That's some good feedback, thanks guys. Looks like I'm going in the right direction.
The pump setup is a bit of a hybrid. It's from a BA falcon I believe but I think it's pretty much the same as the holden one. I machined a pulley in the stock size but I'm running a 25% underdrive crank pulley so that should slow it down a fair bit.
I spent the day in the garden and I'm a bit tired and burnt. I'm waiting on gearbox parts so it's small jobs for a while. I felt like doing a bit of machining to unwind and it's fun to do. Creating a part out of a lump of metal is very satisfying.
I started with a piece of 20mm stainless bar stock. Stainless can be fun to machine but it can be a beast too. The swarf it makes doesn't break into small chips and you end up with long pieces of razor sharp swarf coming off the part. You have to be careful especially working close to the chuck as the jaws can grab it and whip it around. It's also hard on tooling and if your tooling is blunt it'll work harden the stainless and turn into a real pain.
Flood coolant helps keep the tooling in good shape and keeps the part cool.
The milling machine and a rotary table are great for putting a hex on the end of a part. I need to use a spanner on this piece so it gets a 15mm hex on the end.
Machining the other end and the part is taking shape. I use mainly ISO standard tungsten carbide tooling.They use replaceable tips that have several cutting edges to choose from. The advantage is you have a super durable cutting edge and if it goes dull you just flip to the next edge. You don't need to remove the tool from the lathe and your setup dimensions should be the same. A lot quicker than regrinding a tool steel cutter too.
There is still an need for tool steel cutters though. If you need an odd shape cut like a radius or an O ring groove you can grind a cutter to the right shape. Here I've cut a groove near the tip for an O ring and a groove behind it for roll pin to retain the part.
Here's the finished part on the right with the O ring installed on the end. The original part that I'd cobbled together is on the left. It's a fitting for the clutch slave cylinder that lets me connect a braided line to it. The original was welded together from a piece of the original slave cylinder fitting, a machined tube and an AN fitting welded on the end. Part of the issue with it was that during the welding process the plating on the part that went into the slave cylinder peeled off and the dimensions were slightly small. Over the years since I made the original I've gotten better at using the lathe so figured I'd make a nice one piece stainless one.
Here it is installed. It's retained into the housing with a roll pin so it can rotate. The end with the hex on it is drilled and tapped with a 1/8" NPT thread so I can screw an AN#4 adapter into it. The hex lets me tighten the AN fitting down and leaves the braided line completely outside the bell housing. A lot of setups I've seen have the line running inside the bell housing to the slave cylinder. I'm not a fan of that. If you damage the line it means pulling the motor to replace it
Cheers
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