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Announcements & Issues / Re: Exeter Devon. New Model Engineering etc club formed
« Last post by beeshed on March 01, 2026, 11:57:53 AM »Viaduct in progress - about 60ft long.
Recent Posts
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Announcements & Issues / Re: Exeter Devon. New Model Engineering etc club formed
« Last post by beeshed on March 01, 2026, 11:50:40 AM »Update ten years on - eek
Today we ran the full loop for the first time for the public. The track build was in progress during lockdown with plenty of volunteers to be the 4 allowed to gather at that time. We gradually extended the track and run every 1st Sunday of the month for the public and at other events to raise funds.
The lower end of the site needed a gradually increasing embankment until we had to go for a viaduct. Lots of expensive concrete and bricks then safety barriers meant a bit of a delay to get the money and do the work.
At last we have a full circle and take the public right round.
Can't get pictures to load at the moment.
Today we ran the full loop for the first time for the public. The track build was in progress during lockdown with plenty of volunteers to be the 4 allowed to gather at that time. We gradually extended the track and run every 1st Sunday of the month for the public and at other events to raise funds.
The lower end of the site needed a gradually increasing embankment until we had to go for a viaduct. Lots of expensive concrete and bricks then safety barriers meant a bit of a delay to get the money and do the work.
At last we have a full circle and take the public right round.
Can't get pictures to load at the moment.
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The Water Cooler / Re: ModelEngineMaker website down?
« Last post by vtsteam on March 01, 2026, 10:35:38 AM »Great news! 
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The Water Cooler / Re: ModelEngineMaker website down?
« Last post by Jo on March 01, 2026, 06:05:22 AM »MEM is up again 
Jo
Jo
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The Water Cooler / Re: ModelEngineMaker website down?
« Last post by Jo on March 01, 2026, 02:22:28 AM »The server hosting MEM and the Lister stuff is down 
We need to wait for Ade to reboot it.
Jo
We need to wait for Ade to reboot it.Jo
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The Water Cooler / ModelEngineMaker website down?
« Last post by vtsteam on February 28, 2026, 10:15:05 PM »I've been unable to connect to the ModelEngineMaker forum for 2 days now. It had been reported under attack for about a day a couple days ago, but recovered. This time however, I haven't seen a return.
Ade if you see this -- any news about what's happening there?
Ade if you see this -- any news about what's happening there?
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CNC / Re: It's new to me
« Last post by ddmckee54 on February 28, 2026, 01:18:39 AM »Well... It's one step forward and two steps back time again. I got the machine mostly disassembled, the Y rail extrusions have been removed, marked, drilled, and bolted back together into a single truss. (Had to run out and get some longer bolts, the bolts I had were too short, or too long.) I also added the grease zerks to the Y axis linear bearings, two straight zerks on the two top bearing blocks, and two 90 degree zerks on the bottom blocks to make greasing them easier.
I had taken one of the X axis rails off and as long as I has the kit of zerks fittings out I figured that I'd add the zerks to those bearing blocks as well. All of the set screws in the Y axis bearing blocks were black oxide, the set screws in the X axis blocks were SS. I didn't pay too much attention to that at the time. Not, until I discovered that the Allen wrench that fit the black oxide screws would not fit the SS screws - too big. That's when I discovered that the black oxide screws were M6 - which I knew, but the SS screws were M5. I ain't got no stinkin' M5 grease zerks, M6, M8, M10, 1/8" BSP, and 1/4" BSP I've got - but no M5's. They are now on order. The X rail that is out has been marked and drilled, tomorrow I'll remove the other rail and get it marked and drilled too. I center punched the mounting hole location that was closest to the edge of the base, when I used a transfer punch to mark the other mounting hole in that rail it was about 10mm off from my layout. I remember that when I added the mounting holes to the base, one of the mounting holes at the RH end of the machine was 10mm off - so I corrected it on the base. I then made the 2D drawing of the base that I used to lay out the mounting hole locations on the base. I think I moved the wrong hole in the model, so that's why the RH mounting hole locations were wrong. Good thing I decided to do a sanity check before drilling the holes in the base.
I had taken one of the X axis rails off and as long as I has the kit of zerks fittings out I figured that I'd add the zerks to those bearing blocks as well. All of the set screws in the Y axis bearing blocks were black oxide, the set screws in the X axis blocks were SS. I didn't pay too much attention to that at the time. Not, until I discovered that the Allen wrench that fit the black oxide screws would not fit the SS screws - too big. That's when I discovered that the black oxide screws were M6 - which I knew, but the SS screws were M5. I ain't got no stinkin' M5 grease zerks, M6, M8, M10, 1/8" BSP, and 1/4" BSP I've got - but no M5's. They are now on order. The X rail that is out has been marked and drilled, tomorrow I'll remove the other rail and get it marked and drilled too. I center punched the mounting hole location that was closest to the edge of the base, when I used a transfer punch to mark the other mounting hole in that rail it was about 10mm off from my layout. I remember that when I added the mounting holes to the base, one of the mounting holes at the RH end of the machine was 10mm off - so I corrected it on the base. I then made the 2D drawing of the base that I used to lay out the mounting hole locations on the base. I think I moved the wrong hole in the model, so that's why the RH mounting hole locations were wrong. Good thing I decided to do a sanity check before drilling the holes in the base.
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Software Tools / Re: Experiences, thoughts and rants about using Linux as a newbie after Windows
« Last post by vtsteam on February 24, 2026, 06:59:32 PM »Yup I use Seamonkey, downloaded from Seamonkey/Mozilla as a tarball, and it is quite portable and self contained. It's a suite of browser, mail, and html authoring software -- actually the distant grandchild of Netscape.
I like it particularly because of the way all settings are granular and in the preferences menu -- old fashioned style. I pair that with NoScript and disallow scripts generally, allowing them only temporarily as needed on a particular webpage. You quickly learn which ones are needed and which ones are not.
Lately some sites have been making it difficult to use, (Cloudflare, for one) but I have workarounds for that, or just avoid those sites in general.
I like it particularly because of the way all settings are granular and in the preferences menu -- old fashioned style. I pair that with NoScript and disallow scripts generally, allowing them only temporarily as needed on a particular webpage. You quickly learn which ones are needed and which ones are not.
Lately some sites have been making it difficult to use, (Cloudflare, for one) but I have workarounds for that, or just avoid those sites in general.
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Project Logs / Re: Electronic Leadscrew for the New Lathe
« Last post by vtsteam on February 24, 2026, 06:48:51 PM »Congratulations - had to go back a few years to catch up. Are you still using Forth? Must be the last person to use it. Look up Jupiter Ace from 1981 - the only computer made with Forth rather than Basic as its native language.
Hi beeshed, thanks kindly!
Yup still using FORTH. For me it's particularly well suited as a control language in an embedded system -- which is how it started out, controlling radio telescopes. Invented by Charles Moore. As far as I know, I'm not the only one still using it:
https://www.forth.com/resources/forth-apps/
But if I am, I'm glad to be keeping it alive!
My mind just works that way for programming. I like the fact that FORTH let's you make up your own language, and I like the fact that it is very compact and very fast (necessary for this application), and I like the fact that it is both an interpreter and compiler, making debugging and trying changes super easy. And I like the fact that you can write in assembler in it if you really need fast and compact operations.
I wouldn't want to write a word processor in it, or a video editor, but for control programs, I can't think of anything that I'd rather use. Arduino's native Wiring language, was hundreds of times slower -- in fact impractical for this usage.
Viva FORTH!
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Project Logs / Re: Electronic Leadscrew for the New Lathe
« Last post by vtsteam on February 24, 2026, 06:33:39 PM »Well Art, sounds interesting -- I hope you'll keep us posted on those projects!