A tapping arm for the shed

[Occasional machinist]

This is a pair of videos I put together on making up a small tapping arm for shed use. One of those tools I should have made up years ago but...
I've used a casting (and will be making up a couple of more), but could be machined from solid.

[DIYer]

Thanks Occasional machinist! We've added your Tapping Arm to our Tapping and Threading category,
as well as to your builder page: Occasional machinist's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Tapping Arm by Occasional machinist

tags: tapping

[rgsparber]

It was great to hear his reasoning and not afraid to include his mistakes. Well done!

[Occasional machinist]

... and not afraid to include his mistakes.

One of my dislikes is the 'perfection' that is sometimes demonstrated in YouTube clips. Provides an unfair standard to the average person trying to discover how to do things. While I might omit stupid mistakes where I have a brain fade at a critical moment (such engaging lateral feed when meaning to engage vertical), I think that showing mistakes due to error or misunderstanding and recovering from them are an important part of learning.

Michael

[rgsparber]

Related to showing mistakes in fabrication, there is variation in goals.

I view hobby machining as permission to be as crazy and worthless as I want. Today I might want to make a paperweight that is within 1/2 thou of an arbitrary value. Another day I just want to slap together a few bits to try out an idea.

I have many many bad idea. A few I even build. A tiny number of them are almost useful and once in a while I produce a good idea. For me, this is fun.