Rat lapping

Has anyone heard of a metalworking process called "rat lapping"? I am researching an old firm and found a reference in Google Books which lists them as " PRODUCT =97 Precision Rat Lapping & Grinding". Is this actually a process, or is it just an OCR error when it should say "Part Lapping"?

Best wishes,

Chris

Reply to
Christopher Tidy
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My dog laps up little baby rabbits and birds and things -- I think he'd lap a rat right up.

Reply to
Tim Wescott

Flat lapping is legitimate. Think microns, such as optical flats. Maybe Chinese?

ww

Reply to
wws

I did wonder if the word was flat. Here's the picture:

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According to Google, it's "rat". But flat or part sounds more sensible.

Chris

Reply to
Christopher Tidy

Well, there are lap dogs, and lab rats, and lab dogs, are there lap rats?

Cheers! Rich

Reply to
Rich Grise

Isn't that when you set up an automated machine, come back, and find a rat squished in the works?

Dave

Reply to
Dave__67

Check out the failed rat:

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Chris

Reply to
Christopher Tidy

The more I think about it, the more I think it is "Flat". After all "Fl" looks fairly close to "R" in some fonts. Thanks for the sensible suggestion!

Chris

Reply to
Christopher Tidy

My conjecture would be that this is an OCR merger of F and l. There is a machine in the shop like that for lapidary materials. But the concept of seeing how rodents would do turning through a maze built on a vibrating platform might have parallels to human behavior in earthquakes.

Regards,

EH

Reply to
Edward Hennessey

SWAG: Perhaps scraping/lapping with a rat-tail file which was ground into a scraper?

-- Experience is a good teacher, but she send in terrific bills. -- Minna Thomas Antrim

Reply to
Larry Jaques

The most common industrial venue for flat laps in my experience is in optical shops, so if your reference has any relevance to lens or glass working, that would implicate the process.

Regards,

EH

Reply to
Edward Hennessey

Likely an artifact of the OCR and a ligature of 'f' and 'l'. I know that "fi" used to be commonly printed as a ligature (squished together, so the dot of the 'i' merges with the ball on the top of the loop of a lower-case 'f' in certain type faces.

Check this web page on the subject:

Enjoy, DoN.

Reply to
DoN. Nichols

I had an encounter with one of those last week. The Kido came into the shop to do some speech homework with me for 15 minutes. I was eating peanuts and tossing the shells into some kind of round military can

14"w X 15" h that is beside and under the cantilever of a smooth sided work bench. After numerous tosses of shells I noticed a mouse in the far side of the can cringing every time the shells where thrown at it and staring at me. When I looked closer it's tail looked like it got smashed in two places it the past.

The Kido said don't kill it, and since there where only peanut shells in the trash can we drove it down to the end of the road about 1/4 mile. I dumped out the can and it ran down the hill.

24 hours later I tossed something in the can and there was the same mouse staring back at me ! I was kinda wondering how it got into there in the first place and now this.

Twin mice with a genetic mistake in their tails? Lost pets that travel great distances to get back home? Time loops inside the military can that was once on the USS Eldridge ?

SW

Reply to
Sunworshipper

1/4 mile is not nearly far enough if you don't want it to come back to you....
Reply to
Ecnerwal

An angry rat on a mission to tick you off? ;-)

Reply to
Michael A. Terrell

For sure.

When I was 12, my dad bought a bike in an adjacent town and told me to ride it home, 6 miles away.

I paid more careful attention to our route on car rides, after that. Heh.

--Winston

Reply to
Winston

Or an OCR spellcheck correction of 'frat lapping'?

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

1320-2000 feet isn't enough, hmmm.

I am new to this country stuff, kinda.

Cats and dogs must be really hard to get rid of. Just kidding pet lovers.

I'd love to figure out these ^*#!$ flys. How do they propagate? Out of the dirt? And they just stop for the winter. Soon as it gets warm they come back to life.

SW

Reply to
Sunworshipper

Free meals.

Was the mouse wearing a little sombrero? ;-)

Thanks, Rich

Reply to
Rich Grise

Friend had a sqirrel problem He trapped squirrels by the dozen, relocating them several miles away in a different semi-forested area. Got to thinking there's an awfull lot of squirrels, and some of them are looking a bit familliar, so he decided to spray paint a few tails. Within a few hours the little beggars were back - so he decided to relocate them across the river, some 7 miles away. Painted tails were back within a day or two.

He figured he had 2 choices - baptize them or learn to live with them. They are still there.

Reply to
clare

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