How To Make A Clock In The Home Machine Shop - Part 12 - Making The Collets And Other Arbors

Hey Tom, I agree! When I first saw someone freehand turning pivots this way I thought it was nuts! The interesting thing is that because the pivot holes are formed to match the pivots, the OD only needs to be within the ballpark of the nominal figure. This is a huge get out of jail card, because really the only thing that has to be nailed is the parallel aspect, which is corrected (if required) with the arkansas slip stone. Those old clockmakers were amazingly practical people!

Clickspring

The details of hand turned pivots will be very interesting to see. In a world where you've got 0.01mm (or even 0.001!) resolution on your dro, simply going at it with a handheld tool seems impossible. Tom

Tom Colson

Hey Mike, yes the pivots are turned to a nominal diameter, and then the pivot hole is reamed to fit. Most of the pivots for this clock are nominally 1.27 mm diameter and one is 1.6mm. I've turned them to be quite close to that, but any deviation is fine, because it is accommodated by the hand reaming of the hole - It's a very practical approach. The pivot hole formation itself is quite interesting too, because it's done with a 5 sided tapered broach, and an oil sink cutter, so the resulting hole is slightly hour glass shaped in cross section for minimum contact area, and maximum angular freedom. Have a great day, Chris.

Clickspring

Chris, great stuff as always. You didn't say anything about checking the diameter of the pivots. Do the pivots need to be to an exact diameter or do you ream the hole in the frame to fit each pivot? It looks like the pivots may be slightly different diameters? Also, I always have to mentally put real sizes to the parts in your videos. They look so big in the videos, but then I realize just how small something like the pivots are. So cool. Thanks for a great weekend view.

Mike Davey

Ha ha! Terrific to hear Mark - Just call it "research" :)

Clickspring

Brilliant, as usual !. Best $3 a month I have ever spent. Now if only I can get through my list of jobs around the house ..............

Mark Hatchman

Honestly, this one took forever to shoot, there were so many ops! I reckon I used virtually every tool in the shop at some point. Glad you like the post prod work, I really enjoy putting 'em in :)

Clickspring

Thanks for the kind words Jeremy :) I think the best way to get into the sort of machining that I do is to buy a small lathe, and just dive into using it. It's kind of the centerpiece tool for most projects. From there, your taste in projects will direct how things unfold regarding what to learn, what else to buy etc. From what I can tell the manual skills all still apply in most machine shops when the job calls for it, although I don't think they have the luxury of spending a lot of time on the one part like I do :)

Clickspring

I can't wait either Alex! There's at least 8 more videos to go on the build, covering the escapement, pendulum, motion work etc so plenty more to come :)

Clickspring

So much info in one video! Beautiful precision work, loved the way the fillet flushed out! Thanks for the squeak overlay too...love that! ~¿@

PJ

Hi Chris, your videos are extremely informative as well as stunning pieces of art, thank you for putting out such high quality material. What would you say is the best way for someone to get into machining and do you believe there are still opportunities to use the techniques you show or are most machinist jobs changing over to CNC?

Argh, it's so close, I can't wait to see it all put together! Easily my favourite YouTube channel, each new video brightens up my day.