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I had to make a new worm gear for an N gauge loco, 5mm dia 1mm pitch in brass, the only issue was it needed a 0.8mm (32 thou) hole for the motor shaft. the first one i made I threaded the outside of some 5mm brass rod, then tried to drill using a standard 0.8mm drill bit. now centering the drill is the main issue, and though it looked good, when mounted on the motor shaft and taken to full speed, there was vibration. so i had another go today, this time using a 0.8mm carbide PCB drill, these have a 3mm shank and a drill section about 1/2" long, being very careful when starting the drill, barely touching and just very gently started the drill- now these drills will break if you breath on them wrong, but i managed to get the drill centred with no apparent wobble, then pushing my luck I drilled to a depth of about 10mm (3/8") this went on the motor nicely, but was a little loose, so I tried again with a 0.7mm PCB drill and that one was too tight (maybe a press fit, i am not sure. needless to say, the n gauge loco is now running smoothly. I do love the precision i can get from my unimat 3. does anyone else have any techniques for drilling similar small bore centre holes? Peter

Here a list files Charts & Tables for Machinist's. I have found to be very handy doing work . I hope you post your favorite charts & talbes. I uploaded to a different site so I do not fill up this site. I put mine in a 3-Binder in tool chest. The tap and drill chart I have extra large on my wall. Very handy /g/minilathe/files/5%29%20Charts%20&%20Tables%20for%20machine%20work Dave

A recent thread had a link to the wonderful clickspring YouTube clockmaking videos, and I was intrigued to see him use ‘taper pins’ to be able to accurately realign two plates( or, presumably, other items. Seems like a very smart solution. Does anyone use these? Do you drill the holes (with a taper drill), or use a reamer? And any other equally smart solutions to achieve the same thing? (Sorry, not specifically Unimat related - but at least it’s metalwork !)

Happy New Year all ! I’m after advice from horologists, or just those used to making tiny things! I’m fitting a small quartz clock movement into a small, broken clock. The face is nice, but the available hands that fit the quartz movement aren’t, so I wanted to use the original metal hands. The new shafts are bigger though - 1.5mm > 2mm (minute hand), 2.6mm > 3.5mm (hour hand). I tried to open the minute hand hole up using a spike / bradawl, tapping slowly and very gently. Of course eventually I split it. What isn’t visible from the photo is a slight bush or flange effect around the back of the holes, presumably the holes have been pressed out and this helps the hand stay straight and true on the shaft. That’s why I didn’t just try to drill out the holes. Anyway, any advice on how to make new hands (and from what material)? Even gripping them for filing etc. would seem very tricky… Or is it possible to rescue the old ones? The minute hand just slops around on the new shaft now.

I am interested in either purchasing or making a set of adjustable handwheels for a DB 200 lathe. in searching the forum there were some posts mentioning that there were some being made and sold in the past. It does not seem like anyone is making or selling them presently. A dial indicator is very accurate and have used them. At this point I am not interested in installing and using a DRO, maybe in the future. I prefer adjustable dials because they are common and convenient. All of the equipment in my shop have dials that use a set screw to move and lock manually. There is one exception, a small bench mill that has the friction type. A search through the Files section did not yield much information as to how to make them. An article in ME Workshop (Feb.2006) has plans for a set to use on a Unimat 3. They are kind of large 1/3/4" in diameter but may work on a DB. Just curious if anyone has made and used them. Also, any information or plans to make a set would be greatly appreciated. Thank You

Today I installed my digital read out on my Unimat Z axis which is the longitudinal travel. It is nice to be able to set zero at any point along the travel. It took some time to make special brackets for mounting but it paid off in the long run. Now I will need to make some resettable hand wheels to suit. I have done all the machining on the little Unimat as it is the only piece of equipment I have at this time. The more tooling I build on the Unimat the better equipped I get. I am building my “Unimat Shop” one piece at a time. Proficiency and speed builds as I go. Dick -- http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/ OFF-SET-tailstock-center-65965#post105972 http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/s...995#post112113 SMALL TURRET TOOL POST PLANS http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/l...994#post112111 LARGE TURRET TOOL POST PLANS http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/m...383#post110340 MINI-LATHE CARRIAGE LOCK PLANS http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/s...191#post106483 SMALL QC TOOL POST PLANS http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/q...849#post119345 QUICK CHANGE LATHE TURRET http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/m...949#post119893 MINI LATHE COMPOUND PIVOT MODIFICATION

I bought this Unimat 3 quill handle and it has this gear on it. Is this a Unimat item for a quill feed drive, or possibly something someone made?

I have a discount offer from an eBay seller for a mill/drill attachment I put a watch on just to see what it would go for. It's different from others listed and I don't know if it's different item with the wrong name, or simply missing components the seller may be unaware of. The price just dropped to $200 USD from Pounds with $44 USD shipping. Appreciate the education.

Hello: Long time no see. 8^) Absence due to having been busy with a number of things, quite a few of them directly related to putting my U3 in order. Others less so, but such is life. In the course of what I have been doing with my U3 and while going over my stash of photographs, I came across the one I attached to this post. Unfortunately, I only recall having it come up while trolling the web for anything with 'unimat 3' in the text file. Maybe in a 'for sale' ad in Craig's? No idea, I had forgotten all about it till today. But I do recall a couple of things immediately called my attention which is why I saved it: 1. A small motor (w/gear reduction?) and fwd/rev control box for driving the carriage feed screw. 2. An nicely oversized handwheel right in front of the carriage which would indicate (?) it is used to move the carriage left/right without the use of the carriage feed screw which would (obviously) be somehow disengaged. It would be really great to be able to move the carriage left/right with a handwheel and skip the arduous carriage feed screw. So ... Anyone here seen this machine, reference to it or anything similar? I'd appreciate your views/comments on this. --- Something else: As I may have mentioned, I purchased my ca. 1980 U3 used, 2nd. 4rd or Xth hand, no idea. No history, maintenance log or provenance. Preliminary testing revealed OEM bearings sounding like a muted blender crushing ice. Further inspection showed the rest of the machine from the 3-jaw onwards having suffered the same lack of care. A real pity and quite a bit of work to make good, a *still* on-going endeavour. First thing was to swap out the bearings for a new set but did not replace the disk springs. Besides not being available locally in that (DIN) size, it was not part of the many instruction sets I read on how to carry out the bearing replacement operation. That was 18 months ago and after getting a great many (!) things straightened out, the lack of properly functioning disk springs shows in every turning operation. Obvious reasons being chuck abused -> bearings abused/shot -> disk springs/shot. A lesson learned: Change bearings? -> change disk springs. Just like when you drop the gearbox on your Chevy to do the clutch: replace everything. I am presently awating for the arrival if a set of disk springs for my U3's headstock which I was able to source from an OEM factory in China. I attempted other sources but they would: 1. not sell to me | 2. have a minimum order of US$100+SH | 3. only ship via courier (US$40 / US$60) | 4. only sell to certain countries in the EU. Once we understood our mutual needs, things with China were rapidly ironed out and I was able to purchase a set 8 disk springs for ~ US$5.00 + US$10.00 shipping. A stark contrast with the three or four outfits which directly ignored my query. Needless to say, the jury will be out till I can install and test them. These chaps export their various models of disk springs worldwide, no reason they will not be just as good as the original ones. Once installed, the level of deflection I now see when taking a cut will hopefully be reduced to a minimum expression. I'll report back on all that once I have something. Best, JHM

I just got done cobbling together a cheap power feed unit for my Unimat 3. I used nothing more than an Erector Set motor and 2 of the pulleys that come with most sets. The 1 to 1 pulley ratio actually seems like a nice speed. Can easily make multiple pullies to add options for different speeds. You can use a Unimat belt, too. Haven't tried it under resistance while making a cut yet, but it should do well with light cuts. The video looks like the feed is a bit herky-jerky, but that is just the video - it actually feeds very steadily. Any thoughts?