The Home Machinist!

I have been down this road....all the advise is good...but the practical solution is:

when doing metric threads..do NOT disengage the 1/2 nut at the end.

stop the lathe, run it in reverse to back the carriage up to the starting point.

Shapeways is a printing service house...they use the materials provided by the machine manufacturers...like 3D Systems...if you are interested in what is going on in the 'printing materials' world...start on their www site.

'shapeways' is just a 'generic' name for material used by 3D printing. as a general concept...drilling and especially tapping of most of the 3D printed metals is very difficult It does not matter if you get the part from 'Shapeways' or any other 3D printing service house...you are going to face the ...

FORGET TAPPING any of that stuff....even the brass is a tough go

pressure regulators for steam, especially saturated steam are very interesting critters...especially if you expect them to last for a whle

dump the automagic cocks and groove the holes for the drains toward the cylinder heads so that they are not covered by either the pistons or the rings if you don't have enough meat to take off of the pistons themselves. after that is done 3/32" is more than enough clearance (i have locos with a lot ...

be VERY CAREFUL with the concept of pressurizing the tank.

One small leak (tank or any line) and you have vaporized fuel oil flying around in an area where, by definition, there is a lot of flame.

I have a metabo with the same hub and while it slows quickly...the nut has ever come loose....maybe the 'nut' is bad ???

even then..pack them with felt....

I would prefer to look at specific applications (temp / pressure) for a given material than take a reseller's generic rating..as an engineer..that's what I do..

'steam service' is a very broad brush with which to paint a canvas.

i use the 'pill bottle marking method'.

that and the fact that I never order anything except viton or silicone (which is RED).

that is true...even more so with buna.... Viton has been shown over the decades to be OK in the 100 psi steam range for static seals, packing and even piston rings. BvB's steam pumps are all built with Viton O-Rings and generally run just fine. There are better compounds available now...but I have s...