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Machinist Bedside Reader

Jonathans

Aluminum
Joined
Sep 9, 2014
I have been trying to pick up the three books of this set, as they are highly recommended.
If I could get a set then perhaps I won't ask so many noob questions here anymore!
Does anyone know whether they are for sale anymore?
Jonathan
 
I have been trying to pick up the three books of this set, as they are highly recommended.
If I could get a set then perhaps I won't ask so many noob questions here anymore!
Does anyone know whether they are for sale anymore?
Jonathan

Sellers on Amazon have the books, new and used, at some rather extravagant pricing.
 
I checked Guy Lautard's site (he's the author) and apparently these have been out of print since lat 2014. The site suggests he intended to get them back in print in a matter of weeks, but evidently that didn't happen.
 
Insane pricing! $9.95 would be appropriate!
I would let my set go for $200.00:D
 
Enco did have some in stock. I bought the first and second volumes from them and later sold them here because I didn't find them all that useful. I found Tom Lipton's Metalworking: Sink or Swim much more relevant to what I do than the Lautard books.
 
Being directly useful isn't what the Bedside Readers are about. Bedside reader as a term in common use seems very much of a certain era, probably late 1950's to early 1980's, meaning a book containing a pot-porri of, usually chapter length with short interludes, items which a person with some interest in the general field ought to find worth reading a least once. The intent is that the book be read on odd occasions a chapter or so at a time when a few minutes need to be filled. By both inevitablity and author intent any particular reader will find some items ho-hum, some interesting to read once, some must make a note of (or steal) the idea, some must find out more about this and some [insert name] will really like this gotta remember to show him / her next visit. Hopefully nothing that comes over as a waste of eyeball tracking time. I have the Bedside Reader set and all hit every base in some shape or form. Not to mention a few "sounds good but thats not the way to do things" reactions. One thing I have noticed is that my personal reaction to some things, particularily in the ideas worth stealing and re-working department have changed over the years.

Instruction manuals they are not although there is a good deal of helpful information for the non formally trained worker using lighter machinery floating around in there. Many folk will find the task linked or story asides presentation much more accessible than formal textbooks especially as in providing a context which can greatly help grasping an not quite understood idea. Can be a right pain to tease a particular half recalled snippet out tho'.

I'm afraid Tom Lipton simply pushes all my buttons. I bought Metalworking Sink or Swim and Metalworking Doing it Better simultaneously mail order as a package deal having seen good recommendations. Reading Sink or Swim annoyed me as the writing style grated with too many dubious story asides packing out the meat. Didn't help that there was precious little fresh meat in there and that some of what was in there seemed to me bad approaches. As old fart with with something over 200 books in the machining / metalworking section of the library limited fresh meat in any book purchase is a fact of life. I'm happy if I do better than £1 per page fresh coupled with some interesting restatements of things I already "know". Annoyance with Mr Lipton turned into outright fury on finding that the meat in Doing it Better was, I estimated, over 80% recycled from Sink or Swim. As I recall it even some of the asides were repeated. Sorry that much repetition is just not on although some is probably inevitable if the book is to be a stand alone sale.

In this modern era when mail order is about the only way to get books of any substance its incredibly difficult to be sure of finding a book presenting the information you need in a manner you find accessible. Even normally reliable sources can slip up. I got Frank Marlows Machine Shop Essentials from Camden on the basis of a misleading short review in their catalogue suggesting it was a reasonably advanced text rather than close to ab-initio level. Unusual for Camden as, so far as I've been able to check, they rarely get it wrong given the constraints of a short descriptive paragraph. I was however delighted to find the best description I've seen of the angled head method of producing a spherical section on a Bridgeport or similar so at least I got acouple of pages for my money.

In fairness its incredibly hard to write a book for the un-mentored learner. By the time any author knows enough to write it he (or she) has forgotten what it feels like not to know! Frank Marlows question and answer approach is a refreshing change from standard linear textbook presentation or the endless "How to Run a Lathe" clones. Personally I'm ambliviant but as speed, then slow where relevant, reading of scientific reports, research papers and professional level magazines was approaching a daily occurance during my employed life my judgement is skewed.

Clive
 
The story about the apprentice and the old gunsmith was kind of neat, but is a rose-colored-glasses view of the mystique the trade still evoked around 1950 when flat-belt machines were still earning money. It's not inspiring in a present-day context. And a surface guage as a project isn't useful anymore. I'd be surprised if Starrett has sold even one in the last five years. I wouldn't bother. If you enjoy older, well-written books on machining, look online for the Colvin and Stanley series--but be warned, they are legitimate antiques and a copy in good condition will cost as much as a micrometer.
 
Thanks a bunch Oldwrench.

Was just gonna shut down and toddle off to bed (gone 11 pm UK time) but reading your post made me grab Machinist Bedside reader 1 and check. Secret of the Old Master by Lucien Cary is an OK ish story but story it is so some versimilude has to be sacrificed to get enough essential flow and drama for the general audiance reading Saturday Evening Post. An old story at that. Written in 1940 and objectively harking back into the 1930's at least. When could you live on $229 for four or five months? And when was the odd $ difference between $229 and $230 important? Us Brits don't do funny money! So flat belt lathes would indeed have been the thing. Maybe even without proper micrometer dials as an old one man shop craftsman would have been hard pushed to keep up with then modern equipment trends. Even if he so desired. Actually judging by the occasional Heavy 10 for gunsmithing posts around here I get the impression that flat belt drive may still be the thing in some quarters. My Smart & Brown 1024 agrees too.

Whatever the conclusion that the secret of the old master is "to know what nice work is and be willing to take the pains to do it" is pretty much eternally true. It was so for the first prehistoric master flint knapper producing top quality spearheads, is now, and will be so long as men (and women) actually do things. If you don't innately have that willingness you will never be a master.

Again the little scribing block is old, pretty contemporaneous with Colvin & Stanley really in concept and basic execution. Usefulness not to be dismissed if you have a rule holder to go with it and can find a decently deep engraved rule to click the point into. Given the limitations to actual rule graduation dimensions probably as accurate and, with eyeglass, as easy to set as my excellent APE Microbal height gauges. Mybe even better if working to scribed lines as the line is symmetrical so its easier to get the prick punch in just the right place. Not the way I work as I have all the DRO et al refinements. My scribing is pretty much just basic outlines and positions to avoid mis-reading and (old)brain fart errors when going from drawing to DRO. When funds are limited sometimes well executed old tech, perhaps backed up by some good but costly modern tech, is a better way than going all cheap modern tech where made down to a price can have unexpected repercussions. Having things set-out well enough to make an informed choice for your personal situation is more than useful.

Anyway thanks for making me think over something I'd just pretty much accepted.

Nighty night.

Clive
 
...Whatever the conclusion that the secret of the old master is "to know what nice work is and be willing to take the pains to do it" is pretty much eternally true. It was so for the first prehistoric master flint knapper producing top quality spearheads, is now, and will be so long as men (and women) actually do things. If you don't innately have that willingness you will never be a master. Clive

Well put, sir. It has been a long time since I read the story and I didn't mean to imply that the philosophy of mastering the technical skills of the trade is in any way not relevant or out of date, as of course it can never be, by definition. What I see as anachronistic is the representation of machine work as a painstaking activity done by smoldering lamplight, like the stereotype of an artist starving in a garett.

When I started in the trade as a newbie in an aerospace and electronics machine shop circa 1970 and people asked what I did, I'd say "I'm a machinist." Almost invariably the response was, "Oh, I could never do that, I wouldn't have the patience." It did no good to explain that the thrust of the occupation was to devise ever less time-consuming ways to make parts, that "patience" in the way the other person understood it was really not a useful attitude at all, quite the contrary. I suppose the lay person's image of a machinist in 1970 still dated from the time of carbon-steel tools and slow cutting speeds. To me, as a hotshot kid on a Hardinge HLV, it was a mischaracterization and it bothered me. I guess it still must. For example, if I were applying for a job today--and weren't grievously overaged with an orange Mohawk--I wouldn't dare list as a qualification that I could do fast and accurate scribed layout.

Fast and accurate 3D modeling, sure.
 
Oldwrench

Had to grin when reading your comment about scribing as at the time I was waiting for the printer to warm up and spit out a drawing of a one off component (an adapter plate) for which the fastest and most appropriate manufacturing method would have been scribing direct to metal as each measurement was taken from the component to be replaced followed by prick punching and alignment by eye and sticky pin. Which was what I did when making something similar best part of 20 years ago. If I'd been sure this was a certain one and only would have done pretty much same again, albeit only prick punching and sticky pinning one hole to give the DRO a start, but been bitten too often by repeats on "Nah, nobody else will want one of those" jobs that these days I draw everything properly first. CAD is wonderful.

I know exactly where you are coming from and pretty much agree but fact is both the story, and most of the book for that matter, is a period piece so should be read on that basis. That said I wonder if its actually possible to write readable fiction, especially for the general audience, without tampering with technical and specialist stuff so much that folk who know the reality have to restrain themselves from hurling the book out of the window whilst screaming "Its not actually ...(obscenity deleted)... like that!". Several times.

Always felt that technology and equipment wise the intended readership, probably Home Shop Guy and Really Small Shop Guy, will be working in a manner somewhat similar to average toolroom practice 50 years ago and probably doesn't have all the gear yet. Old fashioned, relatively inexpensive to make tooling and working methods needing relatively unsophisticated equipment may well be most appropriate way to get the job done at a suitable cost. Heck I've reached back to pre-war and before when I didn't have the modern gear and up to date kit would have either taken too long to get or cost too much given the limited number of times it would get used. Just don't mention the white elephant cupboard crammed with unused stuff I really thought I'd need! Retired to "old guy round the corner with machines in the shed" status now but for sure there is no way I could ever have paid off on CNC or CMM however great my desire

Clive
 
Just don't mention the white elephant cupboard crammed with unused stuff I really thought I'd need!

Funny you should mention that. I uncovered a brand new set of hex and square 5C collet blocks today. I ordered them about fifteen years ago when I was still mentally in Bridgeport mode. Once you're used to making stuff in a 4th-axis VMC you forget the old ways of doing things...possibly because it involved actual work. That's not to say I scorn the old ways. I still have a set of toolmaker's buttons from when all I had was a lathe with a faceplate. And a set of transfer punches made from HSS drill blanks. And a set of screw-in punches for transferring tapped holes. And a drawer full of spring calipers. Sometimes I feel like Nevil Shute's Trustee from the Toolroom. But like you, if we need to make a repair part I model it. There's always a record and there's no skinned knuckles...
 








 
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