Thread: Brass Thumbscrews?

Sorry -been busy elsewhere & missed this thread 'til now.

As has already been said, the best solution is a metal lathe and a knurling tool, preferably with several extra wheels so you can vary the knurl pattern. However, with a small lathe costing north of $1,000, the unit cost of a few dozen thumbscrews would make the USPS prices seem sweet! The good news is that even buying brass stock in the short lengths I do (which doubles the price compared with whole lengths), the cost of the raw material isn't a major concern.

But before I had my lathe I worked out various ways to make reasonable-looking thumbscrews. If you have a wood lathe that can run at slow speed, you can turn brass with hand tools. You need to be a reasonably practised turner to turn metal, and use correctlly-shaped cutters, but it's quite do-able. Taps & button dies in common thread sizes are relatively cheap & handy things to have in any shed.

With some imagination, you can make thumbscrews from basic bits by various "minimalist" methods: Various LC screws.jpg

From L to R: (1) A large T/S made from brass pipe fitting (modification of Derek's methd) & M10 brass bolt.
(2&3) Two made using M8 & M6 SS bolts in bits cut from brass bar stock, chucked in my woodlathe & grooved manually.
(4) A solid brass knob drilled out & tappped for a piece of brass bolt.

The bolts can be either soldered into the heads or fixed with Loctite (easy, quick & holds them adequately).

There are probably several other ways to go about making thumbscrews if you apply a little imagination, and the results don't have to look shabby if you take a bit of care. I've grown tired of diamond knurls anyway, & have been experimenting with alternative patterns, so if anyone else has ideas, I'd be pleased to see them....

Cheers,

Brass Knurled Thumb Nuts

Originally Posted by rob streeper

Brass Knurled Thumb Nuts

Hummm . . . . US$80 to ship one nut to Australia . If you use your own shipping service there is a US$25 "handling fee" - can't see many people from the forum buying from them.

Originally Posted by BobL

Hummm . . . . US$80 to ship one nut to Australia . If you use your own shipping service there is a US$25 "handling fee" - can't see many people from the forum buying from them.

Exactly my original point... Ian and Derek's innovative work-arounds have me enthused - I'll report back to everyone in due course...

Originally Posted by BobL

Hummm . . . . US$80 to ship one nut to Australia . If you use your own shipping service there is a US$25 "handling fee" - can't see many people from the forum buying from them.

Looks like an opportunity.

Originally Posted by BobL

Hummm . . . . US$80 to ship one nut to Australia . If you use your own shipping service there is a US$25 "handling fee" - can't see many people from the forum buying from them.

Not unusual. The US reaction to 9/11 created an extremely cumbersome bureaucracy to stop terrorists buying their equipment from America. Lots of paperwork.

“The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.” (Vladimir Lenin). US will try not to sell anything to terrorists. So US businesses simply added the costs of complying with anti-terrorist legislation to the costs of processing and export order. Its freight plus paperwork.

Cannot have terrorists accessing american brass thumb screws!