Getting Started

Hi!

My name is Mike. I am a helicopter pilot currently, but many years ago I was a machinist/toolmaker. A while back I ran across an ad for Dave Gingery's series of books on building a machine shop from scratch and it sounded like fun so a few years ago I bought the books and I have finally gotten around to getting started. I work away from home and that can make it tough to keep momentum going on projects but as I have finally gotten going on building the furnace I am hopeful that I can keep it going. Living in Montana and with winter approaching I may not be able to get much metal cast for a few more months but there are PLENTY of things I can continue work on through the snowy winter.

In case you don't know about the Gingery Projects, it all starts with building a charcoal powered furnace that can reach temperatures capable of melting scrap aluminum and pot metal (tin) which can then be sand cast to make the parts that can be assembled into various machine tools. The books detail plans to build several bench top machine beginning with a lathe and using that tool to build other tools such as a mill, a shaper etc. all using old methods.

The above trash can will be used to build my furnace. The book calls for using a 5 gallon metal pail. I am using a 10 gallon trash can so that I can get a bit more capacity.

Over the next few days I will cover what I have done so far and then I will try to carry on and keep things updated as I continue my progress!