Bike builders that have machine tools/shops

You may have to wear shades while working Rick. I loaded a four lamp fixture with LED lamps. Kinda bright

It was this last Winter and pack of two 4 footers were fifteen bucks? I rationalized the long life and less power consumption was worth it. I have ten six lamp fixtures which are crazy bright. The thought of loading them with LED's is a frightening thought.

Tom
 
Tom that's good input and I'll ease into the overhead led's to register effect before commiting to several fixtures. Small expense at any rate and operating costs are very small too. Eliminating eye strain is big to me and eliminating errors in my work are my main concerns. I may need a bug zapper as well.....

Rick C.
 
Need advice on optical aids for tiny parts. Now that lighting is so greatly improved and I have a plan for completing this. I require some optical help beyond my reading glasses and jewlers loupes which I find really bothersome in actual use, maybe dangerous too. Dentist syle opto lenses. Anyone use these?

Rick C.
 
A couple of tools which I find very useful, are a Milwaukee chop saw and an air compressor. The saw I don't use often, but the compressor I use continually to keep swarf cleared from my machining activites, especially drillpress, lathe and mill. I have a really high quality nail gun compressor, but for the activity described it's total overkill. An inexpensive vibrator type from Harbour freight would be perfect, if this is the only task you need it for. Mine is also used todrive a Chinese inverter type 80 amp plasma cutter which is an air hog, but they work well with each other.

Safety glassez are a must all the time but blowing swarf is really an eye danger. I turn the pressure reall low, 20 lbs or so on a 160 lbs compressor and the small hot dog tanks supply enough air at that reduced pressure to not require much compressor activity.

Small machines become way more useful when operated with basic big machine aids, including air and apprropriate cutting fluids for the material and tool being used.

Rick C.
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indian22 said:
Need advice on optical aids for tiny parts. Now that lighting is so greatly improved and I have a plan for completing this. I require some optical help beyond my reading glasses and jewlers loupes which I find really bothersome in actual use, maybe dangerous too. Dentist syle opto lenses. Anyone use these?

Rick C.
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Glasses might be on the way LOL. I am right on the border line with the need for them, had them, doc, said don't really need. So don't ware them now, lot of light and magnified glass works for me, even with bright shop lights, sometimes need a small flashlight to help. ..........Curt
 
indian22 said:
Need advice on optical aids for tiny parts. Now that lighting is so greatly improved and I have a plan for completing this. I require some optical help beyond my reading glasses and jewlers loupes which I find really bothersome in actual use, maybe dangerous too. Dentist syle opto lenses. Anyone use these?

Rick C.
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OptiVISOR - Donegan Optical Company, Inc. Been using this brand for many years. There now around the lens optional lights, and optional swing away loupes'. I venture to guess the dentist version is a grand.

Tom
 
Rick, Would one of the large adjustable arm magnifying glasses work? They come on an arm that clamps on something solid and moves around and often has a light in it. I used one years ago, until a bunch of tools fell off a shelf and landed on it. I used it when I was gluing up very small repairs.

Steve.
 
Thanks guys you helped me get started on this with key words, brands and concepts. Curt I started wearing bi focals three decades ago, I need more power for tiny work and part inspection.

The dentist optical visor is indeed around $1,000.
Tom the ones you referred me to are about a third of that. So that's more in line with my thinking. Also there are various Oriental knock offs which are really inexpensive.

Steve I know a machinest who uses a mag base, with a nice size magnifying glass, nice reminder, as I had kinda' forgot that setup, with led's. I think he made his own using a magnetic test dial setup. He uses it to weld with too?

Now my thought is to maybe try a knockoff of the visor setup, they are really inexpensive, and compare it to an actual dentist's visor & lights. I have a good friend who is a retired dentist and he uses his visor on hobby work now. Compare them side by side to decide if going up a step or two is worth the cost.

Also the magnetic base magnifier that's led based and battery powered. Would be nice to move around from machine to machine. I don't mind spending some$$ to get setup with a real solution. It may take a couple of different styles to fill the bill. It goes back to the can't make what you can't see situation. My current bifocals are close to a thousand dollars with frames and I really don't want to get them scratched in the shop plus they sure aren't the answer I'm looking for.

Thanks again guys for your input as I think this really gets me on the path to a solution.

Rick C.
 
Mine was a tad warm as well with the light. I got fancy with an adjustable light goose neck light. I didn't mourn it's passing but with LED's I'd get another one if I needed it. Looked at the professional ones a couple of hours ago they weren't inexpensive. Started at $300 and up.

Old guy sitting at a bench level started at $50 and those seemed pretty nice.

Steve.
 
Guys again I thank you. I would definitely have spent more than I need to on magnifiers of each type. Now I need to dig through offerings on Ebay and Amazon again and check out specific features, some use plain batteries, others are rechargeable and lighter in n weight, some have head bands or removable legs found on normal eye wear. Also magnification levels vary on each one. 1.5x to maybe 7 power would seem about right for me. I noticed some start at 10x and go up to 30x, low end 10x would be more than I want. At any rate thanks again for the input it does help. I knew the professional dental ones are quite expensive and out of my price range, but there really are quite a number of products which are priced quite low. If I buy a terrible product it wouldn't break the bank. Some of these look promising.
 
Been machining aluminum engine mounting blocks to clamp a 79cc predator to the seat down tube of my Huffy Davidson repower and upgrade project. (1) Huffy Davidson | Motorized Bicycle Engine Kit Forum (motorbicycling.com)
The 1.156" dia. seat down tube bore was finish sized with my genuine Bridgeport boring head pictured. Just ignore the two other .377" dia. holes. Drilled them in the wrong damm axis. I've heard it said it could happen to a good man too. Wink. I am so used to just doing things in my head, which rarely fails me. Wink again.
I really should load an old version of student Surf CAM. For the record. Solid Works has a inventor suite for only $100 a year. Tempting.
The block I bored will be slit sawed in two equal parts which when split will be split in half again make two complete mounting block sets.

Tom
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