Rider Ericsson Hot Air Engine

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DavidA:
...Original fixed steadies are rare as rocking horse...er...stuff, I bought a whole lathe just to get one!...

Last month's MEW had construction articles by Harold Hall for both fixed and traveling steadies. Maybe you could cobble something up from his idea. Looks easy enough.

Dave.

AndyB:
Thank you the ideas.

I went with Jason's...sort of.

I started again and set the the cylinder back up as I had for the facing cut of the table. (Aluminium is soft enough to make marks to see where I had mounted it last time...heehee!) I bored the top hole round and then mounted it on the inside jaws of a small 3 jaw.

It sat a treat and I was able to cut the base end to just under dimensions, then finish it all off once treble checking it all!!!

So far so good!

Bogs will have a field day over this bit....

It is strange how some cuts have to remove 1/4 to 1/2 an inch of metal while others, notably the base bore and the cylinder base bore are on dimension and have only enough space to remove casting high points and rough areas! :scratch: :bang:

Never mind, I am feeling pretty chuffed with myself!

Next bit is to bore the top end of the cylinder for the sleeve..that will be slow and steady!!!! :thumbup:

Please feel free to offer suggestions and advice. Even if I don't take it straight away on the job in hand I store it all away for future use. :bow:

Andy

Bogstandard:
Not at all Andy, you took some good advice, and by carrying it out, you got the job done safely.

With regards to sizes. You will find that with some castings. Where you have little to play with on some parts and bags on another. It is for that reason, you have to go all over the castings before getting it anywhere near a machine, and work from those very tight dimensions at the start if possible, the over large ones can look after themsleves.

If you are going to get into castings in a big way, it might pay you to either buy or make some tailstock fittings that will allow you to support items that stick a long way out of the chuck.

I made myself a rotating tailstock chuck, but you can get away with making or buying a large cone centre.

I look around commercial tooling sites, even foreign ones, just for ideas. You can make a lot of things yourself if you put your mind to it.

Here are just a couple of simple examples of what I was on about.

Go down to the bottom, rotating tailstock backplate. I knocked one up to fit an old 80mm chuck I had.

http://www.arceurotrade.co.uk/Catalogue/Machines-Accessories/Lathe-Accessories/Tailstock-Accessories

Second one down

http://rdgtools.co.uk/acatalog/3MT_REVOLVING_CENTRE_SECTION.html

Lots to look at here

http://rdgtools.co.uk/acatalog/2MT_REVOLVING_CENTRE_SECTION.html

All sorts of ideas spring to mind, especially when you look at the boxed set at the end.

If you don't want to go that way, if you plan ahead a little with the parts you are making, you can make something up like in the C-o-C at the bottom.

It is all part of the fun when working with castings.

John

AndyB:
Thanks John,

I have got a revolving centre, I used it against a piece of wood while setting up the MKI cylinder mount in the 4 jaw.

I really like the idea of the revolving chuck backplate...hmmm...I've got 2 80mm 4 jaws...take some setting up each time but can also be used for offset work (crankshafts etc)

The old Drummonds use 1MT but I have some spare blank arbours.

Yes, I feel a touch of :proj: coming on.

Many thanks for the ideas John and everybody else. :nrocks:

BK:
Looking good Andy, they are an interesting build, and, as you say, some areas have lots to come off, & others just require a skim.
I found I could hold most things in my 3 jaw, I had to use the 4 jaw to grab the external of the flywheel.
I'm not sticking to all the building specs (measurements, yes. material used, no) if you're interested mine is posted here, http://modelsteam.myfreeforum.org/about36368.html
You can learn by my mistakes. :D

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