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Shrink fit with Dry Ice and Denatured Alcohol.....What size hole?

justmakingchips

Plastic
Joined
Oct 8, 2015
I am wanting to shrink fit a 6mm (.2362") pin into a part that is made out of D2 steel. We have driven the pin into a reamed hole in the past after the D2 part has been heat treated (56rc)and the part cracks. I have tested shrinking the pin with dry ice and denatured alcohol and it shrank down .0004" after being submerged for a few minutes. My question is...what size should I ream the hole, given the pin will shrink .0004"? I don't want the pin to come out and don't know how much "interference" I need????
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
I am wanting to shrink fit a 6mm (.2362") pin into a part that is made out of D2 steel. We have driven the pin into a reamed hole in the past after the D2 part has been heat treated (56rc)and the part cracks. I have tested shrinking the pin with dry ice and denatured alcohol and it shrank down .0004" after being submerged for a few minutes. My question is...what size should I ream the hole, given the pin will shrink .0004"? I don't want the pin to come out and don't know how much "interference" I need????
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

rules of thumb is .0010" to .0020 per inch dia so .236 dia pin .0002 to .0004 but of course if part cracks it cannot take the interference fit pressures if too high. thats why they make loctite
 
Shrink fitting parts gets more difficult as diameters decrease. 6mm is quite small.

It'll be much easier to heat the part than to cool the pin. D2 will go all the way up to 1000F without affecting the 56RC temper, but it will begin to discolor past 400F.

What's the purpose of the pin? How deep is the bore? What's the location accuracy spec?
 
Don't think just because you are using a shrink fit your problems with the part breaking will go away. I have had several parts over the years break after shrink fits came up to temperature. Hard parts with little/no elongation are prime candidates for breakage. You need better process control of your hole diameter.

I would try for .0002 interference. You may have to analyze your part to see how much interference you can accept before breakage. That will depend on the shape of your part. Interference fits on small dimension parts become difficult.
 
All posts above good.
I would also suggest remedies.

1.
It is relatively easy to hand-adjust reamers a few microns smaller via judicios use of fixtures and abrasives.
Start with loose and work your way down.
Each reamer is a "special" after You touch it.
Test via pins, calibrated.
Buy a set of 5-10-20 gage pins by 1 micron-2 microns. 100-200$.

Lowering a 5.990 mm reamer by 3 microns will NOT make it banana shaped etc. as You are making a very tiny adjustment.
Any abrasives would likely work.
Or 6.000 mm to 5.995 mm, say.
Since you are NOT trying or expecting to get 1, or 2, microns actual size but a "bit less", with some small variance.

E. 2 V blocks with rotational driver, some honing stones and oil, ground ref. blocks for holding, 2-10 min handwork will do it.
It (the reamer) wont be "perfectly" round, or straight, or even etc. but it WILL make exactly as-good holes a graduated bit smaller.

You won´t know how much smaller at first .. until You have experience.
But sub-micron handwork tolerances with abrasives are std in mirrors and lenses by hand for 100 years.

I have *no idea* of how much interference you need.
For 6.000 mm, steel/steel, normal, I would aim for 6.010 - 6.020 mm depending on load and use.

The *real* problem is customer design, drawing, specs.
They should have been able to spec it properly.
NOW, You are in a position to make money by properly communicating options, alternatives, costs.
This is difficult - but it is where YOU can make the most money.
 
Hanermo, can you expand on the use of abrasives to reduce reamer sizes? I know one can make a larger reamed hole by freezing the part before reaming, the reaming taking only seconds which is too fast for the part to expand form heating.
 
As said, the issue with such a tiny part is two fold... 1, it's not going to change much with temp difference. 2, it has so little mass that it will heat up and lock down the split second it touches the more massive block.
 
I have virtually no experience with shrink fitting pins that small but just the thought of it give me the shudders. :eek:

First thing I'd do is try to turn the "pin" into a "stud by threading one end of it and drilling and tapping a hole in the
workpiece. Won't work for all applications but it would definitely save a lot of headaches it were possible to go that
way...
 
I have virtually no experience with shrink fitting pins that small but just the thought of it give me the shudders. :eek:

First thing I'd do is try to turn the "pin" into a "stud by threading one end of it and drilling and tapping a hole in the
workpiece. Won't work for all applications but it would definitely save a lot of headaches it were possible to go that
way...

They already make those, they're called pull dowels
 
Shrink fitting such a small pin requires very high accuracy as far as diameter and roundness of the pin and the hole. I doubt that a reamer can produce such an accurate hole. For an accurate hole I usually bore or grind it on a jig borrer/jig grinder. As well as your pin must have very close tolerances in diameter, roundness and parallelism.
For small parts shrink fitting I find liquid nitrogen cooling more effective.
 
I do a shrink fit of punches and dies as a regular job. Ground punch bodies .375 diameter +-.0001 tolerance in jig bored holes with no more than .0002" of shrink. Heat the mating part in oven to about 350 degrees and cool punches in dry ice and alcohol. Twenty punches per block. No time to fool around at assembly. Liquid nitrogen would be better but, not as convenient for me.

Billzweig's post is good advice.
 








 
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