Po' Boy's Blanchard Grinder

[Crusty]

I use EPDM "ranger bands" to keep things bundled together. Most of them get an oil covering in pretty short order and I haven't seen any deterioration. I'm a fan of EPDM, it's strong and durable stuff.

For you materials guys, there's two other materials that I want to mention. The first is Kydex, a thermoplastic sheet commonly used to make handgun holsters and it's useful stuff. Heat it with a heat gun, bend it to the shape you want and hold it there until it cools and you've made an object that's surprisingly rigid and tough. Didn't like that last forming? Then just reheat it and try again. If you need to join pieces of it superglue works fine. For me the .090" thickness seems to be a good choice for both strength and moldability.

Another useful material is Insta-Morph moldable plastic. Heat it in boiling water, finger press it into your mold and you've got a tough, custom molded object. I use it to produce positives from internal volumes that I can't easily measure. I press it into a space, pull it out when cooled and then use it as a model to make a copy in metal which will fit into that space, but it might also be tough enough to fix some broken thing that otherwise isn't fixable.

Another source for thick vinyl is unwanted backyard swimming pools. I see them often on Craigslist for free and one old pool would probably provide you with a lifetime's worth of durable draping shields.

[Toolmaker51]

Another source of big synthetic sheets are billboard covers, aren't wallpaper anymore. That's an outgrowth of the vinyl wrap industry, such as used for vehicular advertising.
And I think www.repurposedmaterialsinc.com deserves some recognition here. Not only for materials as mentioned above, but all manner of industrial excess. Energy consumed to reprocess material is better spent on new production; why make something when over-runs/ over-bought are taking up space and capital? With the urge to reduce off-shoring at un-beneficial 'trading partners', this makes more sense than ever.

[Rikk]

I have the same on my mill for way covers. Been there for at least 6-7 years. No issues.

[Jon]

Congratulations Crusty - your Blanchard Grinder is the Homemade Tool of the Week!

We had another big week around here with many high-quality tool builds, but this was the rare clear winner.

Some more good builds from this week:

Hand Knob Press by Kovanca Polock
Clevis Jig by thehomeengineer
Drill Press Truing Method by Philip Davies
Bandsaw Outfeed Table by Karl_H
Knife Straightening Plates by JKeetonKnives
Specialized Angle Blocks by Karl_H
Multi-function Crosscut Sled by Make Things
Tap Handle Grips by rgsparber
English Wheel Outrigger Leg by tony b
Spring Loaded Center Finder by bouboulas
Massage Tool by HandmadeCreativeChannel
Vacuum Pump by Mr.DK DIY
Lathe Stops by celsoari
Metalworking Drill Lathe by Kovanca Polock
Lathe Way Guard by jdurand
Double-Ended Wrench Marker by rgsparber
Motorized Plasma Circle Cutter by Captainleeward
Bar Stock Bender by Kwandotechnic
Bearing Puller by fawabros



Crusty - you'll be receiving a $25 online gift card, in your choice of Amazon, PayPal, or bitcoin. Please PM me your current email address and gift card choice and I'll get it sent over right away.

This is your 2nd Homemade Tool of the Week. Here are both of your Homemade Tool of the Week winning tools. Congrats again

Rifle Brass Annealer by Crusty

tags: heat treatment

Blanchard Grinder by Crusty

tags: grinding, mill

[Crusty]

Well slap my butt and call me Nancy! I never expected my grinding experiment to get much traction. Thanks Jon and all you other interested folks.

I'm in the middle of another project that looks like it could shape up to be a good one and now I'm more anxious to get it done. For a teaser, I scored an old military tanker desk and I just took the top off and am welding the two pedestals together vertically to make my own roll around tool chest. Gonna try to TIG it so I need to make some sort of sacrifice to the Welding God for a non-hideous outcome.

And in other news, I got the 3 phase motor from Ebay and the VFD from Amazon in so I wired them together this morning, gave it a try and everything works as expected. This project to give my mill some low rpm balls is more complicated and I expect it to be a while before it's done but it should be interesting.

[mansworld]

You need a cup wheel guard, some are adjustable to allow the user to change the depth as the cup wheel is worn away. Or fabricate your own clear shield similar to a lathe shield. I was once grinding with a cup wheel without a guard (couldn't find one), when it exploded like a grenade. I was really, Really, REALLY, lucky to get away totally un-harmed!

[tonyfoale]

I know that I am a bit late chirping in but I just saw the link on Pinterest.

One thing that is often forgotten or not realised is that the vast majority of the "grit" when grinding steel or iron is steel or iron not grit from the wheel. So I mount an enclosed magnet right in the spark path and it captures the vast majority of the "grit". If you watch the sparks you can see the tracks bend towards the magnet. Of course this does not apply when truing the stone when all of the grit is grit.

I tried this type of grinding on my mill. I had a 5" cupped wheel that I use on my T&C grinder but that was a bad mistake. It was a CBN wheel which have a thin layer of CBN on an aluminium cup. What does aluminium do well when it warms? It expands. So as it warmed whilst grinding the depth of cut increased, raising the temperature even more rapidly and quickly becoming a runaway condition. It quickly locked the spindle and that has a 5 hp motor.

Now I use an Al-Ox cupped wheel and the problem is non-existent. Flood cooling the CBN wheel may have been a practical way to solve the problem also.

[tonyfoale]

Look at this chap's precautions against grinding grit on his milling machine. On a par with the quality of the surface finish.

[chevy3755]

could you tell me about your arbor that you made ?

[tonyfoale]

I tried a similar setup for grinding with a CBN wheel. The grinding material was on an aluminium cupped wheel. That was a bad idea, even a small amount of heating would cause the aluminium to expand increasing the DOC which would cause more heating eventually jamming the wheel. Once the heating cycle started it was over in one or two seconds. A normal solid grit cupped wheel would be much more tolerant.