Does anyone have a good method of reducing the thickness of the bronze thrust washers without using a lathe?
Currently, I have been laying a sheet of emery cloth on the concrete floor and just working it down. I've been able to keep the thickness consistent, but it is slow and tedious.
How about a sanding disk on a drill press?
How much do you have to take off???
Mark, if you have a table saw, use the deck of it instead of your floor--it's more likely to be flatter, and you can stand up while sanding!
T'
David D.
Mark-
You are doing it correctly.
-Keith
Make a handle from a piece of wood with 3 or 4 drywall screws run in with just the heads left above the wood about 1/8" around the periphery of the washer. Now go to it on the emery on the table saw base. Use a figure 8 pattern. troop
I've done them on a lathe with the jaws reversed.
A similar idea would be to make a handle by glueing a circle of thin plywood to a more substantial board. The circle of ply would be just the size to fit the inner part of the washer and be thinner than the washer. This would let you run the washer around on the sandpaper as described on a surface such as the table saw. Lathes are great if you have one. This would work too. Just rotate the piece in your hand regularly to keep the grinding as even as possible. Check thickness frequently.
I second Richards way it is more accurate than sanding.
Mark, Herm's question needs answering to give you the best advice. How much do you need to take off? I determine this by assembling the diff halves squarely, doing up the bolts a little at a time, while constantly checking for side play. Once you have it right you can measure the gap between the halves of the diff centre to work out how much has to come off the thrusts.
I try to take some off each thrust, but keep one about .010" - .015" thicker than the other. Using a lathe as Richard suggests is the easiest and most accurate as you can control the cuts.
Why make one thicker than the other? Once you have the thrust washer, the steel discs and any shims needed to get the diff centre turning without any side slop, you can then juggle the thrusts, washers and shim stack in any combination when setting the crown wheel and pinion gear mesh.
Hope this helps.
Allan from down under.
I've done it with a bench belt sander for gross reduction, then finish off with emory paper on a flat plate.
Now that I have a lathe I would probably use that. Another possibility is to use a mill.
TH
Take 'em to the time saver and run them through. Or fixture them to the surface grinder. Or if your careful you can do them on the blanchard grinder. Just make sure you tie them down tight.
I'd just use emery on the table saw deck. If you can find some sand paper with adhesive back it can be stuck to the saw deck and the top of the washer for grip and then just go to work and git er done. If you don't have a table saw use the table on your drill press.
You could draw file them but you will have to mike them as you go. When you are close then work the final bit down with sandpaper and a flat surface.
If your wife's not home you might use the kitchen counter as your flat surface.
Mark if you have nothing else one of the flattest things you can easily lay your hands on is a piece of plate/window glass. You can easily tape emery paper to it also. Just sayin'.
Good call on the table saw. Just got the axle back together and it all feels great. Thanks for all the advice
If you have a drill press you can do them on the drill press pretty easily. Get a sanding drum for the press, clamp a piece of angle iron to the table and by adjusting the angle iron or table to the thickness you want you can sand it down to thickness very easily. You don't have to do the whole thing at once, a cheap little one inch sanding drum will work and any piece of angle iron bigger than an inch or so will work, just set it up so you can turn the washer from below as you sand it down. Make sure you are sanding against the rotation of the drum so it doesn't grab it and throw it across the shop. I did them that way before I had a lathe. If you clamp the angle iron to the edge of the table it is easier to hold the thrust washer as you hold it vertical and turn it through the opening between the drum and the angle iron. It is far faster and more accurate than trying to sand them down on a flat surface. A sanding drum is a five dollar tool that you should already have in the shop. Like a lot of things, a picture would be better.
Could anyone please post a picture of a "sanding drum" that Stan refers to ? (Sorry but I'm below the equator and have never heard of one, you know the story, guards/fenders, spanner/wrench, and all that).
Regards,
Bede
I dunno what you call them there but it is just a cylindrical section with a shaft in the middle that can be chucked in the drill press and paper sandpaper tubes that fit over it. You turn a nut to expand the drum so the paper is tight. Any hardware store should have them. If that doesn't do it I'll take a pic tomorrow and post it for you.
drum sander for a drill press
Ya, take a picture Stan. I want to see how you hold the spacer verticle against the angle iron?
I know what you mean about the drum shaped sander but I'm not sure about the rest.
Yup, I can see how that would work well and quickly and keep it even. Thanks for posting Randall
Couldn't be more true here, a picture is worth a thousand words.
Please note in the photo of the drum sander that the thrust washer is being fed from the WRONG direction. Normal drill presses turn to the right (clockwise) and if it was fed that way you will be looking for the washer across the shop after you came back from the hospital (if you were not holding tight)
Jim
I wonder how them plastic thrust washers will stand up.
Randall beat me to it. I've been going to post a pic of this method every time somebody brings it up about how to do it. This is about 50 times as fast and a lot more accurate than trying to do it on a flat surface.
You'll note that I am actually doing it on the end of a vise that is machined true to the spindle of the drill press. If you are going to use angle iron you probably should true up the angle first so the washer is the same thickness all the way across.
I don't do them like this anymore, I have a lathe setup that works faster and is probably more accurate but I did a lot of them this way before I had a lathe.
By the way, note that mine is feeding a little different because I feed it from the back and bottom edge of the table and turn it through the drum from back to front. I'm sure Randall does that, too, it's just for the ease of illustration he did his demo pic this way.
Will the drill presses in NZ turn the opposite way that they turn in the states. Somebody told me that the water turns in the "wrong" direction when you flush the toilet. I think it might happen in Wisconsin too.