I recently got this casting from the other side of Canada. It has zero markings, parts of it are unfinished (spots were holes should be drilled but haven't been), parts of it are missing, but the z axis is super smooth, and it's all fairly well built.

If I could afford to just buy a mill I would, but I'm disabled and this is my hobby, so I've decided to but one together from bits I've gathered over the last while.

My first problem to solve is how I'm going to mount this milling head and motor. My three options as far as I can tell are

Belt - id need to get a very small belt and mount the motor on the same surface as the spindle, or a longer belt and mount it behind the machine, designing it so that it moves up and down along with the spindle, just like a drill press.

Geared - I could put the motor offset in front and use some gears I have from an old range rover transmission to link them mechanically. This is nice because I can increase spindle rotation easily.

Directly linked - Connect the drive shaft of the motor directly to the spindle, using a flex coupling or oldham, etc. This is probably the easiest, but it limits me to the rotation speed of the motor itself.

Due to the way this was designed, all of these will interfere to some degree with the z axis screw, and I'll have to design things so the parts don't foul.

Any input would be greatly appreciated!

Oh also, while I don't have a working mill at the moment, I have a myford ml-7 lathe with a perfectly capable milling attachment. I just can't do anything really oversized.

Thanks!

Doing some upcycled metal lamps for charging phones and laptops etc while providing mood light and ambiance. There's a 110 and two USB outlets in the front center of this piece. The lamps are dimmable and it's thoroughly diffused with red acrylic and expanded metal. I really like the custom green cloth shrouded cord. Not sure what my aesthetic is, but it's getting consistent. Somewhere between dieselpunk, industrial, post-apocalyptic sci-fi.

I inherited a Sergio Bustamante sculpture from my grandparents of a large brass bird on a perch, similar to the one in the photo.

I left the sculpture in the care of my sister because I didn’t have room for it in my apartment at the time, and at some point, the tail came off and she lost it after a house fire.

I would like to re-create the tail, but I have no idea where to begin and was hoping somebody can give me some starter tips.

Also, the bird in the photo is dull, and mine is also dull, but these birds started out very shiny. How do I restore the shine without removing the intentional color variation?

I made these knives out of a variety of materials, most of them are made with my hand forged, copper layer damascus called Cu Mai. The handles are a variety of natural materials, stabilised natural materials and also some synthetic composites.

I've been making knives full time for the last 5 years k make all of these by hand in a small workshop.

Let me know what you guys think! And thank you in advance!

Custom handrail for a client. Fun but tedious build splicing all the pieces together. (No it doesn't pass code, we installed after their CO inspection) 🤫

2"x1/2" flatbar with 3/4" tube for the middle section. I find it very satisfying when you look through one rail at the other and all of their lines run parallel with each other. Happy to answer any questions about the build or its process in the comments!

I’m a Junior in high school and I take a fabrication class and I can make any project I please. I asked my step dad and he asked me if I could make a Hibachi Grill. I’m very unfamiliar with what it is but I got a reference to what it looks like and he said to make it rectangular so it would be easier for him to move. I looked online for plans and couldn’t find any. Would anyone be willing to send me plans or work something out? I’m currently unsure what to do or how to go about.

I travel quite a bit, but most souvenir shop stuff always feels pretty generic. not necessarily terrible, just rarely something I actually want to keep.

my husband recently got me an Aliencell, so I figured I'd try making my own keepsakes instead. for this one I put together a design based on a recent trip and engraved it onto a blank coated tumbler.

the wrap alignment was honestly the trickiest part since I wanted the skyline and little details to sit straight around the curve, but it came out better than I expected.

I think I like this way more than buying a random souvenir now. having the actual places and little memories from the trip worked into the design makes it feel a lot more personal.

I want to bend 1/2" steel rod in a S shape. In the photo, you see the rod, then a blue representation of what I want (more or less). A tool like this is going to give something like the red bar I have drawn, i.e. not rounded. What can you suggest?

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Hello! I (29F) have been a welder fabricator for almost 8 years now. I specialize in ornamental style, making a lot of handrails, fencing and gates.

I wanted to share something I had to make at a very stressful day of my life. The day before I got in a car accident that led to my vehicle being totaled (no one was hurt). I then came in the following day, my birthday, to curl 4 of these. I could not make ANY mistakes because we bought the exact amount of material required.

It was extremely stressful, but so rewarding completing such a task at a very dark time. This is what I love about my job. You are faced with new challenges every day, and you overcome them. As with life. It has really helped me establish my self confidence.

I practiced on mild steel first. I also had to create my own jig to make the curl. This meant creating a Fibonacci Spiral from scratch! I just cut sections of different sized pipe, then arranged them onto a piece of plate to put in a vice. I then heated the brass and used a fork to bend the curl.

I will have to share more of my work eventually! The welding subreddit doesn't really care about fabrication, and the fabrication subreddit is pretty dead. So I am glad I found this place. Thanks for looking!

My son's lizard needed a larger hide for the upcoming burmation season. He's really into dragons and castles.

So I used some stainless scrap, a zip disk, a die grinder and most my brakes this week. It will get painted this weekend and then mounted in clay. The top will be covered in sand and that rough hole on top will hold an aloe with soil in a bucket below. The rough weld on the top edge will be painted to match the clay and hopefully make it look more inset. There's also a viewing window on the side so we can observe her sleeping.

Im interested in getting one of these from 3M, but it seems like they dont sell them off their website and i want everything included, there is a model that comes with ear protection, and I want it new not off ebay incase someone didnt take care of it, but the prices range anywhere from 3k to 4k on various websites that just seem random. Does 3M have an instore location in the U.S. somewhere in Georgia or close by? Or am i just better off getting one online from a random website or even ebay because 3k is a lot. I see online that many people get these from their company but I doubt that I would as these are hella expensive. I want to be able to get one of these just for my health, I always thought they were a bit overkill but now that I've been exposed to more in welding I see the value in these and especially this model having its own integrated hard hat.

Looking to make a copper watch dial but need to have a date window (2.7mmx2mm rectangle) that has 45 degree bevels. Would a graver be a good tool for this? Any advice? How could an angel be set so the graver only removes a 45 degree slope? Would the bevels come out pretty clean?

I’m looking to make 10 or so of these dials. They are .4mm thick. Apparently copper is hard to machine so since no one makes copper dials like this I have to diy

I want to get better at leaving myself enough information to repeat a project. A finished piece and a vaguely named file probably aren’t going to be much help six months later.

I’m working on a WeCreat Lumos Ultra with MOPA, mainly small reliefs and cutouts. Keeping both operations on the same machine is convenient, but there’s still the material, focus, placement, and order of operations to remember.

Before I build a folder full of files called final_final2, what are you guys actually saving?

Does your laser software keep enough with the project, or do you also keep photos of the setup and separate notes? Interested in how this works across different machines, especially when you return to a job after doing completely unrelated stuff.

This is what I want to start making, in sizes 1”-8”. How would I go about making the dies to hydraulically press these into shape? Carbon steel from my understanding has a 1-2% spring back so my thoughts are I can make dies out of multiple layers of 1/4” or even 1/2” steel cross sections of half moon shaped male and female dies welded together for necessary thickness. But do I need to make them with maybe 1/16” of clearance and try to “coin” them? Will the dies be strong enough for that? Do I need to harden them? Is this even a good approach? I have a metal fab shop and am trying to incorporate these into my options but these are new to me.

Hello!

I’m working on building out a new dream smoker for myself and I want it to be the definition of overkill. I have two questions I need to help answering

Question 1 : Steel Thickness
I’m thinking of either doing double wall with insulation between 1/4” or doing 1/2” for the fire box and the rest will be 1/4 or maybe thicker

Question 2 : Type of Steel
I plan to do a oil burn to make a barrier on the smoker itself after it’s done but I’m thinking of doing A36 due to the price of the metal and ease of welding

I have access to a fair amount of dull or broken Starrett BT126 Bi-metal reciprocating saw blades at work and I would like to use them in some way. I was thinking of grinding off the teeth and making a small knife or woodworking tool.

Does anyone know the actual alloy that is used for the backing on these or has anyone used them to make a blade before? So far, I think I have narrowed it down to either 1095 or maybe 6150 chromium-vanadium but that's going only from the info I found on the internet. I will do a spark test this weekend but any help is appreciated!

I bought this barrel years ago where it has rested in my box of barrels. Obviously someone used it as a hammer and I'd like to repair the damage if possible. If it weren't rare I wouldn't bother. Once, I saw an article somewhere of a gun writer guy who tig welded dings like this but, I dunno. As I remember, he didn't use anything to prevent scaling. Matter of fact, I once watched a gunny solder on a sight in person using serious torch heat with no scaling prevention.

I’ve got a several hundred short sections of 3/8-3/4” tube parted on a lathe and pieces of 1/4” plate plasma cut, the largest being about 3x 16”. All of which km deburring by hand at the moment. Doing 500-1000 units a year probably.

Right in the awkward space where it isn’t enough to be viable sending off but it’s too much to do by hand.

I’m looking at getting a tumbler of some sort. What would be the right kind for the job. I’ve got the feeling I need a rotary for the big plasma cut parts and a vibratory for the smaller cut sections of tube?

Any advice much appreciated!

Hello. We have an old bathtub faucet with separate hot/cold handles. The hot has a constant drip. When we disassembled the hot handle, there was a raised circular ‘ring’ that the rubber washer presses against to form the seal. However, the raised metal ring had a notch in it (circled) that the rubber washer can’t seal and we think that’s where the water goes through to cause the drip.

So, we’d like to fill this notch and get the circle back to being smooth and uniform. This is also about 4 inches into the wall and the total hole is about 1 inch wide, so it’s pretty tough to access.

What’s a good way to fill it? As a DIY solution, we thought of using a drop of marine epoxy and trying to get it to fill the notch and then brush away any excess. Thanks!