SEEING BETTER IN THE MACHINE When machining, sometimes seeing where your tool is in relation to the part you are machining can be difficult at best. In the first photo it is difficult to tell exactly where the tool tip is. In the second photo you can see that I laid a...

VACUUM FOR CAST IRON DUST To help with the cast iron dust when boring, I've made a couple different collectors. Vacuum cleaners work, but are so noisy you can't hear the machine. This last one I built,with the large air filter is by far the best one. Made from an old...

SIDE CUTTER UPGRADE One of the most used tools in our shop is a good pair of side cutters. They can be a little messy with the clipped ends flying and sometimes unwieldy if you’re trying to keep multiple wires separate in your holding hand. To make them more...

CHEAP AND EASY RING SQUARING TOOLS I made many different size tools for quick and easy piston ring squaring when end gapping. I used scraps from leftover cylinder sleeves and turned them to size on my lathe. They don't take up much space for storage even with more...

PRESSURE TORQUE PLATE For those who don’t have a pressure tester, torque plates work great. Use along with homemade block off plates for the other holes and I use expandable rubber core plugs to seal up the block. I use them in cylinder heads as well. Just have a...

DIGITAL READ OUTS Here are some inexpensive digital read outs (DRO) I’ve added to various machines in the shop. On the seat and guide machine it’s great to be able to set seat depths for different cutters on the same head without setting the end stop for each one. You...