Shelf pin drilling jig

[morry]

Here is a pic of a shelf pin drilling jig I whipped up on the lathe this week. The guide bush is out of 3/4 Steel with a stepped down section at 5/8. The guide strip is 16mm ply about 3 feet long with 5/8 holes bored every 32mm. The drill bit is 5mm dia for shop bought pins.

[rodm]

Great idea Morry. Good to see somebody else with a metalworking lathe on the forum. Have you turned any other items for woodworking?

[hcbph]

If the holes are the right size, you could also use a router with a collar on it to do you holes. Best of both worlds, a multipurpose tool guide.

[Dan]

The guide strip is 16mm ply about 3 feet long with 5/8 holes bored every 32mm. The drill bit is 5mm dia for shop bought pins.
Morry,
Why do you use a mixture of metric and imperial measurements? I'm not having a go at you, just interrested to hear your take on it.

[rhook]

Why do you use a mixture of metric and imperial measurements?

I didn't initially notice he was doing that, since I automatically do it myself! In my case it was because my dad was a chippie from days of yore, and he taught me a lot of what I know (I just wish I'd learnt it as well as he knew it). On the other hand, I also studied physics etc at a tertiary level. So I find that for almost everything bigger than about the size of my thumbnail I wave my hands and talk in imperial measurements, and anything smaller is metric.

Except for cloth, for some reason, which I always measure in metric. Weird, isn't it.

[morry]

Dan
I am about 40 years old and was in year 4 when the metric system came in. By this stage I already had a good grounding in the imperial system from being a human clamp for my dad's handyman projects. I have never really noticed till you pointed it out that I will switch from one to the other without thought. I am into a bit of model engineering as well and all of the drawings that we work with are still imperial based and my old myford lathe has imperial feed screws yet the mill is metric. Bit of a mess Hey??. It seems that Most Australians my age are in the same boat. My wife is about 6 years younger and if I remark that something needs to be moved 1/8 of an inch all i get is a blank look.

[Dan]

I too was a human clamp (and picked up imperial in the process), but I was taught metric from day one at school, so I wonder if we will ever make a complete swap over to metric (seems a long way off yet). :)

[DavidW]

I to was caught up in the change over period. I jump from one to the other without thinking about it. The funny thing is that I am noticing my 7 yo daughter is talking in inches, feet and even miles. She must be driving her teacher nuts :)

[stephenmeddings]

I too grew up in the metric age but helping Dad and my Grandfather, you soon learn imperial stuff. Even now I find it easier to say "its about an inch long" rather than 2.5cm. But on the other hand I say "its a couple of mm" rather than 1/8 inch.

Its funny how the minds works. Is it just me or do others experience the same thing??

[GCP310]

Then take timber sizes, 8x4 [2400x1200] 2x1,etc then theres hardware 5/8-6's the list is endless. it drives me nuts wehn i go to bunnings chasing a few bolts in the zenith range and they are all imperial sizing. Then theres PSI- Kilopascals with the compressor. :rolleyes:

Then theres thes the cm-mm issues. The missus likes to dable in her own projects and has a fine collection of my 'seconds' tools. She uses cm when sewing so she is used to this, i however am used to mm so at times theres a nice discussion on whos right. :p

G

[simon c]

It doesn't help that a lot of metric sizes are really just imperial sizes converted into mm

eg is it really "metric" to buy wood etc that is 13mm or 19mm thick when that is just 1/2in or 3/4in to the nearest mm/ If measurments were truly metric they would come in nice divisible numbers.