the post office Monday.

The hole on the left is the last one I drilled.  The one on the right is before heat treatment.  A picture of the dust.  I didn't have to stop to clear it while drilling.







If the bit shows promise once you try it out, we might talk about production drilling/clamping. 

[Cypressstump]

Way to go Larry !

Another member comes thru for another.

stump

[hackberry jake]

Hey Larry, while you are in the process of making things for members, I could use a time machine, or a winning lottery thicket printer, or a robotic replica of myself so I can get twice as much work done.  8) oh but if you make the replica, leave out the mouth, I get tired of hearing that jerk  ;D

[Den Socling]

My 7 year old grandson says you can't build time machines. If you went back in time, you could "really mess things up".  :D

[SwampDonkey]

Dig out the Star Trek TOS DVD's, episodes "City on the Edge of Forever" and "Tomorrow is Yesterday". :D

Couldn't mess it up any worse than the first time through. ;D

[Dodgy Loner]

Hey Larry, while you are in the process of making things for members, I could use a time machine, or a winning lottery thicket printer, or a robotic replica of myself so I can get twice as much work done.  8) oh but if you make the replica, leave out the mouth, I get tired of hearing that jerk  ;D

If you had the time machine you wouldn't need the winning lottery ticket printer, would you? ???

[WDH]

It would save paper.

[Dodgy Loner]

Larry's bit came in today 8)

It will be tomorrow evening at the earliest before I get a chance to try it out, but it looks great. I'll report back with the results. I intend to give it a go in my drill press and my lathe to see which works best. I'm excited.

Thanks Larry!

[WDH]

It is a boring customs custom boring bit.

[SwampDonkey]

Well, it sure is a custom bit at least. Happy boring. 

[Dodgy Loner]

Well I gave the bit a spin on Friday evening, and it worked very nicely and left a clean cut, but unfortunately, the dimensions I gave in my original drawing were a bit too "approximate" and the bit is going to be too big. I'm going to try to grind it down some to get the size that I will need. I would have measured more carefully if I had known that my drawings would be used to create an actual bit! :D

Thanks again to Larry. I think eventually I will order a HSS or carbide bit, but I'm hoping that I can get this one working well enough to get me started. My grinding skills are not as good as Larry's, so I'm gonna take it slow

[Larry]

I'm just glad to hear the bit worked.  At least you know which direction to go.

The bit is carbon steel and will lose temper if you get it hot.  I sharpened it with a 120 grit belt on a belt grinder.  You might be able to do the same with a belt sander in a vise.  Don't burn your fingers ;D

[grweldon]

Some fashion of tool steel will be needed.  M2 High Speed steel would be a good choice.  A2 is an air hardening tool steel that would be good for a cutting tool, but it isn't cheap.

Here's a link....  This is a cut to length bar of A2 1/4 thick and 2 1/2 wide.  I think it's a bit over $42 per foot.
http://www1.mscdirect.com/cgi/NNSRIT2?PMAKA=05945845&PMPXNO=1748373&cm_re=ItemDetail-_-ResultListing-_-SearchResults

When you actually machine your tool blank, don't overheat it.  Keep it cool enough that it doesn't change colors from silver to bronze or (worse yet) blue.  Grind it about a 1/16" oversize because it will change slightly when you heat treat it.  For heat treating, heat cutter blank up to bright orange-red, which will be about 1500-1600 degrees, then put a fan on it until it's room temp.  Then, polish up one side enough to tell when it will start changing colors from bronze to a medium blue when you temper it.  This will bring the hardness down to around Rockwell (C-scale) 50 or so, which will be hard enough to last a while but soft enough not to chip.  If you need it harder, only heat it to a medium bronze color before you put the fan on it.  This will be harder (Rc-55-60) but it will be more brittle.  It's a tradeoff any way you go.

[hackberry jake]

I can't stop wondering what is going in the holes... And why it is going into end grain... Dodgy, you are much better at keeping secrets than myself. Guess I'll just keep wondering. Here are my thoughts so far.

1. Wooden shot glasses
2. Candle holder(but you already ruled that out.)
3. Some form of stackable wooden toys
4. This whole thing is a torture test for curious people (me)  ???

[Dodgy Loner]

Thanks for the grinding advice, Larry and grweldon. I've got lots of experience grinding plane blades and chisels without ruining the temper, but I don't have to worry about symmetry with those. It's keeping the bit symmetrical that gives me nightmares! I'm just going to take it slow, dip it in water often, and check my progress regularly, and hopefully it will all come out alright.

Jake, you're right - I am good at keeping secrets ;D

[grweldon]

Don't waste your time with carbon steel.  You will be very quickly disappointed and you will spend more time sharpening than cutting...

[najumcju]

Thanks for the grinding advice, Larry and grweldon. I've got lots of experience grinding plane blades and chisels without ruining the temper, but I don't have to worry about symmetry with those. It's keeping the bit symmetrical that gives me nightmares! I'm just going to take it slow, dip it in water often, and check my progress regularly, and hopefully it will all come out alright.

Jake, you're right - I am good at keeping secrets ;D

If you haven't skinned this cat yet or didn't like what you found after skinning it, you might check with http://www.magnate.net/index.cfm?event=showCustom  They do lots in the size range you are looking at.  Their standards aren't too costly.  Looks like the only dimensions missing from your drawing for what they'd need is the taper angle and the bottom shoulder or heel radius you are wanting.

[drobertson]

Just wanted to add to kelly's great idea.  We made similar blades a few years back, using the shank for the holder while grinding the profile. I thought I had some of the bits saved back, sorry been a few years back. Here is a few images of the basic idea.  I hope they help,  We used A-2 as Gr mentioned, a very stable and grindable tool steel.  david

  

 

[drobertson]

My apologies to Larry, just had a phone call from Kelly,  sorry,  Larry great idea you have there man. We just made our interchangeable so that we could have different diameters for the coin tubes. Have a good day,  Merry Christmas. david

[hackberry jake]

For some reason this post popped into my head today and I checked it to see if dodgy had spilled the beans yet... nope. Any updates? Can ya tell us what its for yet? Did you get something to work?

[Magicman]

And I was working with him last week.  I coulda twisted his arm.   ;D

[woodyone.john]

Well, you are in luck. I just so happen to have the cure to your problems at hand. I can easily alleviate your concerns of equipment choices and multiple tooling requirements, and by doing so, greatly reduce your capital expenditures and overhead for your quest.

Simply put, I make Holes.

I happen to have in stock the hole in the identical dimensions you have posted, although a few minor changes may be required along with additional information needed to obtain the proper holes of which you desire. 

Think about it, no expensive tools, no additional space required for all that expensive machinery, no additional electrical requirements nor higher electrical bills, no tooling to shape, sharpen or break. Sound too simple, well it is.
I will box up as many holes as you need in the exact dimension you desire and ship them directly to you. A partial payment deposit of 75% of total order may be required prior to shipping the holes to you.

Now, if the UPS /Fedex gorillas happen to mishandle the package during shipment, thus resulting in loss of some or all of the holes, I will gladly resupply the lost holes to you at a greatly reduced rate. 

The only reason I am selling some of my holes is to pay off my Ocean front property in Arizona. So please hurry yer order right along............ :D

-----Sounds like you have gotten some goodfeed back on how to obtain your 'holes'.......... I jus' couldn't help myself... ;D

There was a fellow in a small New Zealand settlement called Waimuckaroun who come up with a similar solution,This was about 40 years or so ago,anyway he was thinking more agriculturally and his idea that he put into production was fence post holes.Some how his first big order,and it was a big order,was a shipload and they were going to Japan as I remember.Anyway he got the order finished and sent them to port for loading.This was in the days before containerization and all the loading was done by wharfies or watersiders.They finished loading on a Friday night and the boys were in a hurry to get to the pub after work and were a bit sloppy about loading them but the leading hand signed it off so 'no probs' Not to be the case,half way across the Pacific they rain into rough weather and the load shifted.....badly. All those post moved around and when they hit the side of the boat well you can imagine what happened.In short order the hull resembled a fishing net and went down. My mate lost the contract but worse they sued him for failure to supply,he lost every thing, well almost ,he's still got all the plans but the banks wont touch him ,reckon his budgets full of holes. [couldnt help myself either] cheers john . PS come on Dodgy spill.