Hello Gene, for this reason I am using a plastic cover over the keyboard with pockets for the keys (left over from delivery of the keyboard) :-))
Yes, you are right, the rarer, the more expensive. But I bought my machine from someone who didn' have a faint idea and I got it together with the work bench and a drawer type tool cabinet, all filled with parts, for 50 Euros. Admittedly, you've got to find such a guy, but as I didn't even intended to buy such a miraculous machine, I learned: Don't try, and you'll find. As we say, it dropped right into my lap. No, there is no mechanical work that would be impossible for the UWG. On the Internet, there is a picture of a guy turning out the brake drum of a large car or truck wheel without even removing the tire. You can do rigid tapping on a tapered shaft, engrave scale lines on conic wheels, turn cones, make 45 degree (or any other angle) gears, asymmetrical worm wheels, hypoid gears and such, both turned and ground. The only thing that is needed besides a lot of ingenuity is time for the changes on the machine and for making all those very little chips, because the motor only has 180 watts :-)) Right, there are attachments for circular sawing, a precision turntable (which I motorized with a stepper), two XY tables in different sizes with a vise, three chucks, a turning plate, a lot of change gear wheels for threading, several cardan shafts, a three gear shift box, lots of pulleys, and a grinding attachment for 20000 rpm (which is lacking on my machine). You can also disengage the nuts and move the ways by a hand lever for grinding. All movements are done with 1 mm pitch spindles, which means an accuracy of 1/400 mm with an ordinary stepper. All nuts are split to remove any play. And it is very sturdy, as the wei'ght of 300 kg for a table top machine implies. All important parts are cast iron, precision ground. The column is a solid 100 mm bar. You can attach dials on every axis to check precision. But, for a complete change from, say, turning to rigid tapping I need about one and a half hour. On the other hand, milling gears, with NC, once the machine is set up, takes about 10 seconds per tooth. This machine is really a miracle, but not apt for industrial production. There are rumors that these machines were built in into submarines and parachuted to the troops in WW II to enable them to produce any replacement part that was needed for their military gear. All the machines are numbered, I have the No. 506. I doubt that there were many more of them produced than about a thousand. Best regards Peter gene heskett schrieb: > On Thursday, November 17, 2011 08:42:09 AM Peter Blodow did opine: > > >> Jon, >> I think Richards original message was a little ironical. I think was he >> meant was that this EMC2 list is moving towards commercial users more >> and more, who are making money by using a no cost control program >> system. Consequently, interests of hobbyists (like I am, too) are going >> to the background. Nobody seriously wants to make watches on the kitchen >> table, you can buy them for a few dollars. >> >> The machine Richard is actually looking for is the UWG, a combined, >> extremely versatile table top lathe-mill-grinding machine with >> extraordinary precision (1/100 mm easily) made by the Hommel factory >> here in Germany from WW II times until about 1970. Since then, those >> machines have been dealt in ebay and other shops for tremendous prices, >> even spare parts are paid for by their weight in gold (almost). Call >> www.ebay.de and look for "Hommel UWG", right now there a sale is going >> on. Google for "Hommel UWG" and you will get a lot of hits, also from >> the UK. Besides, UWG is an acronym for "Universelles Werkstنtten Gerنt" >> (universal workshop device). >> >> I happend to buy one some years ago, saving it from the junk yard. The >> people who owned it didn't know what a treasure they were to throw away. >> I added stepper motors and end switches to all axis and run the machine >> with home made software. As one of the first items I made (PC >> controlled) some 60 gear wheels for the machine itself from hydraulic >> piston steel slabs. The reason why I am participating in this list is my >> wish to run the machine with EMC2, but so far I didn't have the time >> (and the guts) to start this as a primary project. >> >> Peter >> > > Now I'll have to clean the drool from my keyboard, Peter. But this is one > of those "if you have to ask, you can't afford it" things. Google found > one, a 1973 model, only 7k euro plus ship from .de land. > > Touring the google output, one site even had a picture of a unimate, the > little one with about a 2.5" chuck, which brought back some fond memories > as I had borrowed one of those for a couple years back in the '60's. I > used it to make a primer pocket swaging tool for mil brass I still own and > use occasionally, fits in the ram of a herters U frame reloading press that > I still keep just to use it. Made it from a 1/4" grade 12 bolt, ground to > contour, no discernible wear in thousands of cases treated. I also made a > few other tools associated with reloading that I still use occasionally. > For a tiny lathe, quite useful and I have been looking for one to buy for > quite a while. > > But is there anything the Hommel can't do? One picture even showed it > setup with what must have been an extra cost scroll saw frame and table. > > Cheers, Gene > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ All the data continuously generated in your IT infrastructure contains a definitive record of customers, application performance, security threats, fraudulent activity, and more. Splunk takes this data and makes sense of it. IT sense. 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