Thread: 1" button dies going to metric sizes?

I would say it's the new metric thing. Won't make any difference on using it, but it will be a tad easier to get out of the holder
Kryn

Won't make any difference on using it, but it will be a tad easier to get out of the holder

I am not so sure about that. I would think it would also be harder to keep them in the holder and square. A reduction of half a mm in diameter means less contact with the holder surface. My 1 inch holder is homemade and clamps the dies as well as having a grub screw for the dimple so it would work fine but with the type that just have the screw who knows. Maybe Bob can tell us how it works. I am used to using 2 inch dies myself.

Dean

When a manufacturer does something like that ,you automatically ask yourself why.

Its a not a minor thing to change a standard size and it says to me that the dies are no longer made here in Australia.

Why do I think that. Well, I measured my cheapy ( made in China ) Machinery House tap and die set and lo and behold, the diameter of the button dies were 24.9.

I suspect Sutton were forced by the Chinese to accept a new (to Australians ) manufacturing standard.

Its not good news for me with a heap of 25.4mm (1") die wrenches. Looks like that in the future, I'll buy off someone who sells inch standard dies.


Remember Suttons input on the buy Australia campaign." Buy Australian made" or cut me out of a job.

Buy Frost drills - a Sutton bottom end brand - and do exactly that, they are made in China. I purchased them thinking the drills were an Oz made product.

Now I suspect the same is happening to the button die manufacture. Please tell me it is not so.

I am not a cheap rrs, I don't mind paying for good quality.

Rant over

Grahame

My good Dormer dies are all either 13/16" or 1". The cheap ones i have from CTC (M3 and M4 i think) are 20mm dia......

The Dormers cut steel like it is made of butter. The CTC's cut steel like it is made of....steel.

Ew

I grew up in Europe. Over there, button dies always had a metric outer diameter (like 16, 20, 25, 30, 38, 45mm etc). Not only for metric dies, but also UNC, UNF, Withworth etc etc. After all, you want to use the same set of wrenches for all dies.

The Brits and the Americans made their dies with imperial outer diameters. As the Brits gradually changed to metric some 30 years ago, they did not want to toss away all their imperial die wrenches. So they kept making dies with imperial outer diameter. However, there comes a point in time where makers in the UK (or Australia) simply loose being competitive in export markets if they do not go the transition to metric the full way. Think about it, why should a customer from continental Europe (or Japan or Russia or almost any other country....) want to buy a British made die with imperial outer diameter, that does not fit into a standard metric die holder? Life is hard enough with all the different thread pitches there are, surely we can in our lifetime at least standardize the outer diameter of all these dies..... Chris

Oldneweng, using a 24.9mm die in a 25.4m holder caused the die to snap at the grub screw. This is an adjustable die and therefore weaker than a non adjustable die. Always wise after the event of course, but the grub screw becomes a pressure point when the die is not a snug fit in its holder. Not that I was working the die hard, it was just doing the finishing on a thread I had already single pointed to 90/95% thread depth.

The good news is that I made a 24.9mm holder and fitted the 2 pieces of die into it. It all fits so snug you can hardly see the break and the die still works like a champ, it will get me through this job anyway.

How very interesting. I always thought button dies were 1", so I just went out and checked mine.
Metric set I bought from one of those travelling tool vans (I was an apprentice at the time) about 1980 are hexagonal.
BSW set I bought from a hardware shop probably well before 1990 are 24.9MM
UNF/UNC (I had a need for one die so I bought a cheap set) from a cheap auto place this year really seem to be 25.0mm

Well, that surprised me a little, but obviously 24.9s have been in Australia in the cheap end of the market for a long time.

I don't ever really use the dies much, just for cleaning up threads and similar.

Regards
SWK

Another idea is that the material that manufacturers use for their die stock maybe 25mm dia nominal so no outside dimensions are machined/ground.
Borriss