DIY Spindle Square "Reloaded"

hi my name is Dale and welcome to metal tips and tricks I'm really excited about this video because I'm starting a whole new segment I call build it use it and that's where I end up building some sort of tool tooling or machine to do something here in the shop now let's talk about what is tooling tooling is anything that you add to a machine to improve its functionality what is a tool is more like a hammer or ranch a digital caliper and of course machine is like a bridge port no we're not going to build a bridge port that I think that would be a little ambitious but there are other machines that I do need to build from time to time like a bead roller so what I want so why I'm so excited about this is going to be an ongoing series teaching you about how to build things for your shop that you can use and expand the capacity of your abilities in your shop today we're going to build a spindle square a spindle square is used to trim in the head of your milling machine what's also unique about these is you don't use them for very many things they're not a versatile tool but pretty much just set up the tram and a milling machine you could do something on the lathe but it's not quite as accurate but I've never owned one until now because the one that stair it sells is over two hundred dollars and it's hard to justify expending that kind of money on something that you don't use very often but with that being said I've always wanted one because the thing I hate to do most in the shop and I mean I really do not like to trim the head in because the old way is very frustrating where you set in a dial indicator and you spin it from one side to the other and try to trim this in well un fighting it this here eliminates a lot of that challenge so let's talk about it very simple to build it's basically four parts actually let's count six because we have two screws in it to lock in the dial indicators we have the main body this bar here it's six and a quarter inches long and then pressed into it as a shaft the shaft here is from 3/4 inch cold rolled stock and then of course two very affordable dial indicators from Harbor Freight they're about 15 bucks apiece so to have about you know a little over thirty dollars into this project and it's going to save me a lot of times I think that thirty dollars is a great investment so let's talk about some of the engineering that goes into this it's not a complicated thing the distance here is going to be five inches and the way I got it set up for five inches is because it fits right on top on the vise and I can square the vise in and tram the head to the vise and I can which is sometimes preferable because you never know if your bites is actually true to your tabletop when you bolt your vise down that could be some little shaving in there that you miss throws it off so it's better to train them the sooner it's a six inch bias so I decided to go with a five inch on center here the other things you got that you want to be careful about is these gauges if they're brought in too close when you put it in the Chuck here or when you put it in they call it these gauges will hit the spindle so you also want to be aware of that besides that this thing isn't rocket science it's probably one of the easiest tools or tooling to produce let's get started and let's get this tool in action here's the body it's 1 inch square aluminum stock very simple I went with aluminum because well that's what I have my scrap pile this is kind of a scrap pile engineering project you're going to use what materials that you have available this one inch seems to be perfect I've already cut it to length milled down the ends so now we're ready to put it back in the machine we're going to drill three holes one for each gauge and then also for the main shaft very easy to do what's great here is line up on this we just want to make sure that our holes come down and perpendicular to the shaft we just trust the machine to make that happen it's one of my favorite tools is the cheap Harbor Freight digital caliper the full width of this is six and a quarter inches so we're going to come out here to three and eight so that's one point two five lock that into place the length on this is not critical that's why I'm going to take a measurement in the middle and then I can drill the center holes and these outer holes would be equal I could go from one end in and over if I wanted to but that's too much work and I don't need to be that accurate I'm going to use the gauge as a scribe so that's our Center so we're going to have to Center up our bar stock we'll grab an edge finder come up here cut picks up and set our dial to zero so there's two measurements we're dealing with here's we know that our pin is two hundred thousands but we're going to move this one hundred thousandths or our Center finder is now in the center hole axis of the milling machine is dead center on there and now we have to go in five hundred thousands one two three four five remember every rotation on a handle it's 200 thousand seven years so we're in center lock the shaft or lock the table I mean now we're going to turn our Center finder over bring this down so remember those two marks we put in to find better that's what we're going to write now I'm going to come over the right-hand side I'm going to zero this out I'm going to be working off the right-hand side here because I'm going to drill this from left to right and the reason I'm going to be on the right hand side is the handle is going to count up for me so when I rotate it I can count up not subtract if I went on this side one two go from left to right it's going to count backwards so it's going to be well more opportunity for error if I work off of that handle and also I'm working off this hand look as well that's where my cameras are set up so that makes it just a little bit easier to film this got this set to zero I know I need to move over two and a half inches because I want to have this whole span of five inches so let's bring out the calculator and I'm doing this for a reason remember what I just said that every time you turn the handle a full rotation it's 200,000 so if we take 2.500 which is two and a half inches divided by point two zero zero two hundred thousandths and go equal we get 12 and a half rotations so it makes the math easier I'm going to turn this handle twelve and a half times one two three four five eleven twelve now we're going to come up to zero that's twelve one more and a half there we go pretty simple on the math isn't it we're going to now move the table the other way and because of backlash because of being accuracies in the screw and the way the nut attaches to it we have some problems so I'm going to zero this out I know that my machine is 13,000 soft so I'm going to bring this over to 13,000 there's 11 12 13 come back to 0 now I'm set to do the work here drill a pilot hole a 3/8 hole move it over two and a half inches we're going to dry out drill a pilot hole 3/8 1/2 inch then go another two and a half inches and drill the final set of holes so remember we're relying on the machine to keep our accuracy we're already centered here this is where we're going to go back twelve and a half turns of the crank so one two eleven twelve and a half centered up where we need to go this is where the advantage a keyless chuck is excellent because I can easily just switch this out now I'm going to tie some about keyless Chuck's this is goes up to a half inch do not put anything larger in it than a half inch I don't care if you have let me grab a drill bit technically you can put this drill bit inside this Chuck don't ever be tempted to do it because the action on this chuck it's self tightens if you end up putting something in there larger than a half inch this has more leverage action when it's drilling and it will tighten up around the shaft to where you may not get it off without damaging the chuck I'd say that I having a very expensive education this is a cheap Chinese Chuck it's a copy of an Albright the reason I'm not using my outright chuck is because it got damaged when I use too large a bit on it and well let's just say very expensive education and I hope you learn from what I just told you I don't want to hear an email saying hey I lose good at work guess what you got lucky next time you're not going to get lucky so let's keep keep drilling so we drilled the pilot hole we're going to do a 3/8 go to the half inch now this hole that I'm drilling here is really up to the science of material that you're working with I'm going to drill a half-inch well I'll go to the detail a little bit later but this is going to be a half-inch hole the shaft is going to be turned down and press fit into here this is a good time to talk about Peck drilling now you'll notice I just drill down a little bit the little sharp shaving come out well the reason I do that is it's easier to clean up and it's safer when it's chips get really long and gnarly well they're harder to sweep up harder to keep point so imagine long shavings like that are not saved and they're harder to clean up so I'm going to keep doing this two holes down rinse and repeat so we need to go 12 a half rotations again one two and we're going to go to 1/2 I find interesting I've had people comment on some of my videos about wd-40 is not a cutting oil or cutting fluid well you're right it's actually a penetrating fluid and it's designed to penetrate water and get the steel so the water can be dispersed and that's what this is called wd-40 which is water disbursement formula number fourteen men took 40 times why it works so good on drilling aluminum is wd-40 likes to stick to steal more than likes to stick to aluminum so it prevents the aluminum from galling and gluing itself for welding itself right onto to the drop next we need to deeper the holes now I could have putt put this in as a drilling process but I decide not to I'm going to do I'm here good now let's go back to our prototype I've got two holes I need to drill in here that set a allen cap headed screw this is kind of a simple thing this size here is 18 24 in use what you guys have in stock now we need to drill those next two holes and we have to mark them this is going to be one of those things that's going to drive some of you just crazy and the reason is because I'm not measuring and being detailed and sometimes you can take up too much time being too accurate when it doesn't need to be done and this is a great case of this I'm going to just kind of take a measurement by hand mark it there look about where center is mark it again do the same thing over here boy I'll bet some of you are freaking out right now but it's good enough for this particular project I don't need to build you know if I had to build 50 of these I would do it a different way I would set up stops and that kind of stuff and have it detailed this is a one-time operation so let's make our lives easy the whole drilling process on this one is going to be a little bit more complicated we're going to do a pilot hole a hole for the threading then we're going to come through halfway drill it open so the threading is clear and then we're going to tap it first we'll be the pilot hole just for thread clearance it's only going to go down a half an inch and again I'm going to Ballpark it I've got a gauge up here up on the top of the head understand ballpark aha now for the cap ndidates screw now these have a flat bottom on them so we're just going to use a mil n bit drill and clean that out check it alright next we cap it this is a good one to power tab but since I haven't been working in the shop in a while because of well moving I'm going to do it by hand aluminum is always great to do by hand anyway I don't want to break this tap off there we go so flip it over rinse and repeat I will do that off-camera that'll meet you we're here at the 14 inch Delta bandsaw this is actually what's called a wood metal band saw it's got an extra transmission hiding inside it that helps gear it down to cut metal now this is my favorite saw in the entire shop is a gift from my brother Terry about two Christmases ago he picked this up on Craigslist and to be honest it was not in perfect condition well it was excellent it was about two weeks before Christmas I was going down to California to visit my in-laws and while I was gone Terry completely refinished stripped this whole thing down and painted it refurbished it brought it back to its original shape and its original color in two weeks and when I got home from from Christmas he had it all wrapped up with a big bow on it sitting in my shop what an excellent excellent surprise so Terry thank you so let's talk about working on the next part of the spindle square and that's the cut this relief slot in the base and what this relief slot is for is when you tighten down the screw it allows it to clamp around the dial indicator now the further we get back here the easier it is the clamp and the less we have to torque down the screw so we're going to probably go back about a half inch on this hole let me show you how I'm going to do that again this is going to drive you machinist crazy so what I need to do is I need to cut this slot so I'm just going to do a measurement here by hand and I'm just going to mark it now I could do this with a square do it a bunch of other ways but it's not that critical and we need to figure out how far back we want to cut it and I'm going to take it a little further come over to this side check it and back here I'm pretty close okay this is a bi-metal blade very fine tooth great for cutting tubing not great for cutting solid material but this is what blade I have in it and sometimes I'm just too lazy to switch out to go for the right blade for such a short cut now I normally do not use any kind of lubricant on a band saw for cutting metal and I do that family of reasons is just putting oil on this blade to me is not effective and the reason that is is the oil ends up getting sucked into the gullet and then the shavings that we cut off or the that I'm going to call it sawdust the metal dust gets impregnated and doesn't get released from the blade so I like to use these saws totally dry but we're going to break one of my rules right now and we're going to try the anchor lube anchor lube is a product I've never used when I was down in LA visiting Stan from bar Z he's got a YouTube channel and he gave me some of this we're going to try it out here on the bandsaw I've got one side we're going to keep clean and we're just going to cut we're going to rotate it around and then try the anchor lube a little bit faster little easier to push on I wasn't pushing as hard I think it's got some great advantages I don't like the mess that's one of the problems but that's problem with every lubrication it'd be fun to actually try this with wd-40 and see what would happen but we'll save that for another time so let's get over the metal lathe and turn the top shaft down we're here at the end collate the finish up the second to the last step on our spindle square what we're going to do now is turn the shaft down and we need to get some measurements before we do that we drilled this hole out a half an inch one thing we know about drill bits is a great at making in accurate holes we know this is not going to be a true half-inch so let's pull out some digital calipers and measure this and we're going to find out this is reading point four nine seven five it's reading a little shy of a half-inch hole but we can't use dial calipers or digital calipers like this to measure the interior of a hole and expect an accurate reading and the reason is because these blades on here are not coplanar they're not in alignment they're actually shifted from one side to the other on the top part the surface where it actually touches and measures on these aren't sharp they're actually a flat so when you're reading an interior diameter especially as small as a half-inch hole we're getting an inaccurate reading the right way to do it is to come in with a snap gauge and the snap gauge is a very cool tool we're going to snap this in take it out now let's make a reading the right way to read this is with the micrometer but we're going to still just stick with the digital I can't read it off the very front because the surfaces here are both curved we're going to come back here on the anvil and measure it so 0.5 0 2 as you can see this is reading the whole 4 or 5 thousands more in diameter than the back jaws here so we're going to trust this over this very important to realize digital and dial calipers like this are great reference tools I use them all the time but I also don't expect exact accuracy the stock we're going to use for this it's just 3/4 inch this is a junk pile engineering project so go with what kind of material you have in stock we now have the stock in the lathe simple turning we're going to turn this back just shy of an inch because I like the look of this not being flush to the main bar that's up to you you guys can do whatever you want here to me I just want it just a little shallow I don't have to grind it sand it off later get in here and do some cutting referencing is a great way for course measurements and what I'm doing here is I know my cutter here is a half-inch so I basically just went double the width so that we got here that's not too bad point nine eight seven maybe I'll go a little bit further but it gives you an idea that there are things that we work with on a daily basis that we can use for course measurements and that's exactly what I'm doing here point five eight seven so we'll go in half of the eight seven so we're going to go in for T zero yeah we better not let's just go in twenty another 20 very close I want to do a press fit on this and we're going to be about a thousand silver we're going to go in one and a half thousands and we're going to go just for a nice little slow feed and I'm going to we're going to see how good I am here if I'm a little a little large I'll actually do the final diameter with a file all right I think that's going to work for me I want to rework the shoulder just a little bit it's not flat and the reason I am pressing this into place instead of screwing it into place or doing something else is because I feel the press fit is what's going to hold it square we're trying to trust the accurate start of a milling machine to get all three of these holes in alignment and if I try to thread this the thread may be off one way or another and that's not going to be favorable to screwing this together and then hoping it's an accurate tool so press fitting this in my opinion is the best way to do it the angle of this bit when it cut in actually cut this in at a slight taper and what I just did now is I just cleaned off the outer shoulder I still have a taper inside a little bit closed on the edge and the reason for that is I feel you'll get a better fit if I were to keep this completely square and a burr developed when pressing it in it might throw it off a little bit so also of the press fit we need to put a pretty healthy chamfer on this and the reason for the chamfer is just to get it to guide through if I was doing a more detailed project I would have reamed this hole to an exact size and it also do a lot smoother finish on this piece that I am presently but like I keep saying this tool isn't rocket science if I was manufacturing them I would be doing this completely different but this is a one-off and the level of measuring that I'm doing for this will be more than adequate for what I'm trying to do on this project okay feeding the trolls twice on that one I'm sure some of you guys have caught it some people say don't file over the top of the Chuck only time I've ever ever hit the Chuck filing is when I try to do something left-handed when I'm a right-handed person and I don't have the skills left-handed I do right-handed and I'll try to do this and the file will get pulled over into the Chuck the other thing is I'm using a lathe file and the angle that is cut here is really steep and that allows the chips to slide out much quicker and with less problem but it also makes this file want to kick over quicker so you really have to get steady get in there and do it and I'ma see how many people know how I fed the trolls twice on this one I just gave you one you guys find the other now we're going to do the polishing of the shaft bring this out get some Emery cloth see this one's been around the block a couple times but it will polish out just fine this one we got to go little faster let's say sometime speed it up that should work again this is a scrap metal project that's whatever scraps I've got there I'm putting this together I'm going to bet 100% that this is going to be fine I'm going to cut this the lake next turn around chamfer the backside and then I'm going to meet you over at the press it's time to assemble the spindle square we've got our shaft we've got our main body and we're going to press this into position there's different ways we can press I've got this homemade press that looks homemade it was designed for one project it was assembled out of a stair what do they call it a stair elevator you know you bolt it to the wall and they have a chair that you write up the cylinder came out of a human body lift so if you need to pull somebody out of a bed that's what the hydraulic system came from what I like about this is it's got like I don't know 12 14 inches of travel great advantage it's funny I built this for one job I've had it now for about two years it's one of the great tools in the shop so simple to build silver sattell that I want to build a bigger one someday but that's for another bill that use it project so let's press this together actually there's different ways to press this together if you don't have a press you can put this into a vise squeeze it together you could use a bar clamp you can use boy whatever you have that can pinch down on this I do not suggest using a hammer though this is not a job for a hammer we're trying to be somewhat delicate here but let me show you how this is going to work it's very simple the goal here is to keep it square just press it in this is when you're going to find out why I put such a good taper at the beginning if you don't sometimes if it goes in a little crooked it's going to bind catch caused you problems there we go nice fit isn't it now you can see why when I turn this and put a shoulder on it and how I set up that shoulder why I did that so that would fit up really nice and flush see the bottom of it here just just shy of being flush to the bottom of this I think that looks really nice let's finish the assembly and put the screws in and the gauges we're at the home stretch now to finishing up this project we just have to do the final assembly it's very easy put the two screws in do not tighten them yet just get them in place so this is the first of three videos on this use it build it or build it use it episode the first one of course is building it the second episode which will be number instead of going one two and three I'm going to go a B and C so the next one is going to be B it's going to be how to use it okay build it use it the third one what we're going to do is well I think the term is pimping it we're going to make this spindle square look cool not just be practical but we're going to make it to where it looks cool and that's going to be a fun video plus we're going to build a case for it stand over at bar Z kind of inspired me when I was at his place he builds these great little triangle squares and he puts them in a nice beautiful simple easy to build wood case and I thought a case similar to what he does too build one for these would be great and really nice to have so the spindle square doesn't get damaged so there we go this is all assembled ready to go to service so let's go over to the mill actually let's back up here a minute before we go over the mill let me talk to you about something I want to give this spindle square away I'm not going to give it with the gauges those you're going to have to go to Harbor Freight and get yourself or you can order them online I want to give this away so what I'm going to do is I'm going to put up an email address that you can email your information well I'll need to have is your name and your address so if you win I can send it to you don't worry I'm not going to use the information I'm not that smart to know what to do with it anyway it's just kind of my way to give back to you guys but before I can you have to enter the contest the email address I think is going to be tool giveaway at metal tips and tricks dot-com have it set up yet but you'll see by the time I get to the third video I'll have that all figured out there will be a drawing at the end and you guys will get a chance to win this the drawing is only going to be up for two weeks okay from the last video and I'll give an exact date at that time so I hope you've enjoyed this project I think this is one of the coolest things I've built and probably one of the most useful so until next time go out in your shop build something cool like a spindle square that our holes come down perpendicular perpendicular back at the holes come in perpendicular to one each of one another boy I'm having a hard time speaking let's try that one more time

Channel: Build Something Cool

Views: 94,137

Rating: 4.8806453 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: a7n7jRvyDg8

Length: 42min 44sec (2564 seconds)

Published: Tue May 12 2015