SNS 329: Production Tapping 180 Tie Rods

[Music] welcome back to the shop guys so today i am getting back on the uh tie rod job right over here i've got my setup going on you might recall a few weeks back i shared in an sns video tapping five of these guys right here these are these are tie rods that have a threaded end right here that need to be chased because they had a batch of 180 in their production where these ends got slightly pinched here on the end just enough that the threaded bushing right here will not screw in there okay so we uh got to get it started straight so i have now started on this uh this production run of 180 i've got the entire uh pallet of them they come in boxes of 10. so i've got the first box right here with 10 of them i just finished these i have improved my setup i made it a little bit more streamlined where i've got less things i'm having to do i took a few of the recommendations off of that previous video and i've kind of applied them to my little fixture right here and uh bring you over there i'm gonna show you what i've done to that to kind of uh you know reduce the cycle time should i say of doing these tie rods here so we're ready to go i figured today i'm probably going to show this and try to get it all completed today danny had contacted me and said that you know he could he could use these as soon as i could get them back to them so that's what we're going to be working on is trying to get get all these done hopefully between today and maybe tomorrow we'll we'll have this whole job knocked out and palletized and sent back i've got some banding material that should be here today i need to ban them back to the pallet you know things like that but uh the other thing i wanted to point out is there's been a lot of comments from people who are just unaware of this design okay and a lot of the comments were basically well that looks like it's going to fail because they drilled this the hole off center right well it is off center this is a patented tie rod in and it's designed this way purposely it's designed for clearance so once this you know once the actual tie rod uh the end is in there i took like i said you got to start that straight it provides clearance on this end of the tie rod okay now i'm not big into four by fours and jeeps and all that stuff there but i do understand there that every little bit of clearance is important whenever you're working underneath a car truck 4x4 hot rod you know all that kind of stuff so these were designed that way by rare parts these are purposely made that way all right and i'm sure a lot of the guys out there in the 4x4 community could probably chime in and say exactly why these are offset that way and probably also tell everybody that these are not going to fail because of the way they're designed like that these these things these are heavy duty tie rods and i really don't know much more about them but i know that they're popular in the in the jeep crowd and these are replaceable ends instead of throwing this entire thing in the garbage and replacing it you can buy a threaded bushing here with the proper tie rod in that that's installed in here or that you installed in there should i say okay so enough with that let's go over here i'll show you my setup and how we've improved that a little bit and then we're gonna get started on and try to get this batch of 180 tie rods done all right so here's my fixture here and the way this will work is i'm just going to slide it in from the right side and when i showed this before i was sliding them in from the left side there we got these shims in there and i've also got a new spacer in there and i'll show you that all right so slide it in from the right side okay i've got my machinist jack already set to the right height right there okay so all i got to do is just slide this in there just eyeball it in the middle of the hole and that's set right there okay then we're ready to go we'll bring our flex arm over here i've got this uh tin can with a magnet on it and i've got my dark cutting oil i was actually going to i actually bought this for this job this is the tap magic extra thick it's it's like syrup is how thick it is i was going to use this but the problem with this is so thick is that whenever you dunk the tap into this can with that that tap magic man that stuff is just oozing off there it's so thick so i just poured it back in there and i'm going to be using my conventional dark cutting oil and it works great i've also got an extra squirt can right here an oiler that i'll be applying a little bit of extra oil as it's tapping you know during the actual tapping cycle there okay so and then run the run the tap back out slide it back out the right side i've got some degreaser over here we're going to be spraying it down blowing it off with the air hose into the trash can and then it's done i will be checking them every time once i get through cleaning them i'll check them with the threaded bushing here and you just have to get it started straight some of these things are it's like you can cross thread it to get it started you see i this is the same one that i just showed you over there but kind of frustrating deal see see what i mean so it will start i'm just it's doing that because i'm trying to show it to you quickly that's the problem all right so on the setup here what i have done is i take i took the two shims let me just go ahead and take it apart and show you all right so we've got the two shims and i cut them in half i'm just using basically one now all right we've got the two shims i drilled and tapped them for those little cap head bolts right there all right in the bottom of this i went ahead and machined this uhmw shim for the bottom of the fixture and what that did was that took up the gap that i had in here i've got it machined where it just pushes in there and so that takes up the gap there so it's got a nice close fit inside that fixture now without a bunch of gap and also helps because the length of the tap was just barely long enough to reach down through there and tap all the way through it all right so this started off as a i believe it was a half inch thick piece of uhmw i cut it and uh fly cut it over there on the milling machine i got a little bit of footage of that that i'll show you [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] so [Applause] [Applause] then i board the hole all right and then i milled these to the proper size and drilled and tapped the the holes in there [Music] so it like i said it just kind of friction fit inside there so it won't really move around on me i'm not worried about bolting that in and then just stick these guys back in there and run these uh little quarter 20 cap head bolts in there and that that'll hold these guys in place just like that and snug those up and that'll keep them keep them in place and and that's it that really that's it right there and it's working real good so i've done the first ten everything's working fine so i'm gonna put this backs uh this batch of them back in the box pull another box out and i'll show you how it's going all right we'll take you through the motions here i just eyeballed the tap hole there in the middle the tap has done a really good job of just lining that up so bring it over here to my tin with the cutting oil we'll just give it a good dunk line up in the hole and let it go i got my other oil can here i'm giving it some extra oil to flow down as it's tapping and i can tell right before it stops right there that we've actually cleared all the way through the part and then we'll reverse and i i've kicked the speed up on this too running a little bit faster than the first five once we're done i just picked that up and we'll slide it back out to the right side and now let's clean it off right now i'm just using this in a can because i've got a few of these that i haven't used yet but later i'm gonna put some i got some of this in a gallon jug that i'm gonna put in my spray can and then we'll use up some of that so i'm just using this to get the cutting oil and some of the chips off and then i got my air hose ready got my ear plugs in all right there we go and then i'll grab the bushing and give it a check and it's cross threading again there you go see it's just because i'm in a hurry trying to show it to you and do it fast but it goes right in there just like it's supposed to all right we'll take that back out and what i'll do is uh i'm just going to try to do this all in one motion i've got a rag there just kind of give it a little wipe get the rest of that off and then we'll bag it back up i'm just going to do them in boxes of 10 that way i can pull them out tap them clean them bag them put them back in the box tape the back the box closed and then stack it back over there on the uh i've got my pallet jack loaded down with them from the pallet outside so we'll take this and put it back in the bag just like that and i'm gonna set it in the box all right then we'll grab the next one and do it get that guy to stay there tries to pull back on me that's actually the very first time that bottom shim moved on me there put the thread sleeve back on there grab another bag bag it up all right [Music] [Music] do [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] i'm getting real close to the halfway point of the tie rod job here and i wanted to give another mention to the the degreaser that i'm using so i was using this earlier so i told you i got a few cans of this so i used up this can and i had a gallon jug i thought i had a full jug but this had just enough to fill up this quart container right there and i was going to recommend this stuff because it does an excellent job of degreasing and getting the oil off your parts right there so if you pick up this in the gallon container this works really well in the hot shot right here i'm sorry the sure shot sprayer and just pressurize it and i mainly focus on the threads you know get kind of getting the oil out of the threads and a little bit on the outside there and just [Music] hit it with a little bit of air and i still have to go there and wipe some of this off but it just does a good job so i'm saying that because i have a lot of people that ask me what kind of cleaner i'm using in this and i've got some other cleaner that i used to buy from motion when i worked there but it's very expensive and i think this right here is another great degreaser to use around the shop when you're trying to get the oil off of parts just get you one of these sure shots and put that heavy duty degreaser in there and go to town with it [Music] um [Music] so the cutting wall that i'm using here as i had mentioned before this is my uh just old school sulfur based dark cutting oil and you can see i'm using it pretty liberally which is what you want to do especially for thread cutting and some might some might be thinking that i'm kind of using an excess amount of oil which i'm not using excessive oil and the other thing i was going to point out is i have a lot of this cutting oil still left over i bought a 55 gallon uh barrel 55 gallon barrel drum of this from my local oil distributor several years back when i was still working in my old shop with my dad and i still probably have if i had to guess i got at least 30 35 gallons of this cutting oil left in that drum it's probably well beyond the shelf life expiration date that they would have put on that drum but let me just tell you it's still just as good now as when i bought it there so i got plenty of this cutting oil to blow through that's still going to last me a very long time the only thing about it is that it just makes a big mess so i've got my pig mat layered all the way around here just to kind of absorb the cutting oil but it's a you know it's a consumable so i'm not worried about how much i use or you know how much gets used during this process here and it works really good it's an excellent oil for any kind of threat cutting or you know drilling holes that kind of stuff [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] just back in the bag all right well it's the next day we've got our first batch finished right here so we've got a hundred down there actually probably about 105 because of the uh the first five that i did i added those into those boxes right there so 105 done means i got 80 left out there i need to bring in here i got them on a pallet outside just bring them in on the pallet jack right here and uh wanted to get more of them done yesterday but i had to go to a doctor's appointment yesterday afternoon ended up taking about three hours out of my day once i got back i had some meds i needed to take i needed to get off my knee and rest it so i feel better today it's early i'm out here getting ready to get started and we're going to get this job finished up yesterday my banding showed up too this is just uh the metal strapping material right here i did not have any more so i just bought a small batch right here from mcmaster carr three quarter wide 20 000 thick and this is a roll of 300 feet by the way they sell this in all the standard sizes in these 300 foot rolls in case you just need a small batch and you know just a single coil that you can just pull out and cut off what you need all right so later on when we get these done we'll go ahead and get them strapped back down to the pallet so i'm going to get started on the next batch here i'm trying a new uh cleaning method here i brought the smart washer back here next to my tapping station and instead of trying to even like instead of using the brush i'm just gonna run it under the cleaner there and then just blow it off and it seems to be working really good getting it nice and clean getting the chips out of there that's the main thing i was running out of my the heavy duty degreaser i was out of and i didn't want to keep using my expensive uh solvent degreaser so i think this is a nice little setup right here working pretty good this thing's on wheels so it's really easy to just roll it wherever you want and then plug it in the solution is uh warmed i believe it's warmed up to like 105 degrees it stays that way and works real good it's a water-based cleaner not oil or salt yep that's getting the job done it's actually a little bit easier this way so i'm just continuing to do my batches of 10 i got about 60 left to go and the way it's looking i should have them done here this morning sometimes [Music] do [Music] [Music] i'm down to the final 20 tie rods to tap i wanted to show you this i've had a few comments come across about the uh be interesting to measure one and see the warpage that we're talking about because i haven't measured these yet or i haven't shown you the measurements on any of them so uh tap size is one point uh 671 i was trying to remember 1.671 is the actual tap size so if we let me see if you can see that all right so one direction and that's this is just one random tie rod 1.643 that way let's go this way with it and you can see right at 1.670 right there so you got one direction that's that's pretty well on the recommended tap size and then you got the other direction that it squeezed in there so you're looking at about 20 thousandths but i have measured several of these randomly and i'm getting anywhere between 20 and 30 thousandths uh squeeze on these things some of them are less than that when we're running the tap through there sometimes the tap goes through for fairly easy and i don't really hear any kind of load on the machine and then some of them that are up to like the 30 thousandths egg shape i can really tell that the machine is working to get that tap down through there and i think also uh you know we've done 160 of these now that tap is probably not razor sharp anymore it could probably use a resharpen but it's still doing a good job in getting the and getting the job done so anyway i just wanted to fill people in that were questioning that and i'm going to get these last 20 finished up one we've been looking for number 180 uh [Music] [Music] um last one i uh my little system has just kind of evolved a little bit here and there as i've as i've been going through it i'm just trying to make them a little bit easier and faster hopefully there we go last 180. time to get these boxed up we'll get them out there to the pallet get it palletized all right there we go so in a case like this right here the uh the freight company is going to be coming to pick this up and because i don't have a forklift i don't have an easy way to get you know from the big concrete slide by the shop out to the road or whatever it's easier using this part of the driveway because it matches up with the road so you can come in with a pallet jack grab this take it right out to the liftgate on the back of the truck so i want to do some wrapping on this with some plastic wrap and then put some metal straps on there to keep them all in place so for some of you that may be watching this that are not really familiar with these banding tools you have the uh this is like the crimping not the crimping tool this is the tool that tightens up the strapping here you just ratchet it in there like that seems pretty good we got the corner guards on there too but it's all just cardboard boxes with those hard parts in there so we're we're good to go and this is the uh little i actually don't remember what you call that but that's what crimps the two pieces together you stick it on there and then this is the actual crimping tool stick it on there squeeze it together crimps it release this by squeezing it together and then i take the uh extra overlap there just bend it a few times it breaks it off that way this piece ain't out there for you to rip your hands open with all right well we got our uh tie rod job finished up all i got left to do is finish cleaning all this stuff i've been kind of you know soaking up some of the oil there with the uh the pig mats and washing all the other parts off but everything went real real good there the flex arm did a flawless job on it that 1 3 4 12 tap that i had that was a brand new tap and it did good it didn't fail you know throughout the job i would like to actually send it out and get it reground to uh touch those cutting edges up and you know just have it ready for you know any future job that might come in here but i'm just real happy with the setup you know this was the first real true uh heavy test using the flex arm and it did a great job so it made it made that particular job very simple and easy to get done because i can just imagine how difficult that would be trying to hand tap all those things not only you know just hand tapping it trying to get the tap to start in there because when you've got a distorted hole a tap trying to get a tap to start manually with your hands into a hole is very difficult it's but that made it just super easy i didn't have one cross thread problem there was a couple of them that i had to set back in there and run the tap to for whatever reason i had a couple of them that the bushing didn't want to uh thread into so i set it up chased it for a second time and then it went in there just like it was supposed to so this should be all ready to go and and uh all i got left to do you see you saw the pallet i just got to put my shipping label on it and then uh and then set up the uh the pickup for it to be picked up and sent back out to rare parts so that's it all good to go i'm gonna get all this cleaned up and hopefully you enjoyed the video maybe you got something fun out of it if nothing maybe it was a little entertaining to watch me do those and i got a couple more jobs lined up that i need to get started on that's what my plan is now we still have the stoker engine over there in the shaper is patiently waiting for me to get to it and i'm trying to get to it and we will soon but we also have a couple more jobs that i would like to get done and get sent out of here stuff that people have been patiently waiting on for me to get to so we're going to try to get those done before the end of the year anyway hopefully you enjoyed and we'll see you on the next video [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Abom79

Views: 142,954

Rating: 4.9393334 out of 5

Keywords: Abom79, Flexarm, Flexarm machine, Flex Machine Tools, tapping machine, power tapping, Tie Rods, Fab Series tie rod, large tap, tapping existing threads, thread chasing, fixtures, tapping fixture, machine shop, job shop, industrial repair, CRC, CRC Smart Washer, CRC heavy Duty Degreaser, Tie rod, automotive parts

Id: 9SZ-VlGralg

Length: 35min 57sec (2157 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 12 2020