Modern Machine-Shop Practice Part 155

In small nuts, if two are to be filed, a better plan may be followed.

The two nuts may be put upon a short piece of screw, as shown in Fig.

2301, and screwed firmly together. In doing this, however, it may be found that the nuts will not tighten against each other, with the flats fair one with the other. This, however, may be accomplished by winding around the piece of screw, and between the nuts, a piece of waste, twine, or rag, and then s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g them together until they bind sufficiently and the sides come fair; the nuts may then be put in the vice, the jaws of the latter meeting the end A of the screw and the face B of the nut in the figure. Select the thinnest flat on either of the two nuts, and file it and the one coincident to it, but on the other nut, at the same time taking care that both are filed equidistant from the screw. To test this, apply the gauge as shown in Fig. 2296. File these faces down a little above size, and then loose the nuts and put in an addition of waste or twine, so that the same faces shall not coincide, and the two filed faces will serve as guides, down to which their new contiguous faces may be filed, the hexagon gauge being applied as before. By adding waste or twine, this process may be repeated, the original, or first-filed faces serving as guides down to which to file all the others, which will insure equal thickness of all the flats.

After roughing out all the flats in this manner, reverse the nuts on the screw, so that the two chamfered faces come together, as in Fig. 2302, and any want of truth in the parallelism of the flats one with the other, or with the axial line of the screw, will become at once apparent, and will be corrected in the finishing, providing that an equal amount be filed off the respective sides that are in the same plane as are A and B in the figure. Of course nuts filed in this way require the application of the calipers and gauges, the same as described for a single nut; but uniformity will be a.s.sured and the filing truer, because the filing in small nuts, as an inch or less, will be more true on account of there being a larger area for the file to rest and steady upon. It is obvious that a plain cylindrical piece, instead of a piece of screw, may be used, in which case the waste or twine will be unnecessary; but in this case the plug, or cylindrical piece, should be shorter than the length of the two nuts, and should not be so tight a fit to the bores as to damage the threads.

In small nuts it will not pay to chip off the surplus metal, because they cannot be held sufficiently firmly in the vice without suffering damage from the vice-jaws, or even from copper clamps, while lead ones are too soft to hold them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2303.]

The finishing marks, if any, should be in a line with the bore of the nut, which gives the neatest appearance. The process is the same for a bolt head, such as shown in Fig. 2295, as for a single nut, with the exception that the gauge must be applied as in Fig. 2303, when testing the truth of the flats with the axial line of the bolt, this being necessary because of the roundness of the end face A, in Fig. 2303. The distances D and C will be equal when the flat is true in that direction.

A pair of outside calipers form an excellent example in vice work. The material should be good cast steel of an even thickness, and therefore (unless for very large ones) saw blade will answer the purpose. It should be well softened by being made to a low red heat and buried in fine cinder ashes or lime, and allowed to cool there; the proper width of this piece of steel being sufficiently greater than the size of the caliper washer, to allow room for a chisel cut and leave a little to file off in truing up the joint. The length should be somewhat more than that required to make the legs, because a piece will be required to be cut off the narrow end to give substance enough for the points. The size of the washer should be drawn at each end of the steel, the centre of the washer should be centrepunch-marked, and a line should then be drawn to set off the two legs. The steel is then severed along this line, thus getting out the two rough legs. When shears are not at hand, or when it is not designed to use them for this purpose, three methods of dividing may be pursued: First, we may drill small holes along the line, and cut between the holes with a chisel. The objection to this is that the blade is sometimes very hard to drill. Secondly, we may make centrepunch marks along the line, and then cut along the line with a chisel; and thirdly, we may drill a few holes at each end, and cut the middle with the centrepunch and chisel. The entire drilling is the safest, and the centrepunching the most hazardous, but it can be accomplished if the centrepunching is done lightly and gone over several times, with the chisel applied between the centrepunch marks, which will be much the quickest plan of the three.

The hole is next drilled for the rivet, care being taken to make it about 1/32 inch smaller than the proper size, because the drill will not make a sufficiently true and parallel hole, and the latter must be reamed or trued out; and again because the legs have to go into the fire to be bent, and hence the holes may become damaged. There is another consideration, however, in determining the size to drill this hole, which is that the two legs require to be riveted together to bend them, and it is as well to drill the hole to suit the piece of metal intended to be used for this temporary rivet, which should be of bra.s.s or copper, so as to drive out easily after the bending is done. During the bending process the points should be thickened, care being taken not to twist them in the process. If the vice hand does the bending, the following instructions are pertinent: Heat the steel slowly and turn it over and over in the fire so that the points may not get burned before the wider parts are sufficiently heated. Let the fire be a clean one, that is, with no gaseous or blazing coal about it, or the coal will stick to the sides of the calipers, and they will get cool while being cleaned of adhering coal after being taken from the fire. Begin the bending from the thick end, carrying it forward by degrees. Strike light but rapidly succeeding blows, placing the steel upon the round point of the anvil.

The bending completed, and the points being thickened, the edges of the legs are trimmed upon an emery wheel or with a file, using the latter lengthwise of the edges if a new one, or crosswise if an old one. A full 1/32 inch may be left to trim off after the calipers are put together.

The temporary rivet may next be driven out, first, however, gripping the legs firmly and near to the rivet end with a hand vice, putting a piece of sheet bra.s.s between each jaw of the hand vice and the steel; otherwise the teeth of the latter will mark the steel, entailing a great deal of extra labor to file the marks out. The rivet hole is then reamed out to the required size, the two legs being held together by the hand vice to render the reaming more steady and true by making the hole longer when the two are together.

The next operation is to turn the rivet and washers. It is a very common practice to turn two separate washers and a rivet. On account, however, of the small amount of bearing in the washer holes, such washers are apt to rivet up out of fair one with the other, making an unsightly joint and causing them to be out of round when the edges of the joint are filed up. A better plan is to turn a pin and washer, taking care to make the diameters of the two exactly equal and the flat faces of each quite level. The pin should be turned about 1/64 inch taper, the small end being made a neat fit to the holes in the caliper legs, and should be made of cast steel properly annealed. When finished, the head of the pin should be gripped by a pair of lead clamps in the vice, the end being left protruding so that the legs can be put upon it and revolved back and forth with a good supply of oil and under hard pressure, so that the pin will be forced a good and rather tight fit into the holes. This process will also smooth out the holes and condense the metal around both the holes and the pin. It is well to leave the pin to fit about one half as tight as the finished joint requires to be. The washer should be countersunk about three-quarters of the way through the hole, the latter being left a close working fit to the pin.

The legs should be rough filed, second-cut filed, and smooth filed before being draw-filed, care being used to keep the files clean, so as to avoid scratches. During this filing, however, the pin should be tried in the hole to see if the head comes fair down upon the face; thus the pin forms a guide and test in facing up the joint of the leg, and this is one of its advantages over the two-washer plan. After carefully draw-filing and polishing the sides of the legs the fitting of the joint is finished as follows: Place the two legs upon the pin in their proper position, and then put the washer into its place. Then behind the washer place another temporary one that will protrude beyond the end of the pin; then grip the whole tightly between a pair of lead clamps or pieces of thick leather in the vice; this will bring all parts of the joint home. Take hold of one leg in each hand and move them backward and forward as far as the vice will let them go, repeating the operation about a dozen times or more. This will mark the high spots upon the legs, which may then be taken apart again and have the bright parts removed by a sc.r.a.per. It is also well to place the flat face of the washer upon a smooth file and rub it backward and forward under finger pressure, which will tend to correct any defect in its flatness. When the faces of the joint bear all over, it may be put together with oil and placed in the vice as before. Work it well back and forth, take it apart again and cut off the rivet to the required length, taking care very slightly to recess the end to a.s.sist the riveting. The whole joint should then be wiped quite clean, freely oiled, and put together ready to rivet. The head of the pin should be rested upon a block of lead, so that it will not get damaged. The riveting should be done with a small light ball-pened hammer, the blows being delivered very lightly and evenly all round the edge. As the riveting continues it is necessary to move the legs occasionally to see how the tightening proceeds, and when the legs are sufficiently tight, one of them may be gripped between pieces of leather in the vice, while the other is well worked and lubricated with oil. Then the riveted end should be filed off to very nearly its proper height and shape, and the joint well worked back and forth and round and round in the hand until it gets quite warm, when it may be cooled in water and tried for tightness. If too tight, it may be either worked until easy, or the riveted end of the pin may be tapped with a hammer to loosen it slightly. The riveting being completed, and the end filed smooth, the rounded part of the washer and the pin head should be draw-filed with a very fine file moved in varying directions, and then the polishing may be done with emery paper.

FITTING KEYS.--Keys that have been planed or milled will still require fitting with the file to insure that they bed properly. If the key to be fitted is taper and intended to fit top and bottom, the sides should first be filed true to a surface plate, and fitted into the keyway in the shaft, so that it can be slid up and down a good working fit. While fitting it, however, it is well to try it once or twice in the keyway in the wheel, as well as in the shaft, so as to see by the marks whether the keyways in the shaft and wheel require any fitting at all, either to make them quite square with the outside face, supposing it to be turned off, or to give them a good even bearing surface. The key being fitted sideways we must give the two keyseats a coating of red marking just sufficient to show that the surface is of a red tint, and then put the wheel in its place on the shaft. Then we bevel off the edges of the key at each end, leaving a chamfer of 1/16 inch, and after facing off the top of the key with a b.a.s.t.a.r.d file, we place it in the keyway and tap it very lightly to a gentle bearing. After driving the key lightly home and taking it out again, we may file it on the top and bed it on the bottom, according to the indication of the marking, and re-insert it, tapping it up until it is home, top and bottom, without being a driven fit at all; on taking it out we file it according to the marks again, and if we continue this process until the key is a good fit, it will not spring the wheel the least out of true, no matter how tight, reasonably, it is finally driven. The key must never be driven in or out dry, for it will, in that case, inevitably cut during the first part of the operation; the marking put on the keyway is sufficient lubrication, but after two or three insertions the key also should be itself given a light coat, which will serve as lubrication, as well as denote the fit.

The bearing or contact marks upon a key driven home very lightly may show at one end or on one side only, while if the key was driven farther in those marks may show all over, making the key appear to fit much better than it actually does. This occurs from the elasticity and compression of the metal of the keyway and key, the metal giving most where the contact is hardest; from this it is apparent that a wheel truly bored and a good fit may be set out of true by the key.

In Fig. 2304, for example, is a wheel hub W, a.s.sumed to be a good fit to the shaft S, while the key K fits at the end A only. If the key be driven tightly home, the wheel will spring over, so that instead of the plane of its diameter standing at a right angle to the axial line of the shaft as at D in Fig. 2305, it will stand at an angle as at E, throwing the wheel out of true in that direction. This would occur not only on account of the elasticity and compression of the metal of the keyway, but also because the surface of the bore of the wheel and of the shaft is not, even under the best of turning, smooth enough to come into close contact all over, but are covered with slight projections or protuberances, which may occur in spirals because of the turning tool marks, or in localities because of differences in the texture of the metal. In driving the key home these protuberances give way, and they do so most where the contact pressure is greatest, which would be at G in Fig. 2305, causing the wheel to cant over. If the wheel is not a good fit to the shaft it will not in this case touch the shaft at C, Fig.

2305.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2304.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2305.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2306.]

Now suppose the key to bear at _a_ and _b_, Fig. 2306, only, then the wheel would be thrown out of true in a direction at a right angle to the length of the key as denoted by the line E, which should stand as at D.

A properly bedded key binds the opposite half of the circ.u.mference of the wheel bore to the corresponding half circ.u.mference of the shaft; but if the key binds at one end only, as in Fig. 2304, the contact will be at the end H only; hence the surfaces will soon compress, on account of all the strain of the key falling on a small area, and the key will get loose.

It is obvious then that if a wheel has not been bored to run true the error may be to some extent corrected in fitting the key, but in this case the key must be driven well home, and the wheel rim tried for running true during the fitting process, the key being so bedded as to true the wheel as far as the elasticity and compression will permit; but a key thus bedded will not hold so firmly.

The distance a key of a certain length, breadth, and thickness, and of a given taper, will drive after being pushed home by hand or lightly tapped in with a hand hammer depends upon how closely it fits to its seat, and upon the elasticity of the metal, as well as upon the force with which it is driven. The workman usually, while fitting the key, drives it well home occasionally, to see how much of its length to allow for the final driving, and while doing so, if the key is a small one, a hand set chisel or a piece of copper should be interposed between the key head and the hammer (a blacksmith's set chisel is used for large keys) to prevent the hammer from damaging the key.

In fitting keys to old keyways the key is made too long, and cut off after being driven home. A long key is apt to bend in the driving, hence it is not unusual to support it by holding a second hammer beneath and against it to support it while being driven. In driving a key out, especially if it is fast home, a quick heavy blow is best, as it is less likely to burr, swell, or bulge the end of the key. But after the key has started lighter blows will answer.

To make a key for an old sunk keyway, it is as well to fit a piece of wood thereto as a guide in forging and fitting the key. If a _fast_ running grindstone or emery wheel is at hand, many will forge the key a trifle large and then grind it as near as possible, and finish by filing. This, however, does not produce good work; it is better to plane the key all over, leaving a little in size for fitting. In preparing the piece of wood referred to, it should not in the fitting be driven or even forced in and out to try the fit, for the wood will compress and the marks mislead as to the actual fit. The proper way is to chalk the piece of wood and push it up the keyway just tightly home, then withdraw and fit it again.

In cases where the key is forged to very nearly the finished size, and is finished by the file, as sometimes occurs when away from the shop, it is best to forge the key with a gib head, as in Fig. 462, to a.s.sist in extracting it, especially when it is difficult to drive the key out from the back end, or when the keyway does not pa.s.s entirely through. The key should be finished with a smooth file and with the file marks lengthways; it is, in fact, better to use a small smooth file and draw-file it, taking care to ease the high spots the most; and before driving it home both it and the keyway should be oiled.

If a keyway is to be cut by hand through a bore, as in a pulley or gear-wheel bore, its width should be marked with a [T]-square. If its width does not exceed 1/2 inch a cape chisel a little less (say 1/32 inch less) than the finished width of keyway should be used, which will leave a little metal for the sides to be filed true. If the keyway be an inch wide it is better to take a cape chisel about 1/4 inch wide and cut a groove along each side of the keyway (keeping close to the marked line), and then cut out the middle with a flat chisel. The sides and bottom of the keyway should be surfaced true with the file.

If a keyway is to be cut in a shaft the cape chisel should be used in the same manner as above. But in both cases it is best, when filing, to occasionally ease out the corners with the edge of a half-round file, for reasons which will be explained presently.

In chipping a keyway in a bore the cut must not be carried entirely through from one side, or the metal at the end of the cut will break out, and even in wrought iron this is apt to occur, so that it is necessary to cut the keyway from each end, or, at least, nick it in at one and cut it from the other end. In long key ways it is handiest to cut them half-way from each side, using, in the absence of anything better, a piece of planed wood and red marking or chalk to try the keyway with.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2307.]

In cutting out through keyways by hand the location of the keyway is marked off by lines on both sides of the stub end of the rod, and then the ma.s.s of the metal is removed by drilling through as many holes as can be got in the size of keyway required, as shown in Fig. 2307, in which W is the work, B C D E the location of the keyway, and 1, 2, 3, 4 are the holes, taking care to have the drill rather smaller than the width of requisite keyway. The holes are drilled half-way through from each side, which is done to keep the keyway true; for if the drills were to run a little to one side, as they are apt to do from a variety of causes, a great deal of work would be required to correct the error.

If the keyway is of sufficient dimensions to admit of the use of a chisel, the pieces left between the drilled holes are chipped out, and for this purpose a side chisel is found very useful, not only to nick the sides of the pieces left by the drilling, but also to take the finishing chipping cuts on the sides of the keyway. To cut out the square corners of the keyway, the diamond-point chisel shown in Fig.

2171 is employed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2308.]

If, however, the keyway is a very deep one, requiring long and slight chisels, the chipping process may be greatly reduced, or in fact entirely dispensed with, by plugging up the holes first drilled in the stub end by driving pieces of round iron tightly into them, and then drilling new holes, having their centres midway between the pieces so driven in, as at A in Fig. 2308. After the latter drilling, the remaining pieces of plugs are driven out, leaving the centre of the keyway cut clear through and the sides with a series of flutes in them, as shown at B, Fig. 2308 (in which 1 2 are the plugs and A is a centre for the new hole at that end), which should be filed away with a file as thick or strong as the clear s.p.a.ce will allow. These plugs must be of the same metal as that in which the keyway is cut, otherwise the drill will be apt to run to one side.

To insure truth in the surfaces, a surface plate to test with is an absolute necessity, while to test the parallelism, a small sheet iron gauge is used, which gauge may afterwards be employed as a guide whereby to plane the thickness of the gib and key.

In cases where a slotting machine is at hand, it is sometimes the practice to cut out one end of the keyway to a sufficient length to admit a slotting tool, and then to slot out the remainder. This plan is often resorted to in getting out keyways of unusually large dimensions.

A much more usual method, however, is to employ slotting or keyway drills.

It is obvious that the ends of the keyways cut by drills are half round; hence, if square corners are required, they must be cut out square with the chisel shown in Fig. 2176, and afterwards filed out true. As a general rule, keyways cut with these drills require filing on the sides to get proper smoothness and bearing for the keys; and here it may be remarked that, in filing the corners of the keyway, a safe-edge file must be used, so that the two faces forming the corner will not be operated upon simultaneously, because that would require that the file be used in a straight line laterally as well as horizontally, and this is impracticable even in the hands of the most skilful.

Even the square file should have a safe edge upon it, and such an edge is usually produced by grinding the teeth off one face of the file. In selecting the face to have the teeth ground off, choose a face that is hollow in its length, or, if none of the faces is hollow, then select a face that is at a right angle to a good face of the file. It will be noted that with one safe edge only the square file will require turning over in order to operate upon both corners and maintain in each case a safe edge of the file against the flat sides of the keyway. For this reason many workmen select the two best parallel faces of the file and grind off the two other faces, giving to the file two safe edges, one opposite to the other. In this case either of the cutting faces of the file may be used upon the whole end face of the keyway operating close up to the corner, or if the file is much narrower than the keyway it may be used with a side sweep that will prevent the file from pinning, and produce much truer filing.

It is useless to attempt to cut out a square corner with a square file unless one edge of the latter is ground safe, because the teeth of the file itself do not form a square corner, and it is therefore only by grinding the teeth off one side that the points of the file teeth can be brought full up to a sharp angle. Here, however, it may be noted that even if the filing is performed with the best of safe-edge files, and as carefully as possible, it will still be necessary to square out the fine corners with the edge of a fine smooth half-round file.

If the edges of the keyways are rounding, as they are sometimes made where strength is required in the strap, it is better to take a file nearly or about 1/8 inch larger in diameter than the width of the keyway, and grind two safe edges on it, otherwise the round file is very apt to go astray and cut the sides as well as the edge of the keyway.

An equaling file is much better for keyways than one actually parallel.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2309.]

Another way employed to finish small keyways is by the aid of the tools shown in Figs. 2309 and 2310, which are termed drifts, because they are driven through with a hand hammer. That shown in Fig. 2309 is intended for holes having but little depth and not requiring to be very true, such, for instance, as those cut in the ends of keyways or bolts to receive cotters; the thickness at A A is made greater than at B C to give the cutting edge clearance.

The form shown in Fig. 2309 is for use by hand, the teeth being cut diagonally instead of across, as at A A, to preserve the strength. This end may also be attained by making the serrations round at the bottom, as shown in the figure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2310.]

The slant of the teeth on one side of the drift should cross the slant of the teeth on the diametrally opposite side, because if the teeth on opposite sides were parallel one to the other the drift would have a tendency to move over to one side, and crowd there during the process of drifting.

In using these drifts the keyway should first be filed out to very nearly the finished size, leaving very little duty for the drift to perform, although the drift may be driven a short distance into the keyway occasionally during the filing, so as to show where filing is requisite. The work must lie flat and level upon a metal block, lead being preferable, and oil freely supplied to the drift. "If the hole is a deep one, and the cuttings clog in the teeth, or if the cut becomes too great (which may be detected by the drift making but little progress, or by the blows sounding solid) the drift must be driven out again, the cuttings removed, and the surplus metal, if any, removed by filing. The drift must again be freely oiled, and driven in as before, and the operation continued until the drift is driven through the keyway. After the drift has pa.s.sed once through it should be reversed (or, if a square one, turned a quarter revolution) and again driven through, so that each side of the drift will have cut on each side of the hole, which is done to correct any variation in the size of the drift" ("Complete Practical Machinist").

The great desideratum in using these drifts is to drive them true, and to strike fair blows, otherwise they will break. While the drift is first used, it should be examined for straightness at almost every blow; and if it requires drawing to one side, it should be done by altering the direction in which the hammer travels, and not by tilting the hammer face.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2311.]

In Fig. 2311, suppose A to be a piece of wood and B and C drifts which have entered the keyways out of plumb, as shown by the dotted lines D and E. If, to right the drift C, it was struck by the hammer F in the position shown, and travelling in the direction denoted by G, the drift C would be almost sure to break; but if the drift B was struck by the hammer H, as shown, and travelling in the direction denoted by I, it would draw the drift B upright without breaking; or, in other words, the hammer face should always strike the head of the drift level and true with it, the drawing of the drift, if any is required, being done by the direction in which the hammer travels. When it is desired to cut a very smooth hole, two or more drifts should be used, each successive one being a trifle larger in diameter than its predecessor. Drifts slight in cross-section or slight in proportion to their lengths would be tempered evenly all over to a blue, while those of stout proportions would be tempered to a deep brown, bordering upon a bright purple.