The Secret Society of Lathe Trolls

The other new plant in Memphis is offering $11-$13 an hour for press operators. Work that one out! That's not totally absurd. The cost of living is low in Memphis and being a press operator is a pretty standard manual labor job. I've worked at UPS and been a press operator, the pay scale was compar...

That supervisor position listing is bananas. They want a guy to fix the presses, cut the records, plum up the hydraulics and pneumatics, train the new guys, set the production schedule, like, know dudes in the industry or something, plus still be able to hear real well and they wanna pay him between...

I've got no documentation on mine either. I know someone else that has a couple of the 250W amps and he doesn't have any paperwork. I found someone on google that had one that was a re-branded/modified Dynaco hi-fi amp. They are easy enough to work on, the design is a really straightforward class A ...

It's a flutter filter, platter mass, those coupling springs, and then the oil is the damping. Neumann used very heavy oil, now it's available for model steam trains, it's steam cylinder oil. Good to know. Thanks for the intel. I've been using SAE10 detergent free oil with no problems. I'll get some...

What amp are you speaking of? Thanks! I figured so, but I wanted to check in with the brain trust here. It's a Ransteele RPA-250. A big 70's solid state 240W RMS mono amp. Sounded really great right up until it stopped working. I used the opportunity to swap out all of the carbon comp resistors wit...

I just rebuilt one of my cutting amps. I want to do a general test on it before hooking it up to my cutting head. Nothing fancy, just checking to see if it passes signal at the impedance the head is going to be, maybe a real crude frequency response test. Can anyone think of any reason I shouldn't j...

I was perusing an internet of things website looking for xmas presents for the family when I can across this... http://www.homecontrols.com/NuTone-Central-Vacuum-400W-1-Stage-Disposable-Bag-NUCV400?sc=23&category=194194 I thought maybe it would be of interest to some folks here. Maybe it works as a ...

My right cutting amp went down. It is a Ransteele RP-250. I tested the power transistors and sure enough, half of them have shorted. I'm looking around for the schemo so I can probe around for other for problems while I'm in there to avoid killing $60 worth of transistors the next time I turn it on....

The machine itself is not unreliable, the wear and tear we put on it does that. Parts are just parts. I have not seen one that cannot be replaced or remade yet. I also believe it is up to us to stick together and learn information from those that came before us. I think people like floski and opcod...

Really 30k-50k for one of these is chump change when viewed in the perspective of how much revenue it will bring in over its lifetime. Think about spending 30k on a car...it is worth essentially NOTHING when you are done with it. . I agree with what you are saying. However, I think one point that a...

At my last job, we would just call around to different local metal recycling places to get prices for nickle. I think there was usually some "this guy will give me this, can you beat that" type of negotiating up, but basically, it was just a bunch of legwork on the phone.

I've designed and built a dc motor based carriage drive for our Scully lathe, which originally (and until this year) always took its feed from the turntable drive shaft. With the Arduino-based drive controller taking a rectified DC feed of the audio, the motor receives PWM power through a Darlingto...

Could be a heat/vacuum combo problem. I'm just guessing that it hasn't always done this, even though it sounds like you've usually cut with the same heating method, give or take. So, maybe you are getting less suction than you had is the past for some reason. I've seen a pinhole in a vacuum system d...

Thanks for the input. I'll try Mr. Grundman and somebody at Aardvark. I put a call into Mr. Horowitz at HRS, but nothing back yet. No problems there, I'm sure those guys are slammed. I'll report back when I have a solution. Worst case scenario, I'll run my own ground wire through the suspension to t...

I've just about got my Scully/Haeco system going, but I'm having a hard time figuring out the heater situation. Looking at it, and ignoring the suspension system microswitch that cuts the power, it seems like one side of the heater voltage is coming in on the plug, same as a westrex, and it is groun...

I wonder if the rug is included at the buy it now price.

Seriously though, just glad to look at the pics, such a nice looking thing.

Nevermind, got it figured out. The start motor was tripping me up. Not automatic. It's more like starting an old hammond organ with the start/run switch. Also, I put it together that the 1-2 is just a barrier strip to hook the start motor to the start capacitor and doesn't hook to anything internal.

I'm bumping an old thread rather than starting one, sorry if that is the wrong way to go about this. I'm wiring up a lyrec sm8-3a. I'm using the factory diagrams Dr. Dub uploaded. Looking over the diagrams, there are a couple of things that are unclear or not really included in the drawings and that...

Yep, end is engaged to the bottom cylinder and the other to the top plate. I'm sure it needs oil of some kind because a lot of the oil spilled in transit. On the top there is a port to put oil into it, the port doesn't have a cap, so you can freely put oil in and oil can freely spill out. Once the t...

Thanks. Good to know. I'm not sure what kind of bearing the Scully has. I'm attaching a picture. It seems like the oil is used to lubricate the bearing as well and act like a damper. There is a huge heavy steel platter that sits on top of the assembly in the picture then the turntable platter ultima...