Did you know that there's an alternate universe in which a cat named Sprocket has a RUclips channel about hobbyist machining, has a pet human named "Quill" and has the catchphrase "Because chamfers are what separates us from the Humans"...?
Now! I haven't seen that since I served my Apprenticeship in the 1960s. Fun to see it again and, yes, it's a simple method that works well, even older than me, but works better than I do now. 😃
Great trip down memory lane. As a first year apprentice in 1965, a set of filing buttons was one of my lathe ‘exercises’. Thanks Quinn 👏👏 Regards Robert
Have you considered making a small heat treating ladle for your small parts? Clickspring has demonstrated it a few times on his channel. Holds the parts and you can fill it with boric acid to prevent the charring and blackening.
Great content, as always! Makes me think that it would be interesting to see more 'historic machining tips and tricks.' I know you already add a lot of that content to your videos, but it might be interesting if you create a playlist of machining techniques from the past that have been replaced by newer techniques, but that still have their uses.
one thing that really intrigues me about very old machining books is the lubricant recipes. today people go "oh you gotta cut SPQR free machining chromolly brass? order an R2D2 insert and a can of single malt WD-41 overnight from McMaster" but those old books read more like herbal medicine manuals. they make coolants and lubricants sound like witch potions.
Quinn, you are very dang clever, and an excellent instructor. I am going to throw away my blonde joke book ! As a novice hobby tinkerer (not ready to say machinist), using my 3-in1 Shopmaster, I am learning many useful techniques in working materials, not just studying how the tools work. Thank you!
Liked this video, kind of confirms the way I have made filling buttons is ok , alot of instructions for making model steam engines just say, use or make filing buttons assuming you know how to do this. I also have found the longer they are the easier they are to work with.
LOL! Oddly enough, I'd initially read your title as "the filing of buttons" rather than "buttons that help while filing". XD Awesome techniques! I must try my hand at this for some project!
In the past I've solved this problem in a 1-off context by grinding a radius on a small scrap of stainless and using a vise grip to hold it in place. This is by far a more repeatable and elegant solution that I'll have to keep in mind in the future.
I gave up the heat treatment. Generally I'm using buttons in the 7/32" to 3/8" diameter range. One button is drilled to the same diameter as the hole in the work piece, then a part threaded rod of the same diameter glued in place (Loctite 603), The rod protrudes from that button with the unthreaded part the width of the work piece plus sufficient thread for the length of the other button plus a nut or two. This avoids any blind tapping of small diameters, which gives me nightmares. The buttons are assembled either side of the hole with the nuts adjusted so that the assembly just rotates in the hole. Rather than holding the buttons, I hold the work so that the buttons can rotate as soon as the file/abrasive contacts the button. Where possible, I make buttons with a 2.5mm diameter part threaded (7 BA) rod then, if necessary, enlarging the hole in the work piece to finished size. It suits my rotary table set up where I round off as small as 7/32", using buttons for that last few thousandths. A further benefit is in final sanding where the work can be run over the paper on a flat surface. I've used this approach on a Stuart 10V, D10, two Compound Launch and on my current project a Stuart Triple Expansion, without problems. I was concerned that the rotation would distort the hole in the work piece, but the buttons only rotate in the final few strokes and this hasn't been a problem.
Seeing the thumbnail I really thought: "What a cute little mallet. What's she going to tap in with that?" 😂 But this is even better. Great job as always.
Thank you for providing my TIL moment for the day. Also, you have shown once again that clever people had great ideas and techniques long before smartphones and avocado toast became a thing.
Never heard this called filing buttons, I discovered something like this technique accidentally because a rivet was loose near a surface I was filing, back in shops class in grade 8. The rivet spinning prevented the file from cutting it, so it formed the shape of the filed part. So I learned something new to me today......
Interesting, not that I'll probably ever use it, I don't do that much fine metal work but it is a nice thing to have in the back of my mind. Keep the good stuff coming.
Can you sand after filing as a last step or will that cut in to the pins? Thanks again for yet another ingenious tool. Makes perfect sense when you see it.
Hello Quinn, you know about concaaf mill you have them from .5 mm up to 15mm (or more ) we have them in the factory just make a 1/4 round corner ? nice video aswell 👍👍😉 you can make them from toolsteel on the turning machine and
"In any system of energy, Control is what consumes energy the most. No energy store holds enough energy to extract an amount of energy equal to the total energy it stores. No system of energy can deliver sum useful energy in excess of the total energy put into constructing it. This universal truth applies to all systems. Energy, like time, flows from past to future" (2017).
Most steels will get harder to some degree with heat treating, but you never know what will happen if you grab some mystery metal from your scrap bin. There are texts which explore heat treating for various tool, alloy, low and high carbon steels, etc.
You can let the metal cool to "black" and quench in water or let it air cool. Coinage metals don't harden like many steels do. Pay close attention to Quinn's annealing of copper. Unsurprisingly, silver and gold behave in a fashion similar to copper. Gold will not oxidize, but silver will. Silver just might have to be annealed in a nitrogen atmosphere.
Quick question, is emery just sand "paper". I've inferred that might be more like cloth than paper, but is just sand, right? I want to think that is a genericization. (I had to look up how to say that in english, I mean trademark erosion, an antonomasia)
I think emery is generally cloth-backed, but I've seen references to a paper version as well. The abrasives used with emery are much harder than the abrasives used with sandpaper. Sandpaper is typically used on wood/plastic, while emery is typically used on metal.
Being that the combinations of those things are infinite, I would say that the cost would be somewhere in the ballpark of $infinity, give or take about 23 cents. For our international viewers, that’s roughly £infinity, or infinity¥.
@@mrimmortal1579 I'm just a hobbyist, so that's out of my range. I suppose that a set to accommodate holes where the edge distance in the X direction wasn't the same as the edge distance in the Y direction would cost even more?
Perfect! Shows that just because the old machinists are by definition old now they were not dumb and they had a plethora of nifty little tricks that still work in what was their future and is our daily routine. Thanks for the humbling reminder! And thanks to the old white men who are dissed by uneducated young folks who could not drive a nail in the wall just for being old.
@Blondihacks not even finished watching the video and I have a question... For small buttons/holes, instead of clamping them for use, could you instead make the button into a fitted bolt by giving it an overlong shaft, and then turning down and tapping the excess length that protrudes through the workpiece to a suitable thread, and then hold it with a nut, washers and maybe a spring washer? Obviously for some things that shaft might be in the way, and the washers need to be smaller than the desired radius, but that more or less applies to the retaining bolt version too. And if not, why would it be a bad idea?
If you didn't hear "Face off the end, as is tradition.", "Because chamfers are what separates us from the animals.", or "Yachtzee!" - did you even watch a Blondihacks video?
As far as things that people say "You can't do {ACTION} it'll dull your file" (such as back-dragging a file or using a hardened guide, I even had one boss that wouldn't let us use file card because of the steel bristles), my attitude is that: 1) files are a consumable that wear out, and must be replaced, the same as sandpaper, saw blades, grinding wheels and such. 2) general purpose files are very cheap when you consider how many parts you use them on before they are unusable. 3) with most of these "bad" actions, I never notice a difference in the cutting ability of the file between the start and finish of my work, in fact, when I do notice a difference, it is because I did something stupid, like try to file a twist drill shank (I needed a flat on it, and if drill chuck jaws can mar a shank, then it should be file-able, right?), or forgot to stone away a work-hardened burr (common on ski edges from hitting rocks, If you try to file one, you hear a "ziiip" sound, and you will see a line on the file where the burr has chipped [on a tiny scale] the teeth of the file, and it won't cut there anymore), used too fine of a file for the work, or some other thing where the effects were near instant. 4) the time savings from doing something "bad" for the file, but faster may outweigh the additional wear (such as with a file card, yes the bristles running along the teeth may add a bit of wear to them, but if using a file card is twice as fast as a cloth or other brush, is that not worth it) 5) Sometimes you have to accept that in order to make a particular part, you need to be more harsh on your cheap and/or consumable tool. Do you complain when you have to dress a specific radius into a grinding wheel, to grind a from tool for the lathe? So why do some people get bent out of shape about using a hardened file guide/button?
@Blondihacks I didn't expect to all that interested in the locomotive build, but week after week I learn another broadly useful technique to add to my mental library. Thanks for bringing us along.
On the subject of tapping very small holes! Constantly switching between your taper, plug, and bottoming tap will help greatly. You only remove a very small amount every time, so you minimize the chance of breakage!
Thank you for this great tutorial. Actually I have been busy lately to make an end rounded key which fits perfectyly in the keyway (those keyways which are made by endmill). As you know the keys can't have a hole through on it. Do you have a soultion for this too?
Excellent, takes me back to when we used to use bearings of different diameters, clamped to the job to file a radius on, kind of the same idea and I`ve no idea who first came up with that idea either!
It took my way too long to realize where I have seen this before! I must have been 5 or 6 when my grandpa build a shed for gardening equipment. He used filing buttons to round corner of the fittings (uh hinges? english do be hard).
Please tell us again what cutting tool you are using in this video to cut the drill rod. As you know, it is convenient because you can face and cut the diameter without changing the tool position. Thanks.
What do you call that specific tool holder you are using to turn that shoulder? Haven’t seen that style before. The one holding the cutter in a vertical orientation.
An idea, if you make several and have a set, you might make a sheet metal tag that you can pin between the two pieces with the dementions stamped on it.
Did you know that there's an alternate universe in which a cat named Sprocket has a RUclips channel about hobbyist machining, has a pet human named "Quill" and has the catchphrase "Because chamfers are what separates us from the Humans"...?
Sprocket the Harley riding cat 😂
And in this episode Sprocket took off "just a whisker" with emery paper to get the fit just right.
100% would subscribe.
yeah, I can back you up on that, it's a known thing
Lol, I literally just finished watching Guardians of the Galaxy part 3. 😂
Now! I haven't seen that since I served my Apprenticeship in the 1960s. Fun to see it again and, yes, it's a simple method that works well, even older than me, but works better than I do now. 😃
Great trip down memory lane.
As a first year apprentice in 1965, a set of filing buttons was one of my lathe ‘exercises’.
Thanks Quinn 👏👏
Regards
Robert
Have you considered making a small heat treating ladle for your small parts? Clickspring has demonstrated it a few times on his channel. Holds the parts and you can fill it with boric acid to prevent the charring and blackening.
Great content, as always! Makes me think that it would be interesting to see more 'historic machining tips and tricks.' I know you already add a lot of that content to your videos, but it might be interesting if you create a playlist of machining techniques from the past that have been replaced by newer techniques, but that still have their uses.
one thing that really intrigues me about very old machining books is the lubricant recipes. today people go "oh you gotta cut SPQR free machining chromolly brass? order an R2D2 insert and a can of single malt WD-41 overnight from McMaster" but those old books read more like herbal medicine manuals. they make coolants and lubricants sound like witch potions.
As a oldschool toolmaker i really enjoy your channel 👍
Now it's really Saturday! It isn't a real weekend morning until your videos come out.
I wish I had someone like you in my family! What an amazing person!
I've never heard of this process before! Thanks for showing it.
Love these approaches to problems and the solutions presented
Hi Quinn, Fantastic video I had never seen the use of filing buttons before thank you for the education, Cheers.
Doh, I was about to ask about dulling the file. You answered before I could post.
Great work by one of our sister mechanic types. And it's great to keep old ideas and make new ideas, growing the abilities of peer workers. 😊
Quinn, you are very dang clever, and an excellent instructor. I am going to throw away my blonde joke book ! As a novice hobby tinkerer (not ready to say machinist), using my 3-in1 Shopmaster, I am learning many useful techniques in working materials, not just studying how the tools work. Thank you!
Thanks for more great content Quinn! Love the old tips, still plenty relevant to this day
Every time you channel the spirit of GHT, Metallikor the God of Machining spares some poor apprentice for another few precious moments.
(the corollary to the above is that apart from Sainted GHT, in the eyes of Metallikor, we are *all of us* apprentices.)
Liked this video, kind of confirms the way I have made filling buttons is ok , alot of instructions for making model steam engines just say, use or make filing buttons assuming you know how to do this. I also have found the longer they are the easier they are to work with.
LOL! Oddly enough, I'd initially read your title as "the filing of buttons" rather than "buttons that help while filing". XD Awesome techniques! I must try my hand at this for some project!
Great video , learned something new , thank you Quinn
Interesting technique. Thanks for showing this.
In the past I've solved this problem in a 1-off context by grinding a radius on a small scrap of stainless and using a vise grip to hold it in place. This is by far a more repeatable and elegant solution that I'll have to keep in mind in the future.
Yay!! It's Blondihacks time!!!
Waiting to see your version of a tangential tool holder!
Thank you, please more of that.
and I was ready to break out the sewing kit :D
nice, old proven low tech techniques are grand, thanks for doing your part to keep them alive
Learn something new every time!👍
Thank you.
Thank you for reminding me of this technique. I need to use this on making a flintlock lock plate.
I gave up the heat treatment.
Generally I'm using buttons in the 7/32" to 3/8" diameter range.
One button is drilled to the same diameter as the hole in the work piece, then a part threaded rod of the same diameter glued in place (Loctite 603), The rod protrudes from that button with the unthreaded part the width of the work piece plus sufficient thread for the length of the other button plus a nut or two.
This avoids any blind tapping of small diameters, which gives me nightmares.
The buttons are assembled either side of the hole with the nuts adjusted so that the assembly just rotates in the hole.
Rather than holding the buttons, I hold the work so that the buttons can rotate as soon as the file/abrasive contacts the button.
Where possible, I make buttons with a 2.5mm diameter part threaded (7 BA) rod then, if necessary, enlarging the hole in the work piece to finished size. It suits my rotary table set up where I round off as small as 7/32", using buttons for that last few thousandths.
A further benefit is in final sanding where the work can be run over the paper on a flat surface.
I've used this approach on a Stuart 10V, D10, two Compound Launch and on my current project a Stuart Triple Expansion, without problems.
I was concerned that the rotation would distort the hole in the work piece, but the buttons only rotate in the final few strokes and this hasn't been a problem.
Seeing the thumbnail I really thought: "What a cute little mallet. What's she going to tap in with that?" 😂 But this is even better. Great job as always.
Thank you for providing my TIL moment for the day. Also, you have shown once again that clever people had great ideas and techniques long before smartphones and avocado toast became a thing.
Thanks for sharing
Thank you 👍
Cool! Thanks.
Never heard this called filing buttons, I discovered something like this technique accidentally because a rivet was loose near a surface I was filing, back in shops class in grade 8. The rivet spinning prevented the file from cutting it, so it formed the shape of the filed part. So I learned something new to me today......
Nice video Quinn.
Could you please do a video on these heat treating techniques?
I filed this video away as useful soon as you buttoned it up and released it.
Interesting, not that I'll probably ever use it, I don't do that much fine metal work but it is a nice thing to have in the back of my mind. Keep the good stuff coming.
great video, as always.
Can't wait to see your next video.
That is very cool.
As my father is a learned precision mechanic, I will interview him on filing buttons.
Very cool indeed ! Thank you for this info and demonstration!
Good idea.
Thanks!
Can you sand after filing as a last step or will that cut in to the pins?
Thanks again for yet another ingenious tool. Makes perfect sense when you see it.
love you shows. im getting better thanks to you
I never heard of filing buttons... very cool to see them in action. But a hypothetical Locomotive project? Hmmm...
I'd be running away too if someone put a torch to me!!😂
Now this is a tool that I can add to my gunsmith hobby tool kit.
great video
8:33 I was thinking the same as you. I wish you’d make me a pair. Of buttons. I file a lot but no lathe or prospect of one.
Thank you and yes, very useful.
Hello Quinn, you know about concaaf mill you have them from .5 mm up to 15mm (or more ) we have them in the factory just make a 1/4 round corner ? nice video aswell 👍👍😉 you can make them from toolsteel on the turning machine and
Love it!!! Thank you!
I think Oxtools (Tom Lipton) often uses bearings at bigger sizes.
Thanks
Nice video! Notice you're using a tangential tool for facing and turning. What's the advantage of that over a "conventional" tool?
She talked about it in her recent "Top Ten Secret Machine Shop Weapons" video. The Diamond Tool Holder by Eccentric Engineering.
Did the part catching cardboard make its way from your old shop? I love hanging onto that type of stuff too. If it still works, just keep using it.
"In any system of energy, Control is what consumes energy the most.
No energy store holds enough energy to extract an amount of energy equal to the total energy it stores.
No system of energy can deliver sum useful energy in excess of the total energy put into constructing it.
This universal truth applies to all systems.
Energy, like time, flows from past to future" (2017).
so cool!
fun fact: Heat treated moulding tools are ground to size to avoid parts going out of specs after heat treating
what lathe you have?
Can only tool steel be hardened?; or can other types of steel be used?
Most steels will get harder to some degree with heat treating, but you never know what will happen if you grab some mystery metal from your scrap bin. There are texts which explore heat treating for various tool, alloy, low and high carbon steels, etc.
Yessssss
How do you anneal gold or silver? do you heat and quench or let it air cool?
You can let the metal cool to "black" and quench in water or let it air cool. Coinage metals don't harden like many steels do. Pay close attention to Quinn's annealing of copper. Unsurprisingly, silver and gold behave in a fashion similar to copper. Gold will not oxidize, but silver will. Silver just might have to be annealed in a nitrogen atmosphere.
Quick question, is emery just sand "paper". I've inferred that might be more like cloth than paper, but is just sand, right? I want to think that is a genericization. (I had to look up how to say that in english, I mean trademark erosion, an antonomasia)
I think emery is generally cloth-backed, but I've seen references to a paper version as well. The abrasives used with emery are much harder than the abrasives used with sandpaper. Sandpaper is typically used on wood/plastic, while emery is typically used on metal.
Pretty neat! I wonder what the cost would be for a whole set that accommodated any pilot hole size, radius and edge distance? 😁
Being that the combinations of those things are infinite, I would say that the cost would be somewhere in the ballpark of $infinity, give or take about 23 cents.
For our international viewers, that’s roughly £infinity, or infinity¥.
@@mrimmortal1579 I'm just a hobbyist, so that's out of my range. I suppose that a set to accommodate holes where the edge distance in the X direction wasn't the same as the edge distance in the Y direction would cost even more?
@@Reach41 surprisingly, the cost is roughly the same!
A simple but useful thingie.
Yes, I said thingie.
Thanks, and Meow to Sprocket.
Perfect! Shows that just because the old machinists are by definition old now they were not dumb and they had a plethora of nifty little tricks that still work in what was their future and is our daily routine. Thanks for the humbling reminder! And thanks to the old white men who are dissed by uneducated young folks who could not drive a nail in the wall just for being old.
@Blondihacks not even finished watching the video and I have a question... For small buttons/holes, instead of clamping them for use, could you instead make the button into a fitted bolt by giving it an overlong shaft, and then turning down and tapping the excess length that protrudes through the workpiece to a suitable thread, and then hold it with a nut, washers and maybe a spring washer? Obviously for some things that shaft might be in the way, and the washers need to be smaller than the desired radius, but that more or less applies to the retaining bolt version too. And if not, why would it be a bad idea?
If you didn't hear "Face off the end, as is tradition.", "Because chamfers are what separates us from the animals.", or "Yachtzee!" - did you even watch a Blondihacks video?
"Your gonna get hot"
Blondihacks quote of the year
Simple...my simple is a hammer, screw driver, safety glasses and sand paper...lol
What I was thinking?
Files are consumables, just like hacksaw blades, and for the same reason as hacksaw blades.Dull tools cut poorly.
I came for the yahtzee deceleration!
i spell bad
I didn’t know that even had a name.
Are you a starwars fan?
youtube is fucking evil, I know I was subscribed to you before, and I was wondering why I was nolonger getting notifications reee
I grew up Mennonite and thought this was an Amish thing.
Good video Bkondihacks
Un chuck the workpiece, rotate and re-chuck and there ya go, instant hole resized- happens to me every time. ☺
As far as things that people say "You can't do {ACTION} it'll dull your file" (such as back-dragging a file or using a hardened guide, I even had one boss that wouldn't let us use file card because of the steel bristles), my attitude is that:
1) files are a consumable that wear out, and must be replaced, the same as sandpaper, saw blades, grinding wheels and such.
2) general purpose files are very cheap when you consider how many parts you use them on before they are unusable.
3) with most of these "bad" actions, I never notice a difference in the cutting ability of the file between the start and finish of my work, in fact, when I do notice a difference, it is because I did something stupid, like try to file a twist drill shank (I needed a flat on it, and if drill chuck jaws can mar a shank, then it should be file-able, right?), or forgot to stone away a work-hardened burr (common on ski edges from hitting rocks, If you try to file one, you hear a "ziiip" sound, and you will see a line on the file where the burr has chipped [on a tiny scale] the teeth of the file, and it won't cut there anymore), used too fine of a file for the work, or some other thing where the effects were near instant.
4) the time savings from doing something "bad" for the file, but faster may outweigh the additional wear (such as with a file card, yes the bristles running along the teeth may add a bit of wear to them, but if using a file card is twice as fast as a cloth or other brush, is that not worth it)
5) Sometimes you have to accept that in order to make a particular part, you need to be more harsh on your cheap and/or consumable tool. Do you complain when you have to dress a specific radius into a grinding wheel, to grind a from tool for the lathe? So why do some people get bent out of shape about using a hardened file guide/button?
@Blondihacks I didn't expect to all that interested in the locomotive build, but week after week I learn another broadly useful technique to add to my mental library. Thanks for bringing us along.
On the subject of tapping very small holes! Constantly switching between your taper, plug, and bottoming tap will help greatly. You only remove a very small amount every time, so you minimize the chance of breakage!
Hearing her say Yahtzee is almost as satisfying as helping to milk the @Lg0rlthym...
Thank you for this great tutorial. Actually I have been busy lately to make an end rounded key which fits perfectyly in the keyway (those keyways which are made by endmill). As you know the keys can't have a hole through on it. Do you have a soultion for this too?
Excellent, takes me back to when we used to use bearings of different diameters, clamped to the job to file a radius on, kind of the same idea and I`ve no idea who first came up with that idea either!
It took my way too long to realize where I have seen this before! I must have been 5 or 6 when my grandpa build a shed for gardening equipment. He used filing buttons to round corner of the fittings (uh hinges? english do be hard).
Please tell us again what cutting tool you are using in this video to cut the drill rod. As you know, it is convenient because you can face and cut the diameter without changing the tool position. Thanks.
Very cool! Hadn’t heard of filing buttons before.
Instead of buttons how about a set of different size hardened washers atteched with a regular nut and bolt?
Easier to make and store.
Thank you for such an eloquent lesson. 😊
What do you call that specific tool holder you are using to turn that shoulder? Haven’t seen that style before. The one holding the cutter in a vertical orientation.
At about t 6:39 and 7:32? I’d like an explanation too.
@@michaelwise1224 looks like it could cut way down on grinding time hey?
Great tip. I did not know about this, but makes total sense. Thank you
An idea, if you make several and have a set, you might make a sheet metal tag that you can pin between the two pieces with the dementions stamped on it.
The lateral deflection to enlarge that hole is very clever.
Your usual high standard finesse!
Good job 😊