The Home Machinist!

A friend of mine put a poor man's DRO on his tailstock ram. He used a 6" digital caliper, the kind that Harbor Freight now has on special for $19.95. It works great! I have half a notion to do the same; and, to put one on the quill of my drill press.

My Quincy compressor blew a head gasket and I'm looking for hints on how to remove the old one from the aluminum head and valve plate without damaging the soft base metal. It's probably not what it appears to be, but the gasket looks as if it's composed of some kind of fiber-reinforced graphite, bei...

Verrrry nice! Good job.

Did the wheels on the cart come with the casting set?

Roy, the purpose of my post was to inform. Many--perhaps even most--hobby casters are not informed about iron contamination of aluminum castings. I am alarmed at the number of "how to" sites being put up to teach the world how to cast aluminum; and, they instruct the viewer to make a cruci...

Iron contamination of aluminum is bad. The cast aluminum will have very poor physical properties. It other words, it will lack strength. Iron is very easily dissolved by molten aluminum. It only takes a tiny fraction of a percent of iron content to do its damage. If someone goes to all the trouble o...

I can think of no better way to start out with a forum than to list some Do's and don't's. Here's my 2¢ (First, don't try to use the Tab key when insetting.) 1) Do use protective apparel: Full face shield, boots, apron, long sleeves, leather gloves and respirators, when appropriate. 2) Don't use iro...