The Home Machinist!

The boiler has two copper, hollow longitudinal stays that have no fittings or threads on either the backhead or tubeplate. Are you sure they're copper? Those stays should be carbon steel. (edit: my mistake, see my follow-up post http://www.chaski.org/homemachinist/viewtopic.php?p=220427#p220427 )

Hello fellow parting tool shatter-ers! For some reason the Parting Gods are no longer looking down on me, for in the past two nights I've broken two parting blades. Details: * Using a Grizzly 10x22 lathe (standard Asian import like Jet). * 1/16" x 1/2" x 4 1/2" HSS parting blade * 150...

On a related side note, don't use aluminum for your petticoat. One of our club members made his very first one out of aluminum and after his first couple trips around the railroad his petticoat went from inside the smokebox to spread all over the railroad as little molten globules.

Started getting the itch again for a DRO (still holding out!) and I figured, out of curiosity, to fire off an email to Grizzly and ask which, if any, of their DROs fit the G3102 mill I have. This is the reply I got from them: We appreciate your interest in our products. The correct two-axis Digital ...

Still plugging away at the boiler. Only get one night a week to really work on it (some of us aren't retired yet!). Got the firebox outer sheets root welded on -- we'll do the cover pass after the firebox is in place to keep warping down to a minimum. Test fitting the firebox and backhead in place t...

I found out yesterday that he had passed away. He had just visited the CSPPRY back on May of this year.

http://csppry.org/photos/runDay051411/r ... 411_11.jpg

Speaking of #573, if anyone is interested in high resolution images of it, an acquaintance of mine went to the museum a couple years ago and took hundreds of photos of it for me. I can zip them all up and make them available for download if anyone is interested. Unfortunately, the loco is in pretty ...

The way I see things, no one person is right or wrong about specifics in this hobby. Everyone has their own way of doing things, all of which are acceptable. Some folks, however, cannot get over "their way" being the one, and only, right way. What I've learned in the almost 30 years I've b...

The Allen mogul I'm working on was started by my father many, many years ago before he passed away. He chose it because it was going to be his first loco. The availability of the materials, drawings, etc., and simplicity of the design makes it a perfect first-loco project. He was planning on scratch...

More boiler work! Rich D did a fantastic job of TIG'ing up all the bushings for me in his shop. http://www.whatthehal.com/homemach/boilerPartssm.jpg We also got the dry pipe for the turret welded in as well. Tonight I spent some time mocking up the throttle valve setup on the bench in the shop. I'm ...

I too have a Grizzly 3102/3 mill and I installed DRO's on it this past winter. Scale length is critical and the Grizzly ones you mention do not fit. Well damn, you'd think they'd sell DRO kits that fit all the mills they sell! Here's another option with scales that are very easy to cut and they are...

I'd like some info as well on the Grizzly DROs. I have the Grizzly G3102 mill (http://www.grizzly.com/products/Vertical-Mill/G3102) with a 6 1/2 by 26" table. I'm not exactly sure which of their DROs to buy. I assume it's the smallest one, the 8x20 (http://www.grizzly.com/products/8-x-20-2-Axis...