Hi folks,

Young gun here. I study design and manufacturing, and I have few suggestions. I think the discussion is indicative of the fact that there is really quite a lot out there both in variety of tool types and brands. Many of the tools that you are talking about (lathes, mills, etc.) are, in my opinion, very much like prosumer espresso machines: they do a limited set of things very well. If you are only looking to rebuild a lever, I would second the opinion that you should look into local machine shops that allow you to rent time on their machines. Again, much like an espresso machine, a really high quality mill will produce a much more consistent result than a low quality tabletop version, though both might get the job done. If you are going to end up buying, its nice to see which features actually matter to you. How could you know whether you like automatic volumetric dosing until you try it? Similarly, perhaps you really don't want/need a lead screw for threading on your lathe.

Another thing that you get in using a machine shop is the machinists that work there. In my experience, machinists love to tell you how you could do whatever you are doing better--which is to say they have a lot of quality of advice. Its also a really fun social environment in which you can meet a lot of really interesting people. Perhaps most importantly, you can find out if you actually like machining! Some people really do not.

Someone mentioned taking a class. THIS IS ALMOST AN ABSOLUTE NECESSITY IN MY OPINION. If you do not respect an espresso machine, it might burn your finger. If you do not respect a mill, it might remove your finger. A class will not only teach you how to use a machine, but how to use it safely. This is of primary importance. To be morbid, for a moment, levers are hard to use if you damage the hand that operates them.

Finally, take a look at the lever that you find to assess what actually needs to be done to it rather than just picking up a blanket set of lever repair tools. You'll waste a lot of money if you find out that you really didn't need that lathe in the first place because all of the repairs can be done with a screwdriver and a set of files.

Cheers!
Josh

jrfeler wrote:Someone mentioned taking a class. THIS IS ALMOST AN ABSOLUTE NECESSITY IN MY OPINION. If you do not respect an espresso machine, it might burn your finger. If you do not respect a mill, it might remove your finger.

Could not agree more. A lathe can kill you. It is absolutely imperative to have someone not just show you how to use the machines in a shop, but reinforce proper usage over and over again. I've spent hundreds of hours in a machine shop, and I still have no idea what I'm doing. But at least I always had someone there yelling at me about safety. Obvious things like "keep your fingers away from the bandsaw blade" are absolutely nothing compared to not-so-obvious-but-far-more-grave things like "tie your hair back and take off your necklace before you bend over that lathe."

There are heavy machinery safety precautions, general shop safety precautions, wood shop safety precautions, electrical/electronics safety precautions, low pressure steam boiler safety precautions, and the list goes on and on and what they all boil down to is common sense and thinking about what you are doing. No class can cover everything and no student I have ever taught can remember and apply all of it every time. It becomes a case of training, self study, common sense, and thinking before acting --this builds the experience level.

What all of this means is if an individual has difficulty with training, study, common sense, and thinking they should not get close to this type of equipment.

OldNuc wrote:There are heavy machinery safety precautions, general shop safety precautions, wood shop safety precautions, electrical/electronics safety precautions, low pressure steam boiler safety precautions, and the list goes on and on

Another list that goes on and on is the safety equipment needed to protect yourself. Even with a face shield over full wrap protective glasses, a tiny metal splinter once made its way around the edge of the shield, through one of the vent holes in the side protective panels on my shop glasses, and into my cornea. Needless to say, I bought a much bigger, better face shield when I healed up after having it removed.

The range of available safety equipment is vast: protective barrier creams and gloves for the hands, in-ear and over-ear sound protection, leather & Kevlar aprons, Nomex and Kevlar clothing, work boots (yes, I've dropped raw steel stock on my foot), etc etc. Proper fire extinguishers are essential - I've seen freshly drilled metal ignite paper in the trash bag next to the press, which dramatizes the need for safety in the layout of your work space too. Slip-resistant flooring or mats will prevent both broken bones and broken projects. And you have to replace safety equipment when it gets worn, damaged or out-of-date.

Then there's the need to know about all those seemingly innocent oversights that can and will hurt you. Leave the key in the chuck and it'll fly into something when you start the lathe / mill / drill / etc. Let the swarf get too long and it'll break off, fly into your face or other sensitive area, and leave a permanent reminder of why you shouldn't do that. Pick up freshly machined or welded metal with your bare hands and find out how hot it gets. Leave that tubing "drop" on the floor until you finish the operation and you will slip on it and fall.

I've been a home shop machinist for about 50 years. All I can tell you is that the more you know, the more you find out how little you know. Precision machining and fabrication are great fun. You can make some wonderful stuff of which you'll be very proud. You can fix almost anything as you gather a lifetime of tools, fill a closet full of custom jigs & fixtures, and figure out solutions to problems others avoid by replacing the broken item. But this monster has sharp teeth - I'll show you the scars to prove it. Take your time, and ask if you don't know. Don't assume anything.

One needs to think about not only general safety precautions, but also about special ones for some materials and for certain machines.

Certain metals can ignite when being machined and cause serious fires.

Certain metals or alloys are toxic.

Furthermore, always remember that rapidly rotating objects can have a lot of rotational kinetic energy!

rpavlis wrote:Furthermore, always remember that rapidly rotating objects can have a lot of rotational kinetic energy!

And because that energy is proportional linearly to the mass but to the square of the velocity, even tiny objects can do a lot of damage when flung through the air and lighter objects are more easily flung at higher speed. So don't assume that you're safer because you're working on a small part or piece.

I just emailed Gary some info about machines (Gary, feel free to post it here if you want).

On the topic of safety, you do need to be very careful. My buddy who owns a big machine shop and has done machining for many years just caught his fingers in a mill last year; it cut the tip of one off and filleted down the other one. I think they had to sow them together for a while so one finger could support the other one.

And when I was a teenager, I had some work bind and the vise I was using spun around and caught the sleeve of my shirt and pulled my hand into the drill. I was able to reach up with my free hand and turn the emergency switch off, but it was a close call.

I also remember, when I was a kid, my Dad was working on a table saw and accidentally pushed his finger into the blade. It threw blood up onto the garage ceiling and he passed out enough to end up on the ground. I was very young, but I think I had to turn the saw off for him and run and call my mom.

So you have to be extremely careful with machine tools. Don't wear rings or jewelry of any kind, no loose sleeves, clothes, etc. And in any battle between the machine turning and you, you lose. Even gloves can be dangerous, even though you think they are giving you protection. My friend (above) who lost his finger had gloves on and was just reaching up to dust some chips off his mill when the tip of the glove got caught and pulled his fingers in.

I also remember (like a dummy) I was trying to use my drill press as a mill once - just to see if it would work - and I had an end mill (and chuck) come off of the taper at 7200 RPM's.. that wasn't fun.

Stuff like grinding, welding, machining; you have to be super careful.

And make sure to wear good eye, ear protection as well as ventilation and masks. You only have one set of eyes. Once when I was working on an exhaust system as a teenager, I had a bit of metal fly past my glasses and directly into my eye. I spent two hours trying to get it out, until my eye dried out and swelled up. I finally had to go to the ER, where they used a needle to dig it out of the flesh of my eye ball. Luckily it didn't leave any serious damage, but looking back it was a close call.

Once I also had some chemicals explode in my face and burn my eyes and skin. Nothing as fun has having the skin of your eyeballs peal off.

So yeah, be careful

Ray

RayJohns wrote:Once I also had some chemicals explode in my face and burn my eyes and skin. Nothing as fun has having the skin of your eyeballs peal off.

So yeah, be careful

Point taken! Here's what Ray sent:

"Basically here are the big tools you probably want:

1. TIG welder. I would check into the Everlast line. That's what I have. Make sure you get an AC/DC welder, not just DC alone, since you will need alternating current to weld stuff like aluminum or stainless, since it needs the back and forth pulse of the arc that acts like a scrubbing action to weld vs. clean the weld during the welding. You need a TIG welder to attach stuff in a lot of cases and to build stuff. There are also other types of welders; I have a gas and also a MIG. TIG is the ferrari of welding.

2. Drill press. A good quality drill press is hard to find actually. I have a very sold Craftsman which my Dad had and I restored. You'd be surprised how difficult it is to find a good one. The old Clausing industrial ones are quite good, but hard to find and heavy. You might be saying to yourself that you can drill with a milling machine, but it's not quite the same. A drill press is faster and easier and has far more uses - it also typically has a longer stroke, which sometimes you need. You might wanna start out with a small one from Sears for $99 or something, then sell it later once you know what you are doing with drill presses and then upgrade to something more husky.

I should interject here, avoid the temptation to buy an 'all in one' milling machine, drill press, lathe. They are better than nothing, but not as good as having one dedicated machine for each.

3. A good quality lathe - or better yet, two. I have two lathes. One is a small Taig jewelers lathe and it's great for making very accurate small parts. But it has its limits. You might check into the Sherline stuff, since it comes turn key, where as the Taig lathe nearly requires a machine shop to tweak But a Taig lathe is very nice and slightly more robust in some ways - its short coming is the lack of a DC motor, which the Sherline has. Check out the videos from my friend on Luiz on YouTube about the Sherline stuff - he's located in Brazil and does some amazing stuff with those little Sherline lathes. I've also been to the factory where they produce them and it's quite a little operation they have going.

4. In addition to a small lathe, you'll probably want a big one. I'd suggest starting with the small lathe first and teach yourself. Then you will better understand what you want from a larger lathe. I have a medium size Dalton lathe, but I still need to weld up a motor mount for it. It's a nice old lathe and a good size. You might also check into a restored south bend 9 or 10. Those are nice machines. The main problem with lathes is their size and space they take up. You kinda either good all in or not.

5. Milling machines are also a must have if you get too far into making stuff. The dividing line is CNC (computer controlled) vs. manual. I have a manual one (currently taken apart) and it's fine for making small modifications. But if you wake up one morning and say 'Hmm, I'd really like to turn this block of aluminum into this fancy part' then chances are you really need a CNC machine. But this opens a whole pandoras box with regard to CAD software and all sorts of stuff. Usually you have to run your CAD file through CAM software and produce tool paths and all sorts of stuff - I've never done it myself, but my friend Bill is big into that and says it's quite a job. Emachineshop.com allows you to farm everything out in an easy to use system, but you will pay a high price for 1 off parts. Also, finding a good quality mill is not easy task. A Bridgeport mill is generally considered the top of the line for manual milling machines, by they have a big foot print and take a fork lift to move. I have a Clausing 8250, which is kinda like a baby version of it. They are just hard to find in good shape, unless you find someone with a restored or cream puff one for sale (they do come up quite a bit on CL and Ebay). Except to pay between $1500 and $3000 depending on condition.

However, there is an old joke: 'a lathe should be free, because the money you spend in tooling will kill you.' It's very true. My lathes probably total up to $1000 or $1200, but I probably have 2 or 3 times that in tooling haha. And if you don't have a CNC mill or lathe, then you usually start needing stuff to hold or turn your work, such as fancy blocks, vises, rotary tables, etc.

6. Bandsaw - I don't have one, but every time I turn around, I need one. I just don't have room for one right now. But a good bandsaw is worth its weight in gold. They do have small scroll type saws (I should have bought one I saw once at a garage sale), and you can probably use them on metal if you take it easy with the cuts.

If I were you, I'd watch some of the videos on YouTube by the NYCCNC guy.. he has started small and gone big - his videos will teach you a lot about what you need and what's out there. He has a pretty decent collection of tools and machines and knows his business.

Also, in general, older is better with a lot of these machines. An old drill press, lathe, mill, etc. is usually much better made than the new stuff. Not always, but in a lot of ways the older machines are just so much more heavy duty. And when it comes to pushing metal around, cutting, turning, making chips, big and heavy is where it's at. You need a machine that doesn't flex or flinch when you jam something sharp directly into hard metal and say 'cut that.' If the machine is light or cheap, it will bend away instead of plow through and that's when tolerances go to hell.

Ray"

Used industrial equipment is a real bargain as long as you can accurately asses the mechanical condition and know up front if parts are available. Many industrial machines used proprietary bearing sizes which are no longer available. I have seen lots of really nice equipment that was nothing but scrap metal as you could not get repair parts and almost all industrial equipment uses 3 phase 240/480 motors. This 3 phase stuff is an entirely different world and an outstanding way to electrocute the unknowing. Rotary or solid state phase converters are extremely dangerous unless you really understand how they function.

This is one reason I suggested the 14" Delta-Rockwell metal-wood bandsaw. It is reasonably common, reasonably low cost, and easily converted to a 120/240 single phase motor. Roller floor stands are likewise low cost.

drgary wrote:Point taken! Here's what Ray sent:

Basically here are the big tools you probably want:

1. TIG welder. I have a gas and also a MIG. TIG is the ferrari of welding.
2. Drill press.

I should interject here, avoid the temptation to buy an 'all in one' milling machine, drill press, lathe. They are better than nothing, but not as good as having one dedicated machine for each.

3. A good quality lathe
4. In addition to a small lathe, you'll probably want a big one. I'd suggest starting with the small lathe first and teach yourself. Then you will better understand what you want from a larger lathe. I have a medium size Dalton lathe, but I still need to weld up a motor mount for it. It's a nice old lathe and a good size. You might also check into a restored south bend 9 or 10. Those are nice machines. The main problem with lathes is their size and space they take up. You kinda either good all in or not.

5. Milling machines are also a must have if you get too far into making stuff.
6. Bandsaw

Also, in general, older is better with a lot of these machines.

This is good and useful advice, but it may be a bit impractical (and even over the top) for most of us. For reference, I'm a few years shy of 70 and have been doing this since I learned to gas weld old car parts using coat hanger as my welding rod (which is not a good idea, BTW). My first major project was "restoring" a '52 MG-TD a friend's brother gave up on when we were in high school (1962). We ended up putting a Volvo B18 drivetrain in it, and we did a pretty good job. The fact that it took us the better part of 2 years to accomplish what I could do a thousand times better today in 2 months of evening and weekend work describes the learning curve for relative newbies. Both of us had been taking old cars apart since we were 10 (his brother and father started a lot of projects but finished none of them) and we were/are very good mechanics. Bill went to MIT and became an architect. I became a surgeon.

First of all, here's the missing piece you really need to accept and believe: you really have to learn from a pro, so take lessons. Most community colleges and vocational schools offer courses in machining, welding, fabricating etc. Trying to learn all this by yourself is a fool's errand for most, and you'll either hurt yourself or ruin enough stuff to give up on it long before you achieve proficiency unless you let a pro guide you.

Second, learning to use all that stuff well enough to get good, consistent results will require many projects over several years - you can't simply buy a lathe, a mill, a heliarc setup and a few hand tools and start turning out pieces with great precision, finish and repeatability.

Third, don't scrimp on safety equipment. Welding will give you everything from a bad sunburn to emphysema to skin cancer to cataracts to retinal burns if you don't use the right stuff the right way. Without protective clothing and shoes, weld spatter and hot parts that roll off your bench will burn holes in you and everything you wear. You need goggles, face shields, ear protection, work gloves appropriate for what you're doing, fire extinguishers etc etc etc. And your work space must be safe - clean, free of tripping hazards, with adequate light, power etc.

Fourth, you also have to have marking, measuring and finishing equipment to do it right. You need files, hand tools, calipers, micrometers, precision rulers, squares etc - and they all come in multiple sizes. You'll need prick punches, drifts, transfer punches, alignment pins, vises, clamps etc. And you'll have to draft the design you want to make before you try to make it. Cutting by eye and intuition is yet another fool's errand - you can't envision and remember all dimensions, relationships, proportions etc of even a single part, let alone an entire assembly like a boiler or valve body. I made most of those pieces when I was a kid but was able to buy a few mics, calipers etc and gradually built up a fine tool collection with money I earned playing the guitar (still do - I made $25 last Sunday night playing the blues in a dive bar). And I drafted at least a rough drawing of everything I made.

My 1948 South Bend Model A lathe (9" swing) is a wonderful machine for which most parts are still readily available (used, of course). But the best description of a lathe I ever saw is that it's the only machine that can replicate itself - and it's true. If you can't find a part, you can make whatever you need. This may be the best reason to have a second one in your shop if you favor oldies (as I do). Precision results, though, depend on the integrity and accuracy of fit of the lathe's parts - e.g. the bed has to be straight, true and undamaged, the tool holder has to move precisely without free play and in exactly the right direction, the controls have to function smoothly etc.

Sherline stuff is excellent, and it's big enough to make most of what a home barista needs. They have CNC setups you can drive with your laptop, and the quality is generally very good (although not up to the standards of a solid old South Bend).

I find Jet stuff to be more than adequate. I really wanted a Bridgeport vertical mill (which you can get cheap or free from shops and schools converting to modern equipment), but they're huge - so I bought a new Jet about 15 years ago and have been very pleased with it. I also have a Jet horizontal-vertical bandsaw that's big and powerful enough for almost anything I've ever done - yet it's small enough to fit in my 8' by 10' shop and inexpensive to boot.

As for welding, I'd start with the method most appropriate for the bulk of your projects - you absolutely do not want to buy MIG, TIG and gas at the same time because you'll never learn to do any of them well enough. TIG ("heliarc") is truly cool, and you can do it in a tuxedo without getting dirty. If you're good, you can weld "a razor blade to a boat anchor". But it takes a lot of time and practice to reach that stage - and you'll throw out a lot of metal, rod and electrodes before you reach a reasonable level of proficiency. I have a Hobart TIGwave 250 I bought new for 1/2 price when solid state ones first came out. I was challenged at a party once to weld a -10 Aeroquip fitting into a Foster's can. I blew a small hole in the can on the first try, but I did it so well on the second that I made another one and used them as the oil catch cans on my Lotus 7. They even passed VSCCA tech inspection and became a minor legend.

TIG is the method best suited for a home barista. Well done TIG beads are works of art, and you can heliarc most of the metals we might ever want to use. MIG (wire feed) leaves a much cruder-looking bead, and it throws spatter all over your work - it's great for quick, structural joins that don't need to look nice. But you don't want your home fabricated boiler to look like a crab steamer thrown together in the backyard by an inebriated Tim Taylor.

You can gas weld almost anything to almost anything else -but it ain't easy, and it takes a lot of time to learn. Gas is great for thin aluminum panels (e.g. the body of a Lotus 7...), but you'll blow holes in the first 25+ you tackle (at least I did - and I've been doing this for 50+ years). You can learn to gas weld mild steel with little difficulty, but mild steel's not useful for much in an espresso machine except maybe a frame (and I'd use stainless for that too). On the other hand, with a basic gas setup, you can braze, braze-weld, and solder - and those are all very useful to a home shop barista.