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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 8th meeting was at Ted's shop in New Hartford, CT.
Ted's locomotive is shown at right with Ted (in red sweater) and Ralph looking on. Ted has been working on this locomotive for over 20 years - although he has been distracted by a number of other projects along the way.
Frank made an interesting tool holder to minimize the grinding needed to produce a vertical shear tool. The front tool holder is a normal shear tool and the holder behind it has the inset for the tool cut at an angle so only the front of the tool blank need be ground to produce (or re-sharpen) a shear tool.
The vertical shear tool is a finishing tool, with maximum depth of cut about 3 thou. Used with a fine auto feed and cutting oil it will produce a surprisingly good finish - often looks like a ground finish - in materials which can be difficult to finish nicely. Worth exploring if you haven't tried it.
Here's an interesting variation on using the Kant Twist clamp parts available to CTHSM members.
See: Kant Twist Knurler at HSM
The October 13, 2024 meeting will be at my shop in Newtown, 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...
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Pictures from our unusual "Music Machine Meetings"
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