4th Annual BLF/OL Scratch Made Light Contest- Hand Made 10/31 finished

I wonder if you annealed the material then rolled it, the outer diameter may shrink back to its former size?

The inner piece was annealed when it was fitted and both again during the brazing process. It’s all good now, I made another and the shims made the tap start true and once going it stayed true. Gonna put the update here as it will be easier to move to page 3 when there is one. Here is the next brazed together and soldered into a piece of coupling that in turn is brazed to the nut. The shims take up the extra space around the tap before it engages to get it on axis. It came out much better this time. It did swell a few tenths of a mm so after cutting it free I sanded and filed it back down until it fit my spacer material. Here it is with a piece of last years leftover pill material. And here’s a view showing the shim material(say “Pepsi please”). It will need a lip to be brazed on like the failed one had. I also got started making some new pill material. !
{width:100%} http://i1166.photobucket.com/albums/q619/Rufusbduck/72C86505-7A9F-4F46-8D78-0976E5D77F7D_zpssmtprsiw.jpg! The larger piece gets collapsed around the smaller and the “cap” sits inside the thickness of a sinkpad below the rim. It took two tries to get it right. The first one just wouldn’t close up and though I could have sanded it down to the right size it was less work to do it over. It needs the cap piece to be installed and then similarly soldered to a bolt so I can wrestle the 20x1mm die down the length.
Brass and wood

I’m not sure if you realise this RBD but this build is identical to your others in one respect. I have no idea what your doing. :blush:

That makes it unanimous.

Edit, it’s only fair since I don’t know what anyone else is doing either. If it doesn’t become clear by the end then it probably won’t work.

I agree, I have no idea what you are doing or where this is going but the pictures look amazing! I am looking forwards to more :slight_smile:

That’s me, designing with ADD.

Your designing with ADD makes something BADD. :person_facepalming:

Why thank you, I think :zipper_mouth_face: I’ve shown it so far with a P60 reflector but I’m waiting on a different one that’s 1mm wider and 7-8 mm deeper so it would affect the design of the head(mainly the length) which is why I cut fins but went no further with that. Bouncing around may be fun and keep you all confused but it’s not really a goal, just a byproduct of my own disorganized mind and doing what I can when I can. There’s a lot still to come that’s going to be just as confusing. Spoiler tidbits deleted.

Made some good progress today. I started by grinding the corners off of the bezel and then mounting it on a 7/8” hole saw using the rest of the compression fitting core I cut the threads from earlier. After a couple light passes. Almost there. The last passes then a bit of sanding, I added a few wraps of Teflon tape on the threads to remove slop. As you can see I need to cut the wood collar down to match. So it goes back on the 1” hole saw with tape. The brass came in ~.03 mm under 30 mm and its ~31.8 mm now. I cut to about 30.2 mm with the hack saw blade and sanded the rest using 320, 400, 600, 1500, and finally 2500 grit. It’s still a bit bigger than the brass by less than .1 mm but I want to get it re impregnated with epoxy and see where it cures to. It such a small piece that it’s hard to make that little a batch of epoxy resin(I’m measuring quarter capfuls already so you guessed it, I’m cutting the tube too. After seeing how Steve’s lathe performed on his pieces I’m a bit embarrassed but here it is. The goal when drilling it was to b equidistant from 3 sides and cutting a but more from the fourth to get to clean wood under a bad bit. The first pic showed the heavy cut on the one side and from this one you can see the matching flats indicating the other three sides should come round at the greatest diameter possible. From here on it just keep tapping the hack saw block(can’t see it move but the sound tells me I’m cutting) then adjusting the table up and down to cover the entire length. I kinda got lost in the rhythm when it came time to sand and didn’t take any pictures, just started with 220 and proceeded on up to 2500. The difference this time is I raised the grain with a damp cloth from 400 on. Also, after raising the grain I switch to the next grit and hand sanded the long way slowly turning the chuck with the other hand before spinning it and then raising the grain again. There was the dark vestige of one flat side remaining so when it was still there at 2500 I started over at 320 and did I it again. Here are both pieces fully sanded. And with some epoxy sealer thinned with alcohol. The dark blemish at the left end is where I hope place the switch hole. That’s all for now.

You can see the same blemish in this pic and how much more usable length was gained at the other end by slightly offsetting the bore.
Brass battery tube

I just love the hacksaw blade attached to the drill press - priceless! :slight_smile: :beer:

I kind of wish I was making something round this year, so I could try it out. …yes, I have an idea of what I’m going to attempt to build…. took me some time - hope it’s not indicative of how long it will take to build it!

That’s some beautiful wood! Good job on the ‘machine’ work there.

That is so sweet. I believe I have been owned. :beer:

:+1:

Thanks guys, the hacksaw is pretty crude and by itself can’t begin to compare with even wood lathe cuts but the closer you get to round the less wobble there is and the more even it gets. Stopping the drill, rotating the wood on the tape a bit, and spinning it past the blade a few times does a lot to clean it up but it’s the time spent sanding that does the trick. Probably about 6 hours work in that last brass/wood session and two thirds of it sanding. My two alternate reflectors came in the mail yesterday so the timing is good and I can figure out the appropriate head length and number of fins. We can each have our good days, eh Steve? That gum wood looks a lot like teak, very pretty.

I’m not sure if it looks like Teak or not. I will still be crapping myself until its finished in one piece. :stuck_out_tongue:
Six hours polishing?
What do you do to get it looking like you have? What sort of finish would you recommend?

6 hours total, I forgot about the grinding on the brass which took a bit more than half an hour before it went on the drill press. About half an hour each for cutting the brass bezel and wood collar and an hour cutting the tube which leaves around 3 1/2 hours sanding the wood parts, mostly the tube as the collar just had much less surface area. I’ll use the same epoxy resin sealer without thinning for several top coats then sand the begesus out of it. I’ve also used lacquer but although it dries quickly it takes a long time time to cure(like a month) before you can polish it. The piece you used looks porous which is what reminded me of teak and you’ll need to decide whether you want to fill those pores with putty, finish, or let them show. Raising the grain is where you lightly moisten the wood with a dampened cloth, cut fibers absorb the water and swell more than uncut ones so the wood next to a scratch puffs up and more easily sands off. Spinning to sand makes removing material easier but it’s cutting across the fibers the hand sanding with the grain that gets the wood smooth without the scratches. So it’s spin sand, hand sand with the grain, raise the grain, change to higher grit and repeat. You can repeat raise the grain/ with the grain sanding. Scratches tend to show more when finish is applied and the damp cloth gives an indication of how it might look. Most finishes add Amber to the look of just damp wood

Thanks. Looks like I have a little more homework to do. :+1:

There are water based polyurethanes that are pretty easy to use and some woods are nice with just oil and /or wax. You’re right though, lacking specific knowledge it’s possible to screw up anything. What else is new. :confounded:

I’m making the sleeve tube for the battery tube and have these two brass tubes One is the right ID and the other has the wall thickness I want but which do I use? The thick walled one is a perfect fit for an 18650 but weighs too much and I’d need to pare down the wall thickness on the outside and just a little at the ends on the inside so I’ll use the thin walled stock and cut a slice from it and braze it back together. Sometimes you have to use a hack saw as intended. And another cut Then annealed so I could squeeze it down and file the cut edges smooth. And also take enough of the edges so I could fit the ends inside part of a TP holder I scavanged for the brass several years ago. Brass work hardens more quickly than copper and between squeezing it to see if it fit and opening it up to file some more I ended up having to anneal it 3 more times before the fit was right and I could clean it up and cut the end collars which serve to hold the seam as well as reinforce the tube where threads will be cut. Finally ready to goop it up with flux and braze the seam and collars Good, the seam is closed. Too much brass added but I can grind off excess but can’t rebraze if there’s a void. After getting rid of excess brass and squaring up the ends its ready for me to figure out what to do with it.
Oops

awesome work