Well back from the 3 days at the show and a very enjoyable time
Now the show, Really enjoyed myself, met many new people and also renewed acquaintance with many old friends. I feel that Harrogate is the best show of the year. It has an atmosphere that seems to be lacking at other shows. Plenty of room, dedicated halls with plenty of power, good hard standing parking and plenty of space for the larger models to run around outside.
I was there for one reason, if you don't count my jolly, and that was to demonstrate the end mill grinder. This was on my time, my shilling and not paid for by ARC although I did get a free meal on Saturday night so the £4 is now down to £3 wink
First off got loads on negative views ranging from it only sharpens the ends [ Yes it was ONLY designed for that in the same way a Myford lathe can't plasma cut metal ]
You can buy a lot of milling cutters for £800 [ perfectly true and if you are someone who won't use £800 worth of milling cutters in you life then a valid point and so it's not for you ] Acra Machine tools were also there with a very large and heavy industrial 14 x 40 lathe with a price tag of £8,000. That won't fit in the average 10 x 6 wooden shed with single phase but didn't stop them coming and I'll bet they didn't have anyone telling them it was too expensive ?
So once the negatives were out the way and simply discounted we got on to the serious players. I had a LOT of interest from a few clubs who soon realised they need to spend money or pay tax and the spin off is once paid for it is then a source of revenue all year and not just fine track days.
A couple of University workshops expressed an interest as did a few serious model engineers who have the foresight to look ahead. Milling cutters are never going to get cheaper and good carbide has never been cheap.
Over the weekend I sharpened a total of 232 cutters brought in by punters, split 91, 71 and 70 on the Sunday. Average commercial price for doing cutters is about £5.50 upwards.
I did many that were good cutters but commercially not viable to sharpen. One one is going to pay £5.50 to regrind a 4mm cutters costing less than this but it now has a new life.
I could have done more but a lot of time was spent repeating how it works and how to set up. I also ground 40 / 50 ? that I brought up in case I had no cutters from punters. These were not included in the total of 232.
I was never hard pushed, often had 3 or 4 people waiting but it wasn't a bind.
These were mainly HSS but probably 20% were carbide. In fact the first person on Friday rolled up with 7 carbide cutters that he gleefully told me I wouldn't be able to do anything with as they were chipped and badly broken [ nice one smiley ]
He left after about 15 minutes with 6 of them sharpened perfectly and has to come back later for the 7th as I had to grind about 8mm off it.
Worst one was an extended 1/2" cutter with about the last 5/8" badly damaged and the guy was perfectly willing to scrap this due to the damage but it survived to cut another day. I was a shame to waste a long cutter like this.
All this was done for free with donations asked for the Children's Heart Trust, a charity my daughter is involved with. No price was inferred or offered, it being left to the punter and I made a point of not even looking at what went in the collection box, most paid but some I think didn't realise there was a charity box and said thanks and walked off, not worried.
At the end of the weekend I had collected £170.89 for the charity and I'd like to take this chance to thank everyone who called round the stand, whether they brought cutters or not, for their company and support.
I'd also like to extend my thanks to the organises of the Harrogate show for the help and friendly support given.