Hello Bob & everyone else here, new member

[cazclocker]

Hey everyone, just joined today and I wanted to dive right in and say hello to this group. I’ve been absolutely fascinated by clocks in general all of my life and in the past few years have begun to acquire a very modest collection. Believe me when I tell you it’s modest! Anyway, I purchased Bob’s beginning clock repair course on DVD a few years ago and in those days Bob was giving out his lesson #1 of “learn to turn”. I watched it a couple of times and said “OK, that’s cool”. But recently I’ve acquired my first watchmaker’s lathe – an E. Rivett model 2B that dates to around 1904 or 1905. I scored that baby at a flea market for fifty bucks – headstock was in great shape, lathe bed in fair shape and NO TAILSTOCK. Since then I’ve hooked up with a new buddy in Oregon who has sold me a tailstock specifically for that lathe – so now all I need is a motor, some collets and some raw stock! Oh yeah – and some education. I guess that’s where Bob comes in. Looking forward to learning!

[Bob Tascione]

Great to see you up here Doug!!
Sounds like you’ve been busy. It’s good to know there are still some good deals on lathes out there.
Well, welcome to the forum Doug and good hearing from you again.

Have fun!
Bob

[Bob Tascione]

Hey Doug,
I just went to your website that you listed above. I had spent some time romping around your site a few days ago! Anyone reading this please check out Dougs free downloads. Lot’s of helpful stuff.
Thanks for posting it Doug!
Bob

[cazclocker]

Thanks for the very kind words, Bob. As far as the downloads on my website, I try to feature articles that are useful and stay away from fluff. The Shellac 101 and Hide Glue 101 have been kind of floating around on the NAWCC forum for years, but I finally got busy and copy-and-pasted the whole darned things into simple Word documents. I hope they expand your knowledge a little!

Anyway, about 15 minutes ago I finished watching the ‘learn to turn” lesson #2 in its entirety. Dang Bob, your stuff is not just some amateur with a camera – you’ve got some production values! But mainly I feel motivated and capable of starting to turn a little bit of raw brass stock. Granted, I’m still putting together my little rig but after I secure a motor & belting, some collets, and a few gravers, I actually don’t feel quite as intimidated as I did before. What I like is how you lay out some basic tooling like the magic center finder, flags, runners, etc., as first projects on a watchmaker’s lathe. I like that – I can learn on tooling that I will use in the future. If I mess up, it’s only my own stuff!

Yeah, I got the lathe at a little bitty flea market in Arizona from a guy who I have bought some nice stuff from before. Last summer I bought a set of tiny hard white Arkansa stones – they were small, barely 4″ long and quite odd shapes. Glad I got ’em. A month later he had a couple of larger Arkansas stones – one black, one white. They were both in wood cases, and were clearly quite old but excellent shape. $30.00 each – how could I pass ’em up? Bargains rock!

OK, see you later,

[Bob Tascione]

Thank you too Doug!
I think you’re going to have a ton of fun with your lathe. It’s amazing how much can be done on a small lathe. These machines are so versitile once you get the hang of them. Making a few tools is a great way to get to know your lathe and once you’ve constructed a few you’ll begin to see how easy it is to design and build more tools as needed. An example of this would be a thread that pkamargo started a while back. He figured out his own very clever way to make a contrate wheel for a carriage clock he had in for repair. You can see his thread at http://www.clockrepairtips.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=72 Being creative and having fun is what it’s all about!
I got a great deal of info from your Shellac 101 compilation. Very interesting. A must read for anyone wanting to restore old clock cases. I haven’t read the Glue 101 yet but will tonight.
You know you hit on a very important topic. Tiny Arkansas stones! You just can’t have too many different shapes and sizes if you’re doing lathe work. To anyone with a lathe reading this buy up as many as possible. You’ll use them.

Keep having fun Doug and thanks again,
Bob

[tuckoman]

I’m also fairly new (joined a few months back) and have really gotten a lot out of the videos, Bob. Watched them several times. I’d just like to put in a big vote for more of them. I’m on the watch side myself, and would love to see issues of using the full range of jeweling and staking tools, for example.

Anyway, thanks again — great stuff….
Jim Tucker

[cazclocker]

Hey guys. I haven’t had ready internet access past few days…been traveling. Went to the NAWCC Sunshine regional this past Saturday and it was great. Wish I had more money. Saw a bunch of collet assortments and other things like cross-slides, but they were all for Mosley or Levin lathes. Ended up with a set of nice quality brand-new set of jeweler’s files. Made by “Grobet” as I recall..??!!

I finally got around to putting pictures of my itty-bitty Arkansas stones. There’s a link to them in my “TOOLS” page on my website referenced in my signature. That page is awfully sparse but hopfully it will get filled up with some neat stuff.

[cazclocker]

Whoops, I just figured out how to post pictures here! Here are pictures of my small Arkansas stones. They’re all about the same size but they are three distinct shapes.

[cazclocker]

Yikes! I should have resized those pics a bit smaller. Sorry! Now I know for next time.

[Bob Tascione]

Hey no problem Doug…a little scrolling won’t hurt anybody. Thanks for putting them up here.
Handy shapes to have. The knife edge one is my personal favorite.
Enjoy,
Bob

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