John, I've seen the type for use on the lathe in a magazine article. Might be nice but I think, like you say, could be a bind.
I'd surly have something setup in the lathe when I wanted to use it.
I enjoy my hand files and treat them nicely, as they do a lot of work for me. I'll come across a die filer one day and probably
will wonder how I tackled life without it!
Hi Dean, and all others who have considered one of those filing machines that fit on lathes, I've got a solid 1948 Logan ten in lathe, and I've removed the carriage and apron assembly several times just because some crumbs of iron, or of bronze have gotten under the flat way in the rear of the carriage, even while taking care to keep such things out, and the thought of deliberately filing crumbs down onto my lathe bed immediately took me off of even considering one of those, even though it would have been far easier and cheaper than buying and building the kit one. I found out by accident at one point, the reason I'd lost my accuracy was some niggling little crumbs were under that back way, and now consider that as always a consideration. I think, as per my earlier post, Mr. Fluffy has got the right idea, and the piston of a vertical engine, particularly if you found an old one that was say cast iron, is perfect for keeping the motion dead up and down, and I dare say the balance issue is far better addressed than in most machine tools since it is so blazingly critical to the higher speeds of the engine's purpose. I wish Mr. Fluffy had posted before I built my filer, I'd be doing it out of an old Briggs and Stratton. The first engine I ever "rebuilt" was a one and a quarter horse Briggs vertical, that came off a reel type lawnmower, and was given to me by a church friend, who got it from grandfather, took it apart, and couldn't figure out how it went back together. It was all cast iron, was as tight as the day it was new, and rolling the exhaust valve on the bench and hitting it in the right spot with a hammer until it looked round fixed it, but as heavy as it was, and as rigid as everything about was, it would have been a perfect candidate. I'm thinking one might be a perfect candidate for a vertical power hacksaw, or using a vertical shaft engine just to provide the reciprocating, and attaching an arm with the right angles incorporated so as to cut on the pull stroke, like the filer, against the solid base, and have a horizontal power hacksaw. Again, all the bearings are there, oil is well designed into the structure, and you're not going to put any real load on it like it running under power, I don't think you'd need more than a 1/4 h.p. motor to run it, and the small ones are 3 and a 1/2, with most at five or more. If you're not trying to run the engine, you can turn it on its side, with consideration for where the oil leaks out if on the breather side, keeping it up, and it will splash oil everything important. One of those central air fan motors with three or five speeds would power it well and make for small rpm changes within the scope of rational pulley ratios in probably one pair. I blew up that old cast iron Briggs when I was ten, when the outside magneto loosened the screws and fell into the flywheel, but it still would work fine for a filer, or a hacksaw, if I weren't forty years away from its last heave ho.
cheers, mad jack
