PeterE - A small useful accessory to my mini mill

[PeterE]

While making the tool holders for my QCTP i got a bit over enthusiastic with one of them and the dove tailed slot became too wide for the QCTP tool post. What to do?

Scrap it? No, no, but hmmm, I do need something to mount a work light on my SX1L-mini-mill, perhaps ....

Yes of course, split into two parts and align/join them using two guide pins and a screw for tightening. A small angle on the side will be the mount for the light.

At this point I have split the former tool holder and made two pins and the tightening screw.

That done and time for the little angle bracket for the light. I decided to round off the part that holds the light and wanted to do that on the mill to make it truly round. To do that I bodged together a pivot that can be nipped in the mill vice and a screw stud around which the work piece can rotate.

To avoid the whole thing rotating while milling the sides, I drilled and tapped a  short hole in line with the stud and put a small and short screw into it. Nipped the item in the vice and milled off the sides.




Worked well and the support was secured in the mill vice ...


and the little angle to be put on the stud and secured with a nyloc nut.


Held tight with a welding pliers it was an easy task to round off the angle. As can be seen, I had made a rough cut with a hack saw before rounding off to make it easier on the mill.

After that the angle was cut to measure and cleaned up. Fitted very well at the end of the mount and time to make the securing nut. I decided that it had to be a nut that had three small spokes instead of just being round and knurled. This be<cuse one gets oily and then looses grip even on a knurled nut. So three small peg spokes was made by eye - as can be seen - and fitted to the nut.

have to fix that later.

First time assembly to make sure everything adds up as intended. It did and looks as follows.

The angle for the light is fastened opposite to the securing nut with just one screw. This as the angle gets support from the mill column and will not move.

I chose to fit the light with the cable towards the mill columnto avoid long loose slings of cable that can be caught by anything.

a test fit on the mill shows that it works very well - sorry for the out-of-focus image, the camera decided to focus on the vice instead

By securing the angle bracket with jut one screw in the center, it is possible to move the light to the other side of the mill  just by rotating the angle 180 degrees as can be seen below.

Same crappy focus I am afraid, but I hope you get the idea.

Anyway, I did not have to scrap the goofed tool holder but instead made a useful little accessory to my mini mill.

BR

/Peter

[rudydubya]

Nicely done Peter.  Thanks for sharing.

Regards,
Rudy

[Stilldrillin]

Great thinking, and nicely carried through, Peter! 

Re cycling at it's finest........... 

David D

[andyf]

That's a good recycle, Peter. Looks as though you meant it to be a lamp clamp all along.

I confess that when making a similar toolholder, I too misjudged the dovetail and used JB Weld to attach a little strip of mild steel, just the right thickness to fill the gap. It's been in place for over three years.

Andy

[PeterE]

Thank you Rudy, David D, and Andy!

It was not meant to become a Lamp Clamp (thanks for the name Andy  ) from the beginning, it was just a mishap meeting an older idea. I fair while ago I was thinking of putting a work light onto the mill as well as on the lathe, but I could not find any "natural" place on the mill to put it - aside from clamping it onto the mill columns dove-tail. I did not want to drill any holes, especially not in the column as it is a box rather than solid.

So when the mishap ocurred, the step was short to make the thingy.

Oh, and that JB Weld seems to be something very useful in various places, I do have to get hold of a tube of that.

When taking the final photos I got further ideas to make the contraption even more useful - I hope. In the same way as there is no natural place for fitting a work light, there is equally no natural place for fitting the fixed part of a DTI-holder, hmmm, if I change the little angle bracket screw from a socket head ap screw to a 10 mm pin with an M6 thread in one end and a length of 8 mm dia peg sticking out in the other, I will get both functions at the same time. The new "lock screw" is then secured using a 3 mm tommy bar instead, which probably would work just as well. The following sketch shows the idea more clearly I hope,



Will get back with photos when done but that will be more towards the upcoming weekend as during the week I will get two of the floors re-fitted with new flooring.

BR

/Peter

[Topos]

Peter,  so outstandingly brilliant and clever. 

[dsquire]

Peter

If you had sat down to design this from scratch with no bits to work from, you would not have ended up with anything as nice or functional as you have. It was a beautiful recovery for that bit of scrap.
 

   

Cheers 

[PeterE]

Thank you very much Topos and dsquire!

I did get a short time in my shop this evening and finished the new screw/measurement fixture. It turned out as follows ...



... and from the other side of the column:



This time I remembered to wind out the table to get the vice away from the picture field. Hope the new pictures are easier to see than the above.

The screw part is M6 but only 17 mm long compared to the sketch, the 10 mm portion can well be 30 mm and the length of the 8 mm peg sticking out is 40 mm long according to drawing.

BR

/Peter