Custom Billet Shift Knob BS

I guess the next logical step would be for me to also offer your design in black acetal ... lower my price point a little and they wouldn't have to be painted. I'd still offer the Aluminum, of course.

 

Exactly.

 

The electrician is popping over tomorrow (have off already because the Taco is getting an alignment, perfect timing)!

So yeah, I really know nothing about electrical service ... but I started reading a bit. He was worried that the panel might be 60A max, but after looking it is 125A. It looks full, meaning there are no free slots ... but apparently there is room for tandem breakers. I'd just be adding a 220V single phase 20A outlet to this ... as the motor from the lathe only pulls 8.4A (14A max load).

The more I read about this, it seems that the garage panel is sufficient for a medium sized house ... so hopefully that means I am good to go, and possibly have room for expansion?

 

Okay, so apparently the previous owner of my house had 220v in the garage, and just took the receptacle with him when he moved. Everything else was still hooked up.

Headed to Lowe's for some parts, should be able to turn the lathe on today!

 

Wow. It looks like you hit the jackpot!

You're going to be having fun really soon.

Every house we've been in except this one had a full junction box. This house has a lot of expansion but no space to put anything.

 

Hehe, hopefully insulated with proper grommets in a federally approved junction box covered in a certified plate replacing the absent receptacle...either that or your home inspector missed that biscuit

When I built my garage I put in 220V for a compressor and RV charging (I don't and will never have an RV, I just wanted a feed from my gennie into the home circuits for power outages).

Hey, since you you wanna get all "latheing" (good thing I caught the splele check on that...it came up "lathering") this weekend, I have a query.

Back when you turned your first SS knob, you commented on how you were tempted to fashion it onto a melee stick...well, I happen to have this extra Al knob. It sits on my desk in my office upstairs...when I'm on con calls (which is often) it gets polished (yes I polish my knob while conversing with customers) alot.

What would the effort be to build up a collar for my Al knob to attach up to a melee shaft. And no, I haven't a clue yet what the staff would be...ive got some nice branch driftwood that would make less "melee" but more walking stick. Would still pack a sold punch tho.

Noodle on that if you would good sir!

 

Speaking of polished knobs, my delrin one is getting nice and smooth.

 

Gotta crevice the MT knob thread again

Edit: dafuq engrish is that? Meant revive

 

A little covfefe to go with your knob? Haha!

I murder English alllll the time.

I was thinking about those threads, but I wanted to give Rick a bit of time.

 

It wouldn't be difficult to make something like that, but I'd have to build a tool post and get some wood lathe tooling (which is something I planned to do anyway for making candlesticks for a friend with a wedding planning business). My only concerns are wood choice really because getting wood dust into the worms and gears of a metal lathe is a bad thing. I've been reading that some of the turnings are very abrasive and when finished the equipment requires a thorough cleaning as to not accelerate wear. Could probably mitigate a lot of that by building a Dexter-esque "kill site" around the work area, so there's that.

I'll let you know when I get set up for that.

I've been wondering how the delrin has been holding up for folks. Mine is still kinda new, and was never really polished well enough toward the bottom of the ring to begin with, so it's going back up on the lathe today most likely. This will reset the clock for me.

The MT thread seems to be where most want to post, even for the AT knobs. I might just use that for everything, and post a link to the main thread in 2nd gen section(new MT design fits 2nd and 3rd).

I do have about 7 people waiting for me to start up again, so I will probably bump the thread in a day or two.

I never went to Lowe's, and somehow ended up on a mountain bike in the middle of the woods for a few hours ... so I still have to get some Romex, wire caps and plug ends today.

 

I do wood turning, its setup in my garage. I just do it for mental therapy, and my wife likes when I just show up with a bowl or something. I always tell her, turning a bowl is easy. Turning two identical is the hard part lol

 

Thanks for that laugh!

It sounds like you made a solid decision there!

BTW, you could make some sweet wooden knobs also.

 

Dood! Cutting two identical pieces of a 2x4 is hard!

 

The digital readout should make repeatability somewhat easier for wood turning, but the rest will have to be good ol' fashioned OCD.

 

Okay, lathe is running and about 95% set up. I still need to wire the coolant pump, but that's two wires and done (have to wait on that ... reasoning below).

Weird thing, the breaker (at the lathe, not main box) trips when I put the spindle in reverse. These are things that happen when you are colorblind and try to wire a motor yourself. Will have to bring the lady in to look for me when she's home. I was pretty confident in my connections, could just be the wire nuts not being an optimal size.

Fucker is running, leveled, digital readout installed and configured. Everything is caulked up so the coolant doesn't leak. I might need to fine adjust the headstock angle, but I'll wait until I get a longer part in there for that (when it actually matters).

 

Color blindness is not good. At least it will get your wife in the garage. Fun times will ensue!

 

Yeah, it can be a pain at times ... they eye thing. Having her in the garage is just going to bring comments on what needs to be cleaned in there, haha.

Most everything is numbered, except I have to go on color for the wires entering the motor terminal box. They are numbered inside of the lathe's electrical box, but not once those wires enter the motor terminal box.

This stuff is foreign to me, but to me this diagram ends in two bunches of 4 wires, each under their own wire nut. 1,8,5, 4, ground are the only wires coming off the motor. The chart on the right side are designations on the lathe itself. Any thoughts?

This is what I ended up with;

Wire nut #1 = 1, U1, 8, Z1
Wire nut #2 = 4, U2, 5, Z2
ground also wired to the obvious place under the terminal screw.

 

Yep. The off topic advice is usually not what I want to hear. But, it is great when anyone comes down for a visit.

Um, I'd love to help, but I usually deal with electrics by process of elimination. Generally, that means that some of the electrons in the wire get eliminated through my toes.

 

Only other thing I can think of (if my colors are matched correctly), is that the 1 and 8 go under the wire nut, and the U1 and Z1 get spliced in farther down the wire. Hmmm

 

Ooof. Does the motor turn when your done or did the shaft shoot across the room? If you made a rail gun, I know a small armada that would like to talk with you.