Build Your Own Metal Working Shop from Scrap (2011)
gingerybookstore.com
gingerybookstore.com
I think an interesting modern take on the Gingery machine, would be a homebuilt machine tool; built from epoxy-concrete. Linear rails, servos, fly-by-wire controls with force feedback.
Machine form factor would be a la Mazak Integrex but much smaller and fits in a two car garage. Total envelope would be 8"x8"x8"; high spindle speeds w/ low depth of cuts. That should compensate for the total lack of stiffness :)
The main thing about the small epoxy granite milling machines is that they have stupidly (30K RPM+) fast spindles--and generally have through coolant/air. That way, the cutting edge removes material before significant lateral forces develop and compromise accuracy due to lack of rigidity.
A gem for the post-apocalyptic bookshelf. Assuming anyone can still read.
It’s a pot of work but very rewarding.
Here are some pictures of ‘the 5 bucks furnace’ i built:
https://chrisbergeron.com/2008/01/21/metalcasting_furnace/
Phil’s books are great and it would be handy to have them in a post-apocalyptic scenario to bootstrap society.
I assume that to get a bookshelf, you have to build the wood workshop first?
Edit: Or he would just hack some bamboo or some thick branches with a stone axe and tie them together using some dried vines to create a pretty good shelf.
Take New Zealand or Hawai'i and try to bring back an animal that humans caused to go extinct. Like the Haast's eagle.
The eagle only went extinct around 1400, but did so because the Maori hunted the moa to extinction. So bring the eagle back you need to bring the moa back. To bring the moa back you'll need moa habitat, which have been radically changed and are in short supply.
More broadly, it shows a central problem with humans who want X but don't want to dedicate the work or resources for X. Take the current issues in restaurants in America. American consumers want cheap and well prepared food, but aren't willing to pay very much for it. So, and entire industry matured using exploitive employment practices and keeping wages below the cost of living let alone a living wage. The business can't pay enough and make a profit with the price consumers are willing to pay.
So yeah, we want pandas and gorillas and the buffalo to roam, but often aren't willing to pay the bill needed to do so.
https://acoup.blog/2020/09/18/collections-iron-how-did-they-...
I can't see someone making an accurate lathe or mill without an expensive suite of metrology tooling (or going full whitworth three plates method and lapping like forever).
Would be interested in seeing people's results.
The books are light on the theory of precision and accuracy, but I would be surprised if most readers of Gingery books didn't also have a PDF of 'Foundations of Mechanical Accuracy' somewhere :). These days nothing about this process is practical, it's all basically an exercise in bootstrapping.
Duckduckgo for 'gingery lathe' if you're interested in seeing results, people have been building these for decades.
The fact that you can make a precision flat surface starting without any precision tools is pretty amazing at first glance.
Granite surface plates are pretty popular, though. Maybe glass would be okay for light duty.
Speaking of glass, amateur telescope makers can grind mirrors accurate to within 1/4 wavelength of light, using nothing but abrasive powders and patience, but they start out with a pre-cast and annealed Pyrex blank.
Some people do use borosilicate glass (like Pyrex) for this, but I've been satisfied so far with a piece of regular float glass window stock I had cut to size at Lowes.
You know, I've never really thought about it, but I would think that grinding two same-material surfaces together with an abrasive compound would result in flatness if the pressure is even.
With two surfaces you can still have some bias (convexity/concavity) even though they appear to be relatively flat, you need three surfaces for absolute flatness. See the Whithworth Method described earlier in this topic.
If you're interested in this sort of stuff and want a video introduction, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNRnrn5DE58
I don't think Gingery wrote these books as a way to demonstrate bootstrapping. When Gingery wrote these books there were no Chinese machines available, and hobby lathes (say the Southbend 9" or the myford 7") were way out of reach for a lot of people. He wrote the books to let people get to a machine with what they had. Everyone would be able to find a piece of glass and a file.
I built this lathe, but with much heavier sections and out of ZA12 rather than aluminum. I did a pretty good job, I think, but it is still inferior in every way to a Chinese 7x12. Zero regrets that I did it though, even with those better machines available.
And also lots of old machines that likely have lost their flaking and true trueness a while ago. Still being run by old operators that understand their limitations.
You can make accurate parts on an 'inaccurate' conventional machine.
> You can make accurate parts on an 'inaccurate' conventional machine.
To a point, sure. At some stage, it doesn't matter how much of an old timer you are and how much knowledge of your machines' limitations you have - you just need to make a part the machine cannot.
You can basically always rescrape a machine, give it new gibs, and be back to 100%.
I started with sand casting aluminum cans. I realized I was woefully unprepared to deal with molten metal, if something went wrong. I wasn't willing to iterate at the bottom, and buying the next level of tech seemed like cheating. Still have the books though.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface_plate#History
Here's a video (four parts) of a guy doing it. He uses modern tools in the video, but really that's just about saving time (and showing off). You can simply subsitute (a whole lot) more time spent lapping for the lathe part in his video.
Also, <3 oxtool