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My Attempt at making a A2Z QCTP Holder
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wongster:
Hi Johnny,

I got this from Proxxon site:

Bandsaw blade of bimetal for MBS 240/E
Carrier belt of alloyed tempering steel, sawing teeth of wear-resistant high-speed steel. Varying teeth 10 - 14 TPI. Ideal for cutting all standard steel qualities, non-ferrous metals and stainless steel.

NO 28 172     1,065 x 6.0 x 0.6mm

Regards,
Wong
wongster:
After the painful process of tramming my mill, I get back to fly cutting the top of the aluminium block.  Everything went well and I'm able to be at around 0.02mm over the 150mm stock.  Now I'm ready to start work on the toolholder.

I spread a layer of blue acrylic paint over the surface so as to mark the slot to be milled.  As this is my first attempt in milling the slot and the dovetail, I play it safe by cutting off a small chunk of stock sufficient to make 2 holders.  The layout lines were scribed on using my newly acquired digital height gauge. This is a Taiwanese made that is within my budget.  It cost me SGD260.  The Mitutoyo gauge which I initiall wanted is priced at around SGD900.  I trust Mitutoyo more as my vernier caliper and micrometer always return to zero when the jaws are closed.  Not true for this Taiwanese gauge. It always go back to either 0.1mm or -0.1mm.

I use a centre finder to locate the bottom left corner and "dial" in from there using Mach3 MDI (I do not have handwheels on my mill. I've been using XBox360 controller to move the axes).  The bottom of the slot was milled first to full depth and I moved from there till I reached the opposite edge.

The dovetail was done next.  This is much easier than I thought.  Now that the dovetail is done, I'll do the cleaning up and drilling / tapping of the set screw holes and the slot for holding the tool in the next session.

Some pics below on my progress:

After cleaning up the sides.



Milling the slot starting from bottom



Slot done



Cutting the dovetail



Dovetail done



Another angle



Test fitting



Comparing with the original



Rough cutting to almost actual size



Another test fit



The gap looks big. Hope it wouldn't affect the performance of the holder.

That's all for now.  I'll do the cleaning up and mark the hole for set screws and do the slot for holding tool in my next session.

Regards,
Wong
andyf:
 :thumbup: Looks pretty good, Wong. I don't think the gap will cause you any problems at all; it's the pressure on the dovetails which holds it in place. On one I made, the dovetail came out so wide after a miscalculation that I had to to stick a 1mm shim on one side to make it work; it still works today, 6 months later.

Andy
winklmj:
Looks good! When I made mine, I took the tool post off the lathe and did my test fits while the part was still on the mill. That way I could sneak up on a good fit.
wongster:
Thanks for the encouragement.

I measured the gap of both the original and the one I made.  Strange enough, the gaps are both the same though mine looks wider. Could it be the colour playing tricks?

How would you folks approach the milling of the slot?  I went all the way down to the final depth and from there side mill all the way to the next line at the opposite end with the z axis locked.  This is to prevent the backlash on the lead screws from "screwing" up my work.  Would you folks mill to the full width of the slot on each pass while moving z down?

Regards,
Wong

ps: I've started a blog to document my progress of this hobby.  Its at wongstersproduction.blogspot.com.  Comments and pointers are welcome.

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