I've said this before...

More to the point did you get a pint or three out of it ?

Had a funny phone call today, some cretin rings up and asks if I have a tap about 10mm or so by 30 or 40 threads per inch.

Had a look in the drawer but there were no marked taps that size..............

-- Regards,

John Stevenson Nottingham, England.

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In article , John Stevenson writes

I've got several in the bank. This lad's a good 'un. A year or two back I had to do a business trip a week before I was supposed to be doing a pleasure trip on one of my bikes. The evening before I set off, I spotted the leaking fork seal on the bike of choice...

A quick SOS to the bloke in question, and it was all sorted out.

I'm more than glad to have been able to repay the favour. Thinking about it, you may remember some odd-sized ground stainless that was needed in a hurry a while back? That was him too. So he owes *you* a pint or three, on the current accounting. :^)

"10 metres of two be four, please!"

In message , Nigel Eaton writes

Heard a farmer ordering a new gate the other day. Obviously he had just found 'metric'. The size he gave for the gate was "Three metres, five inches, and my thumb! :)

"10 metres of two be four, please!"

"That'll be half a crown a foot then!"

On the original topic, a mate of mine reckons :- "You don't realise how much you know until you come across someone that doesn't."

Henry

I found my Dremel clone collets wouldn't cover drills from 0.3 to 0.5 mm, then from 1.1 to 1.6 mm, so I asked a friend who said his didn't either. So, I set up the instrument lathe to knock out the blanks, and made a jig for slotting them on the mill, then made half a dozen of the required sizes. Worked fine. I didn't mark them 'cos I couldn't be bothered to set up the Gravograph!

Funnily enough I have a 10mm x 26 tpi tap

Cheers Tim

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Dual threads are not that unusual. Wadkins the woodwork people were good at this. During the 70's when the change over to metric was going on and imperial bearing became harder and more expensive they changed over to metric bearings.

What used to be an 1-1/4" spindle molder shaft with bearings and BSF thread now became 30mm to suit the bearing but because they couldn't cut metric threads on their outdated machinery they stuffed 16 tpi on the 30mm diameter and made the nut to suit.

Look at a Wadkin spindle moulder of this era at the next auction you go to, I'll bet you it's missing the nut............

-- Regards,

John Stevenson Nottingham, England.

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I remember my father having a large compartmented steel box that stocked the various metric studs that fitted pre-war Morris engines. A legacy of Hotchkiss building engines for Morris. That Morris bought Hotchkiss in the early 20s and was still using metric in the 30s must have meant old man Morris believed in long term amortization of tooling..:-)

Tom

Those were metric thread with a BSF head - to avoid the garage man having to have metric spanners. Bloody confusing when you find one!

The other great legacy was admiralty threads. Herbert Austin did lots of wartime machining (Great War) and therefore was well equipped to make things with fixed pitch 16tpi. This is why in the twenties the Austin 7 had some 16tpi threads in odd places and why 50 yaers later the A series engine still had a couple.

Charles

Perfidious Albion..:-)

Some Scandinavian built engines did the opposite - Whitworth threads with metric hexes. Had me scratching my head for a while when I first came across it!

Cheers Tim

Dutton Dry-Dock Traditional & Modern canal craft repairs Vintage diesel engine service

I think I'd have just put my 6mm allen socket on the end of a 10" socket bar but each to his own :)

FAR too easy ;-)

Regards, Tony

Spoilsport. Anyway, the price of allen sockets, it was probably cheaper for the bloke to get Nigel to do it his way & buy him a pint

Cheers Tim

Dutton Dry-Dock Traditional & Modern canal craft repairs Vintage diesel engine service

There's quite a bit of agricultural machinery around with imperial bolts and metric heads.

Mark Rand RTFM

In article , Tony Jeffree writes

FAR too impossible. It wouldn't fit dahn the 'ole...