Finally!

Ken Davey · 2006-10-03T06:11:43+00:00

Yup, I finally did it - broke a tap in the last hole of a part that represents (at least) five hours of work. If anybody can believe - this is the first tap I have ever broken (I am 63 and been messing with things mechanical since I was 9). 6/32 high speed steel tap in merchant steel. As far as I know there is no way out of this one so tomorrow I will bite the bullet and start all over again. Got too confident and failed to back the tap fully out of the hole to clear the chips. No warning; no "oops shouldn't have given it that last bit of torque" thingy; just a sudden'snap'. Didn't ruin my whole day but it came close. And before the suggestions start rolling in - I have no access to EDM tooling, there is nothing sticking out of the hole and I do not have (or have access) to an appropriate carbide drill. Mostly it is a joy to live on an island in the middle of nowhere. Sometimes (and this is one of those times) it can be 'somewhat' inconvenient. One thing I can say; there is no problen with thieves here. I have dubbed the three miles of ocean between my outfit and the nearest center of civilization as the 'fool filter'. Speaking of a ruined day - Please check out the URL in my sig line and (if at all possible) join the team. So far there are only five members of this NG on board. I am sure we can do better than this. Ken.

Oct 03, 2006 23 Replies

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William Noble 19 years ago

I have a set of those tap extractors - I have never successfully extracted a tap with them - they sit unused in my tool box now.

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Richard J Kinch 19 years ago

I have several sets of that same "never successfully used" kind that I got cheap at an auction. I almost want to break a tap sometimes just to see if they work.

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William Noble 19 years ago

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Bob Engelhardt 19 years ago

Or drill the hole a little larger. It's usually the case that you don't need the strength of full-size threads.

Bob

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