While the handwheels on the Grizzly G0678 mill are large and of a decent quality metal construction, I wasn't very happy with the stock axis lock handles or dial lock thumbscrews. For the DRO installation, the lock handles for the X axis would have to be changed anyway so it was a good time to upgrade the knob hardware to something that's a bit nicer to use for all the lathe axes.
For several years I've been using a LED work light bought at the local home improvement center for machinery lighting. The promise of LED lighting is a bright, low wattage illumination source that will last a long time. While this light did great on the first two items, it didn't nearly have the promised lifespan. I could just replace the light with a new one, but then I would have to adapt the custom mounting bracket for a different light, so it's easier (and cheaper) to repair the old one.
Several years ago I chanced upon a really good deal on an almost complete Greenfield Tap & Die 2" diameter threading die set. On the lathe, most of the time I just single-point threads of the size covered in this set, but sometimes it would be handy to use a die, especially for tapered threads like NPT. Because of it's long handles, using the set's die holder is impossible on the lathe so I will need to make a holder to support the dies with the tail stock.
Construction continues on Mr Pete's DA Wobbler steam engine so make sure to check out Part 1 of the build first. With machining on most of the parts completed, it was time for the initial fit of the cylinder to the plinth to determine the location of the steam ports. In his video, Mr Pete showed a clever trick to get these ports perfect the first time. A small sharpened rod is inserted into the ports in the cylinder and used as a transfer punch to mark the position of the steam holes in the plinth.
In the early spring, Mr Pete of Youtube fame posted a series of videos about constructing a Dual Action (DA) wobbler model steam engine from bar stock. While I already had an unbuilt casting kit from PM Research of a similar design (the 2A kit), I thought it would be a good idea to build this engine first as a learning experience. When you screw a part up, it's easier and quicker to make another from bar stock than order a replacement casting from the manufacturer.
Several years ago I made a LED spindle light for the mill. While it worked well enough at first, over time I became dissatisfied with the amount of light it produced and the lack of an oil-proof enclosure was making it unreliable. It was time to build a new one and improve upon the original design by sealing the LEDs in epoxy and ramping up the light output with 3 COB halo rings.
While this Kreg featherboard fit reasonably well to my new Dewalt table saw, I wasn't that enamored with the plastic wedge-lock friction-fit hardware. It's a universal design created to fit as many sized miter slots as possible and while it works reasonably well a direct fit into the miter gauge T-Slot would work better. Luckily it looked pretty simple to convert the hardware to use custom milled aluminum T-Slot holders.
Bought a Jensen 20G a few years ago on the well known auction site. While it's a little rough around the edges, it's fundamentally very sound and has the capability of being a very nice model steam engine with a cast iron base generator. The cast iron based generators have been out-of-production for quite a few years now and are very desirable. While I'm not exactly sure, I would say this engine was probably made sometime in the seventies.
A spring loaded tap guide assures your tapped holes are straight when hand tapping. I have a 1/2" one from Fisher and it's always worked great. I decided to make a new one that directly fits into the Morse Taper 2 socket of my lathe for a few reasons: I should be able to get more point travel with a larger device, another tap follower would always be handy and that it would be fun project.
Sometimes you require tailstock support while turning an object, but for whatever reason lack or can't use a center hole. A Jacobs #100 armature chuck works well for small work, but for something bigger you really need a small lathe chuck attached to a live center. Bison makes a nice one but they tend to be rather expensive for a piece of tooling that is used very infrequently. How about a cheap 4 jaw chuck that just slips onto a live center?