What's new
What's new

Pretty Wing Nuts

rivett608

Diamond
Joined
Oct 25, 2002
Location
Kansas City, Mo.
As many of you know I have weakness for collecting antique tools. One feature collectors have an interest in are tools that look pretty, something where someone took extra time to just make it nice to look at. The Studley tool chest is a perfect example. I happen to like fancy knurling and things like wing nuts. Here are a few from tools in my collection I just happened to have photos of with descriptions.

Share some of yours.

Bronze, late 19th c. from a surface gauge

Brass, French, circa 1835, from a rose engine, this is about 3" across

Brass, Swiss, 19th c. from a watchmakers mandrel lathe

Steel, 19th c. from a surface gauge
 

Attachments

  • DSC_0698.jpg
    DSC_0698.jpg
    83.3 KB · Views: 301
  • DSC_0700.jpg
    DSC_0700.jpg
    86.3 KB · Views: 375
  • DSC_0702.jpg
    DSC_0702.jpg
    76.5 KB · Views: 472
  • DSC_0703.jpg
    DSC_0703.jpg
    82.4 KB · Views: 152
Last edited:
Iron, English, Lancashire, 18th c. from a clockmakers turns

Steel, American, 19th-Early 20th c. from a surface gauge

Iron/steel, English, Lancashire, 18th c. from a past of rack wing dividers

Steel, English, London, 18th c. From a beam compass by Edward Nairne, w 1748-1774, about 3/8" wide
 

Attachments

  • DSC_0705.jpg
    DSC_0705.jpg
    82.6 KB · Views: 120
  • DSC_0706.jpg
    DSC_0706.jpg
    81.5 KB · Views: 116
  • DSC_0707.jpg
    DSC_0707.jpg
    90.2 KB · Views: 116
  • DSC_0708.jpg
    DSC_0708.jpg
    78.9 KB · Views: 121
Steel, French?, Late 17th c. from a hand vise

Steel, English, Early 19TH C. from a Peter Stubs hand vise

Brass, French, 18th c. from a drafting pen

Brass, French/German, 18th c. from a drafting pen
 

Attachments

  • DSC_0710.jpg
    DSC_0710.jpg
    81.6 KB · Views: 152
  • DSC_0712.jpg
    DSC_0712.jpg
    84 KB · Views: 194
  • DSC_0714.jpg
    DSC_0714.jpg
    78.7 KB · Views: 129
  • DSC_0715.jpg
    DSC_0715.jpg
    81.3 KB · Views: 107
As many of you know I have weakness for collecting antique tools. One feature collectors have an interest in are tools that look pretty, something where someone took extra time to just make it nice to look at. The Studley tool chest is a perfect example. I happen to like fancy knurling and things like wing nuts. Here are a few from tools in my collection I just happened to have photos of with descriptions.

Share some of yours.

Bronze, late 19th c. from a surface gauge

Brass, French, circa 1835, from a rose engine, this is about 3" across

Brass, Swiss, 19th c. from a watchmakers mandrel lathe

Steel, 19th c. from a surface gauge

How do you tell brass from bronze without doing some chemistry?
Absolutely lovely wingnuts!.
 
Great looking wing nuts, and I am partial to the Holtzapffel type wing nut.

I think Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin; Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. If you polish the metal the color is the first clue. Although I watched a Youtube video this past week where someone "smoked" brass with some chemicals and it looked like Bronze... so the reason for my suggestion that polishing the metal is what I would try first to discover what kind of metal. CAUTION, I'm just a student of the arts!

HF
 
How do you tell brass from bronze without doing some chemistry?
Absolutely lovely wingnuts!.

There are zillions of brass and bronze alloys. Usually if there is any zinc at all they refer to the alloy as a brass. They used to pour a lot of red brass back in the day which was 85% Cu, 5 Pb 5 Zn and 5 Sn. The stuff looks like bronze and a lot of people call it bronze but it should probably be called brass.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
“ How do you tell brass from bronze without doing some chemistry?
Absolutely lovely wingnuts!.”

Honestly, more of a BS guess based on color. I could be wrong. I didn’t do any chemistry. Glad you liked the wingnuts.
 
There are zillions of brass and bronze alloys. Usually if there is any zinc at all they refer to the alloy as a brass. They used to pour a lot of red brass back in the day which was 85% Cu, 5 Pb 5 Zn and 5 Sn. The stuff looks like bronze and a lot of people call it bronze but it should probably be called brass.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I help cast hundreds of kilos of that alloy into marine hardware at a friend's foundry: LG2 leaded gunmetal bronze.

272872d1576665781-pretty-wing-nuts-spindle-bore-6.jpg



Plain old brass is noticeably more "golden" than "copper pink" by comparison with the same camera and lighting.

272873d1576666237-pretty-wing-nuts-machined-spindle-castings-small.jpg
 

Attachments

  • Spindle bore 6.jpg
    Spindle bore 6.jpg
    63.4 KB · Views: 969
  • machined spindle castings small.jpg
    machined spindle castings small.jpg
    84.7 KB · Views: 997
No offense to OP, or any others, but a question maybe?

Why is it I get a full screen pic of a damn wingnut, but I get a itty bitty pic of a machine offset page or the like (something I need a full screen of to decipher)...? :toetap:

Maybe a mod could post a sticky in general?
 
No offense to OP, or any others, but a question maybe?

Why is it I get a full screen pic of a damn wingnut, but I get a itty bitty pic of a machine offset page or the like (something I need a full screen of to decipher)...? :toetap:

Maybe a mod could post a sticky in general?

The forum software lets you easily attach photos which show up as a clickable thumbnail, it takes a bit more effort to cut and paste the URL of the image back into the post manually to get a full image.
 
The reason I took a bunch of photos of my wing nuts was to make my girl friend's Christmas gift. It seems she likes pretty wing nuts and has often admired them around my shop. So I thought I would just make her a silver necklace of wing nuts. I find there are so few things sold in stores that interest me to give as gifts so I often make things for those special.

The large one is about 1 1/2" across, these were made by machining the body and threading it 6-32, then the wings were sawn out of silver sheet, about a 1/16" thick for the big one and I think .045" for the smaller. This is a case measurements really don't matter as long as the finished part looks right. The wings were then silver soldered in place, drilled and put on a chain.

BTW, She totally loves it!
 

Attachments

  • hpL+JOJpQrecHIyH73VYWQ_thumb_19a19.jpg
    hpL+JOJpQrecHIyH73VYWQ_thumb_19a19.jpg
    98.5 KB · Views: 116
  • tK%uiNltS%KfgX5hsTj81g_thumb_19a32.jpg
    tK%uiNltS%KfgX5hsTj81g_thumb_19a32.jpg
    97.1 KB · Views: 132
  • 1Cl0%L5LRxCOr8U8rEtyaQ_thumb_19a34.jpg
    1Cl0%L5LRxCOr8U8rEtyaQ_thumb_19a34.jpg
    58.2 KB · Views: 102
Just a side note, these are cast iron, “made in the USA”, and currently available from MSC, (kinda blew my mind when I found them);

A4994D4C-3F7F-4220-AA45-1AC6096362D5.jpg 2C148911-41A2-4797-9A28-9A584953861E.jpg
 
I think that necklace is really cool!

My wife would probably think I was the wing nut if I gave her one, though.
 








 
Back
Top