What did the postman bring?

[markse68]

On 30/03/2020 at 12:11, Chaz2b said:

Latest arrival from the East! My adapter so I can use any of my Canon EOS lens with an eyepiece, next purchase will be a correct image diagonal and therefore use it as a spotting scope, neat, and all for £12.99 delivered.

The only criticism is the release button is a little hard on your finger, looking into glueing a silicone button onto it.

The lens is a ROKUNAR 500mm mirror lens with a Hoya 72mm PL-CIR filter, another skip freebie! In very good condition at that!

I just did similar with the M42 Zenit lens @Space Oddities very kindly sent me 😊 Adapter is a Baader T-mount one so it doesn’t screw down fully and I’m having trouble finding reasonable cost thread adapter (they all go the other way!) but it kinda works.

Beware though- I picked up the diagonal from abs but unfortunately being a camera lens the back focal distance isn’t enough to reach focus with it in place so I’ll only be able to use it as a straight through wide field scope- which I’m looking forward to as soon as I can get a tripod out of storage....(don’t think it would justify as essential travel right now!)

[laudropb]

Just arrived from Springer the three volumes of Luna Cognita by Robert Garfinkle. Very impressed by the quality of manufacture and the contents. This will keep me busy for the rest of the lockdown hopefully.

[JeremyS]

1 minute ago, laudropb said:

Just arrived from Springer the three volumes of Luna Cognita by Robert Garfinkle

Congratulations - looks amazing. Enjoy!

[Dave1]

33 minutes ago, laudropb said:

Just arrived from Springer the three volumes of Luna Cognita by Robert Garfinkle. Very impressed by the quality of manufacture and the contents. This will keep me busy for the rest of the lockdown hopefully.

They look some amazing books!

[Chaz2b]

2 hours ago, markse68 said:

I just did similar with the M42 Zenit lens @Space Oddities very kindly sent me 😊 Adapter is a Baader T-mount one so it doesn’t screw down fully and I’m having trouble finding reasonable cost thread adapter (they all go the other way!) but it kinda works.

Beware though- I picked up the diagonal from abs but unfortunately being a camera lens the back focal distance isn’t enough to reach focus with it in place so I’ll only be able to use it as a straight through wide field scope- which I’m looking forward to as soon as I can get a tripod out of storage....(don’t think it would justify as essential travel right now!)

Yes I’m finding the exact same problem, I should have done some research first I suppose.

[Stu]

On 25/03/2020 at 14:39, merlin100 said:

I prefer the Hammerite look myself, but each to their own.😉

So do I, but I also like to be able to focus accurately 😉

[Stu]

7 hours ago, laudropb said:

Just arrived from Springer the three volumes of Luna Cognita by Robert Garfinkle. Very impressed by the quality of manufacture and the contents. This will keep me busy for the rest of the lockdown hopefully.

Looks excellent John. Hmmm, might just be tempted!!

[Ships and Stars]

Mega tap and die/drill set  - it may seem non-astro related, but this is going towards the construction of a tripod and fork mount for my Helios Quantum observation binoculars.

As I may be unemployed in the long run, if the fork mount is a success, I'm thinking of making a few of these and gauging reaction...👍

[PeterW]

There are certainly people out there with 25x100 who don’t have a good way to mount them.

 

peter

[Ships and Stars]

2 minutes ago, PeterW said:

There are certainly people out there with 25x100 who don’t have a good way to mount them.

 

peter

I'm thinking something along the lines of a simple but robust alt-az mount, almost like a 'dobson fork' for large binoculars. Even with my old AZ4/25x100 combo, the bins struggled to stay in place when going up past 45-50 deg.

I've plenty of time at the moment to work on a design!

[tooth_dr]

9 minutes ago, Ships and Stars said:

Mega tap and die/drill set  - it may seem non-astro related, but this is going towards the construction of a tripod and fork mount for my Helios Quantum observation binoculars.

As I may be unemployed in the long run, if the fork mount is a success, I'm thinking of making a few of these and gauging reaction...👍

My tap set is used regularly for making brackets and mounting points for my scopes. I couldnt be without it. Although I only use M4 M6 and M8.  I love taking pieces of raw aluminium and making useful astro stuff 😆

 

[Ships and Stars]

9 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

My tap set is used regularly for making brackets and mounting points for my scopes. I couldnt be without it. Although I only use M4 M6 and M8.  I love taking pieces of raw aluminium and making useful astro stuff 😆

 

 

That looks top quality! I was looking at drill presses from Machine Mart, etc.

May I ask where you found your countersink drill to get that nice bevel? I could only find one or two online so far but haven't spent a great deal of time chasing one up (no drill press yet!)

I've only ever welded mild steel with my MIG, but want to try stainless and aluminium. It's supposed to be able to do these as well, but TIG seems to be the way to go for stainless and aluminium.

Great work there!

[Stu]

34 minutes ago, Ships and Stars said:

Mega tap and die/drill set  - it may seem non-astro related, but this is going towards the construction of a tripod and fork mount for my Helios Quantum observation binoculars.

As I may be unemployed in the long run, if the fork mount is a success, I'm thinking of making a few of these and gauging reaction...👍

Ooh, that looks nice. I keep looking at tap and die sets but have no idea what to buy, and what I’m likely to need. Really would like to re learn how to do this, last time I did it was at school!

[johninderby]

I have cheaper taps mostly but did by Dormer taps for the few most common sizes needed. Ouch they are expensive now.

Nice set BTW. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[Guest]

11 hours ago, Stu said:

So do I, but I also like to be able to focus accurately 😉

That's always an advantage!

[DaveL59]

42 minutes ago, Ships and Stars said:

Mega tap and die/drill set  - it may seem non-astro related, but this is going towards the construction of a tripod and fork mount for my Helios Quantum observation binoculars.

As I may be unemployed in the long run, if the fork mount is a success, I'm thinking of making a few of these and gauging reaction...👍

looks exactly like the Tap set I have, they work pretty well and have been real handy on the car and on astro gear, cleaning up a thread or cutting a slightly larger one to re-work when someone's overdone it and wrecked the original thread. 

[Ships and Stars]

39 minutes ago, Stu said:

Ooh, that looks nice. I keep looking at tap and die sets but have no idea what to buy, and what I’m likely to need. Really would like to re learn how to do this, last time I did it was at school!

 

35 minutes ago, johninderby said:

I have cheaper taps mostly but did by Dormer taps for the few most common sizes needed. Ouch they are expensive now.

Nice set BTW. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

 

30 minutes ago, DaveL59 said:

looks exactly like the Tap set I have, they work pretty well and have been real handy on the car and on astro gear, cleaning up a thread or cutting a slightly larger one to re-work when someone's overdone it and wrecked the original thread. 

Thanks all, I went with this 110pc set like Dave has (glad to hear they work ok!), it was only around £50 from ebay with shipping and has various fine, standard and coarse metric tap/dies up to sizes up to M18x1.5. I'll probably never use the larger ones except perhaps for automotive on my ageing fleet of MOT failures 🤣 If I break any, I'll replace them with higher quality individual ones as I go.

Stu - the first thing I do to determine what I need is to use a thread pitch gauge and digital caliper (pictured below) to determine what size screw/bolt and what thread pitch I'm dealing with, then hunt for the right tap/die. In this case, for the price, I just went for the whole enchilada as they say and bought a big set to avoid not having the right size in the middle of a project.

My last set of tap and dies many, many years ago was a fraction of this size and easily twice the price. Amazing what you can buy online these days.

Edited April 4, 2020 by Ships and Stars

[johninderby]

Worth getting a good set of digital calipers. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[PeterW]

... looks like we may have a fledgling custom ATM bits cottage industry forming....

Peter

[tooth_dr]

1 hour ago, Ships and Stars said:

May I ask where you found your countersink drill to get that nice bevel? I could only find one or two online so far but haven't spent a great deal of time chasing one up (no drill press yet!)

Thanks! Heres the packet. I think the whole lot was £6 or £7 from Homebase. I just use the countersink bit to remove the slightly raised lip that forms. Plus it looks neat. 

[Ships and Stars]

19 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

Thanks! Heres the packet. I think the whole lot was £6 or £7 from Homebase. I just use the countersink bit to remove the slightly raised lip that forms. Plus it looks neat. 

50 minutes ago, PeterW said:

... looks like we may have a fledgling custom ATM bits cottage industry forming....

Peter

 

Thank you Tooth Doctor! I just ordered a set.

Indeed Peter, I'm playing around a bit now with metal working and fabrication to test the waters, but if I can find a workshop locally to rent then I'll look at getting a proper TIG AC/DC pulse welder and perhaps a plasma cutter. A metal lathe or CNC mill would be spectacular. I worked for awhile for a firm in Slough fabricating industrial components, so not under any huge illusions regarding costs and complexity. Dreaming perhaps today, but plenty of time for that at the moment 👍

[johninderby]

My micro lathe gets the most use although have a bigger lathe in the shed. 

[Ships and Stars]

8 minutes ago, johninderby said:

My micro lathe gets the most use although have a bigger lathe in the shed. 

Ooooh, that's very nice. That would be a really useful size. My list is growing, haha. Number one for me, I seriously need a better workspace. 

Thanks John! Nice to see others making their own items. 👍

[johninderby]

13 minutes ago, Ships and Stars said:

Ooooh, that's very nice. That would be a really useful size. My list is growing, haha. Number one for me, I seriously need a better workspace. 

Thanks John! Nice to see others making their own items. 👍

Just such a handy size for small jobs. Bigger lathe in the shed is just gathering dust. 😁

[DaveS]

I have an extensive set of taps and dies, plus gauges inherited from dad. Unfortunately, due to the era, they are all imperial (Remember it?), so may need to buy a new set. The nearest I get to metric is a full set of BA taps and dies, including the odd numbers.