Needle File Storage

I have managed to accumulate quite a number of needle and rifler files over the years and these were stored in a range of tins and plastic boxes. This was not the best way to do things and could be quite annoying to rummage about trying to find that particular favorite file. So a better solution was sort. This is the design I came up with and it has worked well for me over the last 10 years or so, hopefully it will be of some assistance to you.

The base is a sheet of 8mm PVC about the size of an A4 sheet and the tubes are 32mm diameter PVC waste pipe. The advantage of using PVC is that it is easily fabricated into a range of designs using the cement that is supplied for fixing PVC pipes and fittings.

My piercing saw blades are in a jumble and a project for the future is to make up something similar using 12mm diameter pipe. 

I hope this gives you a few ideas for solving your storage problems.

Some Woodspoiling

I have recently just bought a small rolling mill, the main reason for the purchase is that silver sheet and wire are not available here in Brasil, or if they are I have yet to find a seller. Along with the rolling mill I also have bought an ingot mould and some silver grain, my attempts at casting an ingot will have to wait a week or so as I have to go interstate.

This ingot mould produces round ingots or rectangular by reversing the plates

Having bought the rolling mill the next question was where is it going. The model I bought does not have reduction gears, so a fair amount of torque is required to get the material to pass through. For an initial try out, I clamped the mill to my existing bench with a G clamp; over optimistic in the extreme. The bench is fine for light jewelry work but just not up to the duties involved in rolling metal, additionally it was too low. 

As the rolling mill will be in regular use and not a seldom used luxury, something serious was called for. Firstly I determined the height the mills needs to be so that I am standing erect (not a Neanderthal look alike) when the handle is at its lowest point. 

The completed bench ready for action

I decided to use hardwood throughout for strength and weight, the legs are 80x80x950mm, the top is 2 pieces of 30x300x1300mm both angelim (similar to teak).  The top rails are 50x100mm and the lowerails are 20x80mm both eucalypt (probably Blue Gum).

The rails are morticed and tennoned  to the legs, I made the mortices by rough chain drilling then chopping out with a chisel and finishing with a rasp. The tennons I used my circular saw to chop out and gave a final finish with a rasp to take off any rough spots. The joints were glued using PVA glue and pinned with two 8 mm wooden dowels for each joint.

The top is screwed to the base with ten 75x6mm csk wood screws and is quite secure and the mill is bolted down with four 8x75mm hex bolts.

So I am now ready for action, or perhaps a hernia, if the preliminaries are an indication of what is to come.

I will hopefully be able to show you some successful results soon.

A Brasilian Anyone

I have been trying my hand at repousse as this is an area that I find of interest but my initial results using black pitch were not exactly encouraging. The pitch worked fine as far as producing the formed item, BUT it took ages to prepare the pitch (much heating and black smoke) and when annealing the sheet the fumes from the pitch remaining on the work were not exactly healthy.

  

I looked around for alternatives and initially tried candle wax stiffened with talc (lower melting point and less fumes), this worked to a degree but was on the soft side and lacked the stickiness to hold the sheet.  
   
In Brasil where I am now living I came by chance  upon the ideal medium , namely depilation wax. The wax consists of beeswax and resin (which I believe is shellac), which is fairly much the same as one I found a French site. It melts easily and quickly, less than 100degC and the vapours when annealing are easier to get along with than the black pitch. I use a hair dryer to heat the wax and sheet and this only takes a few minutes. The wax initially was on the brittle side, an addition of small amount of olive oil gave me just the right hardness. 

This is the latest ring that I have designed using this wax.

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/546413367261943736/

Before committing a design to silver I make a trial of the design using sheet from aluminium cans, these are some ideas I am considering.

The pitch bowl I use is a small stainless steel cereal bowl, and this sits on a small sand bag. The punches are ones I have made myself using budget price center punches from discount tool stores. The punches were initially rough ground using a small bench grinder, final shaping being done with a small hand held rotary tool and diamond files. For final finishing oil stones and wet n dry paper gave an acceptable result. 
  
I have yet to discover if silver steel (drill rod in USA) is available here in Brasil or a stockist of any suitable steels with a carbon content around 0.7% -1.0% for making further punches, I just have to persevere and improve my Portuguese. I will post details on my punch making efforts at a later date.

The beauty treatment.