* GadgetBuilder.com * © 2008-2025 John Moran
Last Modified:
April 2010 Group Picture
There are hobby machinist groups scattered around the USA including a small HSM group in Connecticut. Our CTHSM group is congenial and freewheeling:
no rules, no dues, just people getting together to learn new techniques plus share thoughts on machining and other topics that arise. Meetings are held in member shops, nominally on the second Sunday of the month at 2pm. Anyone interested in attending a meeting please contact me
(via the link below on this page) for more info and travel directions.
The September 14th meeting was at Roger's shop in Shelton, CT.
Paul built a right angle gauge with a dial readout. It is slightly unusual in that it has 4 feet which were lapped to be planar; commonly 3 feet are used since 3 points determine a plane.
In use the dial is zeroed against a cylindrical square via the thumbscrew to the right of the center bar. Then it can provide a readout of how far out of square the target surface is.
Eric built a grasshopper escapement for his latest clock; it has miniature ball bearings at all the rotation points. Here it has aluminum plates to hold it for testing, where drive is provided by a weight on a string (seen trailing off to the right).
Grasshopper escapements are tricky to adjust because they are sensitive to inertia of the components.
Allan is making a cover for the end of a large pipe using his press to form the cover from a flat sheet. He got advice on how to avoid the wrinkling along the outer edge of the cover. Most of the distorted material will be cut away - the issue is near the edge of the flat area.
Here's an interesting variation on using the Kant Twist clamp parts available to CTHSM members.
See: Kant Twist Knurler at HSM
The October 12, 2025 meeting will be at Paul's shop in Darien, CT.
Parts for Kant Twist clamps will be available at this meeting.
As usual, bring items for demonstration and/or discussion. Plus items for the sale/swap/free table.
Home shop machining is often a solitary hobby, as are most hobbies now according to "Bowling Alone".
The CTHSM group is an attempt to get area HSM's to know one another and thus make our hobby a little less solitary.
The much larger NEMES HSM group is 2-3 hours away so we share some members and occasionally have visitors from that group.
The CTHSM group has been meeting since November 2008, mostly on the 2nd Sunday of the month at 2pm, but we deviate from this with some regularity. The January meeting is not held since Cabin Fever conflicts, February has seen a couple meetings cancelled due to weather, the May meeting is on the 3rd Sunday to avoid a conflict with Mother's Day, and we don't meet in July because many members are on vacation. Over time our meeting schedule has become predictably irregular...
If you have a comment on my site or its
contents, click here scroll down and
click again.
Pictures from our unusual "Music Machine Meetings"
.jpg)
