CNC machined Header Flanges

I will soon be carrying CNC machined header flanges for Small Block Ford and Small Block Chevy engines.

Harbor Freight Tool Review

Racing Jack I have the roughly $135 (on sale) blue anodized aluminum HF racing jack (the one with two springs in back) and might I say it kicks ASS. It raises the car very quickly, is pretty easy to carry around. Its quite sturdy and is way better in every single way than my previous jack. My car weighs in at well over 4000lbs.

Cutoff wheel I bought one of these for $5. Put at least 10 wheels through it without it missing a beat. Use drops of trans fluid, motor oil, or whatever nearly empty bottle I have sitting around.

Digital Caliper Ive used one of these for almost a year now. They come with an extra battery which is good as I use mine almost every day and it has used up the battery. I think I paid $15 for it. I've used it and used it and checked it for accuracy maybe last week and it was still correct. I've dropped it once or twice too I am ashamed to say although never really hard.

Auto Darkening Welding Helmet
Ive used it quite a bit and it works great. I can spend a whole day welding and not have any spots or anything. Instant flash to anything emitting any UV light. I bought it when it was on sale for either $39.99 or $29.99. Either way it was a great deal.

Welding Gloves
Work fine and a steal deal at $5.

Electronic Ear Muffs
I use these to shoot my 12 gauge shotguns and they are an amazing deal. They can be purchased on sale for $10-12.

Blue and Red 2 Knife Box Cutter Set
These can be purchased for $7 or so and come with enough blades to last you a very long time. Work great.

The $7 Rotary Tool
Will not come anywhere near a Dremel. I'd say save your pennies and get a corded Dremel.

Disc Brake Clock
Neat clock. Works fine. Often on sale for $15.

Mover's Dolly
This mover's dolly has been handy in moving many few hundred pound things without doing any work. It feels quite sturdy like it could handle anything I need it to. Usually on sale for $10.
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=93888

Countersink Deburring set:
If you need to deburr anything more than aluminum, this isn't really for you.

Magnetic Machinist Base:
Works just as good as any other but costs $15 - coupons

1" Travel Indicator:
Frequently on sale for about $8 this is a decent, cheap indicator. That is if a resolution/accuracy of .001" is acceptable for you. The nice thing is though if you drop it you can just throw it out.

Magnetic light:
I have this on my lathe, it is awesome. Didnt need to fabricate anything and seems like it would stick in most places/semi flar surfaces like, for exmaple, under a car when a hanging light won't do.

3W LED Maglite:
This works ok, I have not tried their red and blue 2 pack but usually those lights are pretty terrible. This one is ok as $20 flashlights go but cant even compare to a nice $50-60 one. If you wanted one for concealed carry, this is not it. If you wanted just a small white LED flashlight that you dont have to worry about if it breaks, its a decent investment especially witht he recent 20% off coupons.

Electrical connectors/heatshrink tubing:
They have the best deals on ellectrical connectors. Really very very good. Youre getting ripped off if you go to auto zone. They even sell those vampire/quick connectors cheaply in Red/Blue/Yellow.

It turns!

The lathe is up and running but I am having a bit of trouble with the chuck, it is running out. I think i may have (very stupidly due to inexperience) put the camlock pins in incorrectly. I plan on working on it today and checking. The outside of the chuck itself was running out .001 but with a large drill bit (don't have anything that's ground round besides that) in the jaws the drill bit was running out .020. We'll see.

Other than that the rotary converter was easy to install on the same outlet I run my generator and 220V TIG on. It needed some hydraulic fluid which I was surprised to find that Northern Tool sells the kind I wanted. (ISO-32 Light Hydraulic) Surprisingly I can find ISO-32 hydraulic fluid but no major store in Orlando sells center drills.

Just Purchased

I am still accumulating parts to get this shop up and going. I am starting with the lathe as it will likely be the simplest to get making money and I know of parts I can produce immediately to make money.

So I just picked up 50 feet of 10/3 wire, a 6" 3-jaw D1-4 lathe chuck, and a 5HP rotary phase converter for $570 shipped with about $100 cash back through Microsoft that I am waiting on. Pretty good deal versus buying local.

As soon as I get started I plan on making O2 sensor bungs and aluminum V-Band clamp flanges to sell on PMTCRP.com

Helpful places to ask machinists

There are two fairly large forums for asking questions about machining and machinists, they are CNCzone and Practical Machinist. I am a member of CNCzone although I've read Practical Machinist now and again. Practical Machinist I believe is bigger and is better laid out but they tend to be a bit more elitist than CNC zone.

Save a ton of money on eBay with Live.com's cashback

Microsoft has this search service called live.com. If you search for the right terms you can get a cashback link that you follow to eBay and then search for what you really want and get that percentage cashback.

You can track the percentage off that's offered with what keywords here. I have gotten deals as much as 30% off. This would be a great way to purchase some machinery or some endmill lots and save even more than you already are by buying on eBay.

There's a bit more to it so be sure to read the terms and conditions. You can get some mroe info on it by going to the original topic on slickdeals:

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=846962

So far I have used it to purchase a 28" LCD monitor that I got $135 cash back on and a 3 to 1 phase rotary converter that I got $81.25 cash back on.

Quick way to estimate how deep to drill.

A quick tip to avoid drilling too deep is to use a very basic property of trig. While not completely precise it is quick. Most drill bit that are used are 118 degrees, which is quite close to 120 degrees. A 120 degree drill bit would form a 30-60-90 triangle. As you can see from the diagram above you can figure out how deep to drill by figuring out what x is. Most machinists keep a pocket calculator handy (or should) which will make calculating your approx. drill depth quick and easy. Well x*sqrt(3) = .5*d with d being the diameter of the drill.

So You want to drill X Deep...

Step 1) Divide the diameter of the drill by 2.
Step 2) Divide that number by the square root of 3. (Just divide it by 1.732)
Step 3) Add this to how deep you want your hole at the full diameter to be. The resulting number is how long the tip of the drill is.