Re: Tungsten Flashlight, or something else?
A little more progress, after a lot of work and learning.
One thing any machinist should know is that it takes a while to learn how to machine a metal that one hasn't worked on before. Sure, you can read the books for speed and feed recommendations, but until you've spent some time cutting a particular metal, you really can't be 100% sure that you are going to do it right. So practice makes perfect, eventually. Unfortunately, since I don't have any more Tungsten to play with and learn, I have to learn while trying to make a light. :shakehead
And it didn't take long to realize that I really didn't know how to part off Tungsten:
That was perhaps only another try away from going drastically wrong--too much chatter, the material pulls the cutting edge into itself, and, voila, the tool broke. Thank goodness it broke, rather than having the piece climb over the tool and thoroughly ruin the piece.
So, what was the answer--adjust the tool height, slow down the RPMs, increase of decrease the feed rate? Hell if I know--I just got out a different, stronger tool bit and proceeded with a very soft touch as I fed the tool into the material. I'll have to figure out the right settings and procedure when I get some more Tungsten to play with.
In any event, this was a most welcome sight:
Head of the light on the right and the battery tube still in the four-jaw chuck.
Then I had to bore out the battery tube, close to the diameter needed for the battery, but primarily so that I can get an expandable collet in the battery tube, to allow me to machine the squares on the OD.
Boring out the battery tube--just about done.
The next few days will be spent cutting the squares in both the head and the battery tube. How do I know it will take days? Simple--it took me one and a half hours just to do the axial cuts in the head of the light--but that's only to half the eventual depth of cut. At that rate, each piece would take 6 hours for just the machining of the squares.
However, I do think that machining the circumferential grooves won't take as long--a good part of the metal will already have been removed--still, they will certainly take a while.
Go ahead and count them--27 grooves, to save you some time. That's half way to the final depth of cut.