Show us your T&C grinder set ups

[RotarySMP]

I know tool grinding is one of those 5 minute jobs, to get another job done, but it would be greatly appreciated if the experienced guys could take a photo or two of their set ups and post them here.

I got a Clarkson MK1 T&C Grinder last week, and just got the 3PH power where it stands, so after grinding a few drills with a cheap and nasty drill jig, I thought I'd better try and sharpen up my extensive collection of blunt end mills.

I have the Clarkson guides from Steven:
http://www.bedroom-workshop.com/grinder-clarksonbooks/0grinder-clarksonbooks.html

Page 10 of the 1971 pdf.

but for a rank novice like me, the instructions are obviously not basic enough.

Searching the web, there really isn't that much information about the nitty gritty of using a T&C grinder. Overview yes, but details are thin.

For this case I have the Universal head mounted. Clarkson says turn the table 90° to the wheel. Easy enough, but the swing table has no stops. Do you guys just eyeball it, or do you use a clock to set that?

Since my universal head has no scale, I use the digital level in the phone to set the 7° primary angle. Clarkson then recommends using the "swan necked tool rest bracket". They show a pretty small diameter cup wheel. Mine is bigger. Size does matter.  The swan neck hits the cup wheel.

I have metric bushes. They have 25mm OD's. Of the six straight shank cutter holders I have, only one has a 25mm bore (the rest 25.4 /1"  ), but it is at the back. I tried stacking a bush into an longer stright shank holder, and then that into the short one which fits in the head. Had no way of locking the mill in length, so just pushed it in till it hit something. Was all a bit fiddly.

Setting the mill horizontal is another one of those simple concepts. Maybe the way I have my Clarkson close to a wall is the problem, but looking in from an angle I find it hard to judge the angle to get the support finger set right.

I think I need to make up a type F tool rest/finger from a thinner hacksaw blade. The one I have is too thick to allow it to spring out when turning from tooth to tooth. I have to back out o the spiral and then reinsert, which goes against Clarksons instructions.

Did the same for the 22° relief angle.

Result was ginding about 1mm off the end mill. The four flutes aren't very even. The center relief no longer existed, and it rubbed when I tried it, so I then relieved the center freehand on the end of the cup wheel. If I understand Clarkson correctly, the proper way to do this is to simply gash a cross with a cut off disk (Page 11 of the 1971 guide)

After grinding the rougher a bit, I had a go at butchering another beat up 10mm endmill. This time a center cutter.

Weird bit is, despite a pretty crap first attempt, both cutters cut much better than blunt.

Regards,
Mark

[RotarySMP]

I made a lathe tool holder. I know that lathe tools aren't that critical, being single piont, and it is easy enough to off hand grind them. Still, this makes them look nice. I ground up two aluminium cutting bits, using 12° side rack and 35° top rack. If I'd offhand ground them, I would never have made such an extreme top rack, but they cut beautifully.

Mark

[RotarySMP]

Since the first attempt at end mills was pretty crappy, I got a bit more serious.

My wheel dressing diamond is mounted on an 11mm shaft, for which I have no Clarkson bush, so I just clamped a vise to the table for dressing.

Then I made a new F style finger from a broken, thin hacksaw blade. For the set up this time I used just a straight shank holder and bush, and locked the end mill in with a set screw. The set up was much more repeatable, and I got a pretty nice even grind this time. In the end I used a handheld proxon grinder to hollow out the center.

T&C grinders are a lot of fun to play with. I can see the big advantage being the convenience. Since it only takes a minute to set up, you are more likely to touch up a tool, and use a sharp cutter, drill, etc rather than just getting by with a one which is a bit blunt.

Mark.

[Fergus OMore]

At the risk of censure, criticism and probably worse might I say that I have a Mk1 Clarkson.

Whilst the instructions are correct, they were actually written for people in a tool room who were engaged in repeating the same old job- time after time on probably one setting! I doubt that few of us are doing much the same.
Frankly, people have been simplifying tool grinding for the home workshop which has little to do with 'factory methods' Model Engineer and Model Engineers Workshop have been full of variations which are based on putting a cylindrical cutter into in a square bit of steel block. It is fastened down with a grub screw after ensuring that one lip is aligned correctly.  Quite simply, that is achieved  by nothing more complicated that a piece of metal exactly half the thickness of the holding block.  Once established, the whole block can be rotated 90, 180, 270 degrees with simple accuracy.  How one fixes it to the Clarkson table is NOT using the proprietary on which holds a round insert. Probably an old fashioned nothing more than a couple of brackets would suffice.  You can get a bit daft like me and fasten a Vertex BSO dividing head  with appropriate collets onto the table but  at a push, my original tooling was no more complicated than a bit of best B and Q   2" square wood and a few wingnuts, bolts and washers out of Wilkinson's

Going off at a sort of tangent, I had a look at this recent offering from Eccentric Engineering from OZ and their video of the Acute Tool Grinding rig. I even bought the book for ?£17 and whilst it doesn't tell the tides in HongKong Harbor which my Quorn probably does, it should fit onto the Clarkson table. Of course, it isn't the only simple and easily constructed method.

Me, and I have one extension piece for the spindle but  I now want more to hold different abrasive disks. The trouble is that one needs 1/2"BSW Left hand taps and dies.  Happily, a set came with my new to me  Myford ML10 only days ago.

Does this all help and I hope that it will be regarded as advice.   No doubt others will add their way. I'd also be please to read it


Norman

[RotarySMP]

Does the table leadscrew on your Clarkson Mk1 also turn the wrong way? On mine, you rotate the handle clockwise to retract the slide. Both my Lathes advance the slide with clockwise motion.

Otherwise I really like the Clarkson. Today I needed to use a little 6mm HSS wood router bit which I'd ruined the cutting edges on last time it was used. Couple of minutes on the T&C and it is no longer 6mm, but cuts like a champ again.

A mate just bought a Hardinge in the UK (Lucky bugger), so I made a care package of tool bits ground for steel, brass and aluminium for him. I know it is overkill doing lathe tools on the Clarkson, but the resulting tools look really nice.

Mark

[Andrew Wildman]

This is me grinding a slotting tool for the shaper on an ancient excel tcg that I refurbished

[RotarySMP]

Looks like you did a really nice restoration on that Excel grinder. Like the scraped table.

Franz, the friend who sold me the Clarkson, made a really nice welding job on the wheel cover, so I figured I'd finish it to match the machine. Bit of bog and sanding, and I undercoated it yesterday.

Mark

[RotarySMP]

I tried to use my Clarkson as a surface grinder to thin down a shim for the lathe. Didn't work, as the head adjustment does not provide sensitive, repeatable, fine, down-feed control. The way the motor counterbalances the head, there is more control of upfeed than down.

Mark

[RotarySMP]

Finished dollying up the wheel cover...

[DMIOM]

Functional and smart      

[RotarySMP]

Thanks
Mark

[RotarySMP]

Today I bought the radius grinding fixture for my Clarkson. It is only a Mark 1, without the tilting head bracket, but am pretty sure it has never been used. It isn't rusty, it's been sprayed with a waxy preservative oil. It came with a 25mm tool holder shaft, for which I already have the metric mills size bushes, two finger hoders, and I bar I am not sure is for. It is missing the setting bar slide, so I'll have to mill one up.

I bought it from the mate who sold me the Clarkson. He is a tool nut, very skilled machinist, and replaced the Clarkson with a huge TOS T&C grinder, with every accessory you can possibly imagine, and a bunch you wouldn't have thought of.

I had a quick bit of a play with the radius fixture this evening, but since looking in the Clarkson manual, see it needs to be mounted the other way around.
Mark

[chipenter]

The club I belong to got a Clarkson two weeks ago , only a few tools with it made a er32 spindle and tooth rests , John Stevenson made a how to cd for Clarkson , Norton do a free download of there tool room grinding booklet search for tool room grinding , still learning how to set up done 4 facet drill sharpening , have you found bedroom workshop.com loads of info there ,

[RotarySMP]

Yep. The bedroom workshop collection of info has been really helpfull. I sent him some photos of my clarkson, but I think he has gone inactive on that front. Tool grinding is a pretty cool way of turning loads of time into grinding dust and maybe a few sharper cutters. Good luck with the four facet drill grinding. So far I have just been using one of those cheap chinese swing jigs for drill sharpening. A bit hit or miss, but still more repeatable than hand grinding for me as I don't practice enough.

What other accessories does you club have for your Clarkson?
Mark

[chipenter]

Drill sharpening is a doddle set the universal head to 31 degrees set the base at 90 and the slide to 8 or 10 for the cutting edge then 25 for the relief , for the next drill do the relief first and so on , we only have the two centres and holders so far but the machine was free .

[RotarySMP]

Thanks for that recommendation. I'll give that a try.  Do you also split the point on your four facet grind.

There are so many different ways to skin a cat with a T&C grinder, that sometime the most simple solution gets lost in the fog.
Mark

[Fergus OMore]

Really, the Clarkson was not designed to do drills. It was designed to grind and then restore milling cutters.
Indeed you can 'do' lathe tools and you can 'do' drills but there are plenty of better ways.

Only a couple of days ago, I visited an old friend who was using a short wheel base Stent to do tiny bits of grinding which would have been lost on the BIG Brother Clarkson from which it is copied- and improved. My friend had an ancient Reliance jig 'tied' to the table of the Stent.

Again, I recall that in a different age, I recalled a then new Quorn having a similar jig 'tied' to one.

Don't get me wrong. I have a Mk1 Clarkson and I have a Quorn  and oddly, I have a fabricated Stent.

What is probably pertinent is that Arnold Throp of Dore Engineering and also connected withIvan Law had made a Quorn but was using a very much more simple Kennet at a Harrogate Model Engineering stand.

Over the past few hours, I was following 'Peter's' suggestion to use a three way vice ex RDG Tools to do his lathe tools.

All well and good, you may think but can a whatever you have 'mirror finish' a piece of steel in the lathe?

For what it is worth, I rough grind- to shape and then change the grind to say a wheel with a 80 grit wheel and then finish with a diamond wheel.

However, NONE of this can easily break the  sharp edge to a lathe tool which will literally remove a barely perceptical dusting of swarf. I do it by hand on a 600 grit diamond stone and then traditionally finish on a conventional Arkansas stone- by hand.

Indeed, I could use an undrilled cast iron face plate impregnated with perhaps green diamond paste.

Something more to think about? Your comments would be appreciated

Norm

[RotarySMP]

I also touch up the surface on HSS lathe tools with a whetsone after grinding.

Funny to think of the Clarkson as big. I find it rather small and cramped for some operations. I don't have the space or inclination to have multiple specialised tools set up for lathe tools or drills, and am happy with using the Clarkson for these tasks as well.

The mate I bought it from replaced it with the Tos BN-102, which must weight at least a ton (his is in much better condition than this one...
https://espmach.com.au/images/Grinders/2012%20Grinders/Tos-T&C-Grinder.jpg

Then he puts the 80 kg Haller spiral grinding attachment on it, like this one:
https://www.cottandco.com/en/lots/haller-type-ufs155-universal-spiral-cutter-grinder

What a dream to use. You can dial in any lead angle from -90° through to 90°, has no backlash, feels near frictionless (although still not quite like the TOS air bearing attachment. His regrinds are not perfect.
Mark

[Fergus OMore]

What has me intrigued is the Beijing Deckel clone. More of this later?

Regards

N

[RotarySMP]

Yesterday I stripped down the RGA to wash off all the preservative wax. It was a real magnet for grinding dust. Ground a radius on a lathe tool. Man I could get hooked on this. Next I need to make the missing setting bar slide.

Shame I ran out of time to try the four facet drill grinding method.

[Fergus OMore]

I'm in the middle of restoring a Quorn T&C which came off badly when I lost my shed roof twice in the winter storms.

However, it seems fair to mention that since 1973 when the Quorn details were published in Model Engineer that there has been a vast amount of published information - much of it in Model Engineers Workshop, to improve not only the Quorn but also the Clarkson and its smaller copy, the Stent.

Apart from copyright restrictions, half the fun can be actually finding out which issues are relevant.

And then, of course, is the mysterious Tinker T&C of which I have the basic drawings but not the set which probably cover the more complicated possibilities.  My requests in the past have been greeted with a very loud silence

N

[gerritv]

Guy's phone number is (604) 922-4909 according to Canada411.ca, a call might get results?
Also MEW 76 has a series of articles on a Raymac T&C which bears some resemblance to the mini Tinker.

[Fergus OMore]

Thanks but unfortunately I'm a Limey B****** which complicates things about payments and so on.

I actually bought the original castings etc from Norman Tinker in Nottingham, England-- a million years ago.

I was curious about how Tinker reground things like taps which are not on my copies.

As mentioned, I'm doing up the old rusty Quorn and have just designed and made a jig to weld the  polyethylene drive belts.

Where I got to( mentally) was to change the single speeds on my various grinders to three step ones.  Again, there is a series of articles by the late Philip Amos on his Quorn variant.

I'm still quite busy at over 88 years!

Cheers

N

[chipenter]

I mounted my Tinker on an old cross slide and compound and has improved it no end , I did post pictures when I modified it on hear .

[Fergus OMore]

Thanks Jeff.  I'm merely curious to know what a Tinker is really capable of.
I'm into this maths formula thing for determining variations on Pi etc which seems to be the basis of the Tinker-or was.

One wonders how these 'newer' slot drills are re-sharpened.

Cheers

N