Surface Plate Calibration and Conditioning
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- čas přidán 20. 01. 2016
- In this video we see the process for inspection and reconditioning granite surface plates. The plates are inspected and calibrated with an Autocollimator and a special instrument called a repeat meter sensitive to millionths of an inch. The plates can be resurfaced in the field using diamond charged cast iron laps. For more information or to get your plates calibrated check out the links below.
www.standridgegranite.com/
www.precisiongraniteusa.com/
I like that guy, you can tell he loves his job, which is something I always like in people.
Ya... but I think that guy who empties the port-o-lets likes his job a bit too much for my liking.
What if your job is the guy who injects baby bunny rabbits with poison? Would you like that guy if he whistled through his shift with a smile ? ?
I’m a hitman, I love my job. You love me too?
The dude has skinny arms. The Mexican guy does all the work and the skinny guy takes all the credit.
@@noeraldinkabam would you be willing to take apprentices?
In the mid-60's I was on a Polaris Submarine repair ship and I worked in the Fleet Mechanical Calibration Lab. We had 2 black granite surface plates a 4'X8' and a 2'X4', we calibrated our own using a procedure from Metrology Engineering Center in Pomona, Calif. we measured every inch and plotted it using a Davidson D638 autocollimator and a precision front surface mirror. It would take as about 2 days to shoot the big plate and about a half day to shoot the small plate. Then we would enter all these measurements into a Frieden mechanical calculator and it would set and crank out for about 8hrs to give us our high and low spots as I remember it was a AAA plate but we used it for everything from a bed to ironing our uniforms on. It was mainly used to calibrate all the optical equipment we serviced, when I went back in the Navy in the early 70's nearly all the optical stuff had been replaced by electronic equipment. I really loved working on and calibration optical instruments. Those days are long gone.
Tres Å? Wow. Bueno.
You watch one video on surface plates... and now the algorithm's got you.
still true as of today. done the wormhole i go
Tom, thanks for sharing this with us! The process of flattening granite surface plates isn't seen often by machinists. I saw the tail end of a calibration about 30 years ago but that's all. Funny story - when I first began working in the engineering department where I'm working now (25 years ago) I found under a huge pile of junk, a pink granite surface plate , a monster size 6 foot by 10 foot. After I cleared it off and tried cleaning it, I found globs of hardened epoxy all over it's surface! It turns out that a bunch of students were using it to make composite panels on it! That stone must have cost 10's of thousands of dollars and was used as a table! We have since gotten rid of it and I replaced it with a 4 x 4 foot pink stone that I use to set up fixturing for my new wire EDM.
AAH!!! the money that schools spend is indeed staggering, the mistreatment of what is purchased is even more staggering!!
The kindness of the field techs walking us through the process... thumbs up! Thanks Ox!
I was surprised at the simple equipment too. You can tell those guys have a solid understanding of the concepts, and are not just following steps.
+Bill De La Vega It's actually a very simple thing to do. I mean, people make telescope lenses/mirrors at home with similar (yet applied to the world of glass) methods and devices. I can totally see something like this done by someone with the tools and patience required.
I remember reading about a guy who made a 60 cm mirror and had it checked and he was within PRO levels of accuracy.
But yeah, those two are very adept at what they are doing, also, well oiled teamwork.
+aserta
Yeah, I have also been fascinated by telescope mirror making.
Technically grinding and polishing a telescope mirror looks quite alike and simple. However the accuracy of the parabolic mirror has to be within 1/8 of the wavelength of visible light, about 2,7 millions of an inch.
While polishing looks simple, getting it right is actually hard to do. Even the
experienced amateur mirror makers often have to take several attempts. It is not like dusting the high spots down using a surface grinder. The motion of the lap is the key. The pattern the lap is moved by, whether in strokes, ovals, swirls and with which overlap: all influences how and where material removed.
+Strax Gasser Yeah people hand lap telescope mirrors to within millionths of an inch of parabola.
And thus begins my descent into the youtube black hole of telescope mirror lapping haha
Giuliano's Things
I've been there. It's nice.
Interesting work. It was nice that the guy was into talking about what he was doing and let you video it for us. That story about the lady who only wanted the B certification was hilarious.
+ILGopher yes it was. But you run across those people everywhere in every field.
We once had a customer complain to us that the picture on her new computer looked to good...
+ILGopher Good kid, excellent customer service skills combined with great technical aptitude=fine employee. It was nice to see he is passionate about his job also, which I thought was shown by his comment about being grateful for Tom's interest and participation in the process.
Great video and I hope everyone is doing well, Aloha...Chuck
+ILGopher I understand the desire for B certification. It's like buying a car and worrying about the first scratch. I usually just give the bumper a little ding myself so I stop worrying.
+Knolltop Farms Agreed. His commentary was excellent. It made all the difference in understanding what we were watching.
very cool to see, and yeah that was far less involved than i would imagine.
25+ years in manufacturing and I have never seen this done. Thank you so much for posting this video. It's not at all what I had imagined. Great stuff!!
Wow what a treat! How many of us would ever have seen this on our own. Thanks for sharing Tom!
Great to see folks who are enthusiastic about their work, happy to be filmed, and happy to explain for everyone even though they probably weren't expecting it. It says great things about the company and the professionalism. Big thumbs up to Precision Granite for this (and you of course Tom!)
Man, I've watched this like 3 times over the last few years, and it's still as entertaining as the first time I saw it. You can really tell these guys love what they do. Love how they took time to educate you and us. Thanks again Tom!
"Under promise, over deliver." Really cool video!!
Hey Hugh,
Hard to complain about that right. Thanks for the comment.
Cheers,
Tom
Wish I had 50 millionths of this dude's energy
"your granites are actually improving my laps" OK then let's just do a contra, you don't bill me, I won't bill you. hahaha
Man, I'm a geomatics engineer (formerly know as a survey engineer) and these guys are talking about 1/4 second precision and all that, that's incredible! You've got to have some pretty fancy equipment to reach that precision, I'm gaining some new appreciation for the measurement precision needed in machining.
I'm coming into contact with precision plates for the first time and this is completely blowing my mind! I love how so many precise things come from such a simple tool... a surface!
Yet another job I can add to the list of "careers I had no idea existed".
You can't tell me you've never heard of Rick Sanchez...
@Robert Slackware that's what he was showing with them "charging" the plate with diamond. They put either a very thin coating of wet diamond lapping paste, or dry diamond lapping powder on the roller, and then roll it into the plate. Because the diamond is obviously harder than the cast iron plate, much of it embeds into the cast iron.
Particularly enjoyed this video Tom. These guys obviously know their stuff. It's always good to see professionals doing their thing. Thanks.
It's nice to see such a young guy getting into this kind of old-school technical work. Hopefully they'll be able to keep the skills alive!
I started watching your videos for the machining, but you've made me really love the theory and practice behind inspection and metrology. Thanks Tom!
Tom, you blew my mind with this one. Never have I seen this process, and its amazing how (relatively - given that young guys expertise) simple it was.... I'm still digesting this video. Absolutely useful.... Thanks a million, Daniel.
Absolutely fascinating! I loved every second of that. Listening to that guy talk, you can tell he really loves his job.
Awesome stuff, Tom.
Love this kind of stuff! Machining and metrology go hand in hand. Big respect to all the smart people solving problems in machine shops.
Hi Tom! For me, this qualifies as the top most informative video of the year! My wife and I both found it fascinating. The tech guy was speaking so fast, I had to rewind and listen more closely. Many thanks for sharing this info which I had never seen or read about anywhere else. Daniel
Simply fascinating that you do not see very often. I learned something new today thanks to you, Tom. Much appreciated.
Tom,
Awesome video!
I've always been mystified about how such a precision piece of equipment could be so relatively inexpensive to purchase. Now it all makes sense!
Excellent video Tom! Never seen how this was done and am glad I could see it. The whole process seems so simple but that's what professionals do.....make it look easy.
I used to hear legends about guys like these in my shop days and it's funny to have CZcams now, and see the guys doing it. They weren't even born when I was in high school.
This was super fun to watch. It's always cool to see a professional explain the process too.
Absolutely fascinating and informative video! It addressed little things I've wondered about for years. Thank you, Master Ox!
Gread video, Tom! Thanks for recording and sharing this.
Very cool Tom. Understanding the details really reveals the magic of the simplicity of thinking the methods through. Almost too simple.
Really enjoy this vid Tom. It was a real eye opener for me. This is my second time through seeing it. I met Mike and John at the tour put on by Stan this summer and they were wonderful guys, so generous w their knowledge and their time. Keep up the great vids.
Great video. That's the first time I have seen that done to a surface plate and I really enjoyed the video. Thanks for sharing with us.
Excellent Tom. As said this is something that not a lot of home machinists would ever see. regards from the UK.
Fascinating to watch. Thanks you for uploading this (and the inspection company for letting you film it)
Very cool Tom! I remember seeing the surface plates and inspection tables being calibrated when I worked at Nook Industries.
awesome tom. its just amazing the simplicity of the tools to do that job.
the guy knows his stuff and that is just as awesome!!!
I ran a calibration lab in the UK 🇬🇧. And now 3 of my 4 children work in the same field. It brought back some memories of working on site.
Hello Andy. My name is Len. Been watching your videos for the last few months. Just want to tell you that where you are is beatable. I know because I have been there for both treatments and today have a quality of life second to none. Your will be back in the tractor for planting.
This is why I love this channel... where else are you gonna see something like this? The problem is that now I want my own lapping set up! Very cool stuff.
Great video. I had no idea how they checked or finished a surface plate.
I have read about the process of reconditioning plates but there's nothing like seeing it actually done. Thanks for the video!
wow, that was so much simpler than I thought it would be. Thanks for sharing. I really enjoyed that.
Wow...I did not expect to enjoy that video as much as I did. Thanks for posting it. It was very entertaining. And yes, it was very cool to see them achieve such precision with such simple tools.
Really fascinating stuff. It's wonderful to see real specialist people working like this.
This was a nice video. Great to see a young person who takes such pride in his work. Very knowledgeable technician.
A rock-solid video that did much more than skim the surface of a monumental subject!!
As usual, I watched and learnt.
Wow, I learned so much from watching this! And the tech is so assured- his manner is as precise as his work. Manny didn't say much but I bet he's nearly as well-versed.
Just watched all your lapping vids plus this one... FASCINATING!!! Thank you for capturing this.
Thanks Tom, that was very interesting. Nice to hear the one tool was from the forties and made in England.
Mart.
Just bought a small lathe and came here looking for machine tips and setup etc. Half and hour later and I am absorbed in surface calibration.
Awesome vid! It was great to see someone so passionate about his work. He should really be working for himself. Only a good tradesman invites observation and inspection.
+Micky c Hi Micky,
Thanks for the comment.
Cheers,
Tom
truly amazing to watch thanks tom and the guys who sorted your grant
i recently took an interest in reconditioning and collecting tools. even ones i wont ever actually use. understanding how they work is so fascinating in the respects that the thinking and evolution that have gone into making them tools blows my mind. recently i brought a double sided diamond lap from faithfull tools and when i started using it for sharping wood chisels and plain irons i quickly realized that a flat surface is imperative for a keen edge. ive even used the lap to flatten my polishing stones and used them on the plane irons. so far the shaveings have come off the wood at 3 thou or less. never underestimate the value of a good flat serface.
So the standard of standards all boils down to rubbing two flat surfaces ... awe hell ... as complicated as measuring some machining surfaces can get, in contrast it seems so stone-age simple to get it there. It all goes back to rubbing two rocks together. Thanks for giving us a look at the process!
Technically if you rub two rocks together you'll end up with one convex and the other concave.
Realizing a flat surface from scratch is only as simple as rubbing *three* rocks together.
Jordan Rodrigues Yes three al la Whitworth, if any two will mate all three are flat.
True flatness requires three plates. And they must be rotated both in the horizontal and end over end. Otherwise twist can be introduced.
@@jordanrodrigues1279 hehehehe!
Fascinating! When I first started watching, I said to myself, "There is no way I am watching this all the way through." Now 33+ minutes later, here I am. Oh, yea I had two rewind a few times to catch the good parts. Haha! O.C.D.
ahh that sound of the lapping iron working over the granite is so satisfying...
I'm with you --- I found this fascinating. I have no use for this knowledge but, I love learning so, I watched this from end to end.
Thank you for making this video.
Hi Tom, what a treat, and as my physics teacher said 'Keep it short and simple', nothing works in this world that is not related to physics!!!!
Really enjoy your videos (including the physics stuff) regards. Joe
Thanks for showing us that process Tom, very interesting.
Very impressive craftsmanship. I’ll watch this a few more times.
I keep coming back to this. Foundational for precision and super interesting. Thanks for sharing!
This was so cool to see. Thank you for filming this.
I always look forward to Standridge coming out. I run a flat lapping company and when they are here I get to really geek out about flatness!
Killer stuff, I work for Newport Corp and we deal a lot with high precision flats, always fun to see them calibrated.
Two thumbs up, Tom! That was very fascinating!
Thanks for sharing
Tom, that was a great video. I had the same impression you did before seeing it done in the video. Figured they would work on small areas, measure and repeat until they had it flat, similar to scraping ways. So there's three items for the tool acquisition list.
Fantastic stuff, Tom. Very interesting process and some really good results.
Great video and thanks for sharing and same goes for the crew letting you film/ask questions etc.
I'm pretty sure that there's another video floating around with this guy in it at their shop.It's been a while but I recall him pulling out the old 40's era gear to double check the laser they use.Seems like they've worked a lot together and make a nice crew too.
Very neat video. I love to see people that love doing what they do and are so good at it!
Love to see that Myford behind you . They were made about 4 miles from my home in Nottingham. Long gone now I'm afraid.
Very interesting Video Tom. Its amazing how simple it was to resurface those plates.
Learned something today. Thank You for sharing.
Cheers. PS got one your books about 4 months ago . Great job I have passed it on to a young machinist to read over.
+Fred's Machine Werks Hi Fred,
Thanks for the comment and support!
Cheers,
Tom
Tom, very interesting, thanks for sharing it with us. Craig
This was quite interesting and entertaining, thanks for the upload and also to the nice guys from the company for taking their time, explaining stuff and letting you have a look. This would almost never be possible here in Germany. We might do it as thorough as these guys, but you wouldn't get that nice of a chat out of it as time is precious and the guys have to be hyper-efficient and customer-chat is a "waste of time".
It's funny that he's providing you with a free "upgrade" on the surface quality. This reminds me of Thyssen Krupp steel works, where TK used to make different grades of steel. Automobile industry always did order grade B but they always got grade A, as it was too costly for TK to downgrade their production processes. When the Chinese started to buy almost all of the scrap metal on the planet it became too costly to uphold the grade-A-process for TK an they startet to do grade B for the automobile industry. The industry then complained about the bad quality, but that's what they were paying for in the fist place. They never even realized that initially their orders were much higher steel quality.
So this guy is doing it right: he tells you what you're paying for, but he also tells you what you get, so you can appreciate it. That's were TK got it wrong (Germans are not that good in communication with customers and proper advertising... :) ).
Thanks for your videos and your effort you put in them! Keep it up! Cheers from good ol' Germany
Alex
+0Fidel0 Hi Alex,
Thanks for the interesting story about the riddle of German steel. These guys were very generous with their time and expertise. Hopefully this video will make up for the loss in efficiency. Thanks for the comment.
Cheers,
Tom
I had no idea that it was such a "simple" job.
Thanks for sharing Tom.
Learned something new.
+Jan Visser Hi JAn,
Impressive in its simplicity. Thanks for the comment.
Cheers,
Tom
Good to see the boys out in the field doing their thing.
Stan had a horse that was 18 hands?!!! That's six-feet tall at the shoulder. BIG horse!
Very interesting video, Tom. Re-calibrating a surface plate is a fascinating process. Thanks for sharing!
+Richard Freeze Well Tom now I know you've done the math already. .. 1 hand = 4". It's literally the average width of a human hand, same imperial source as the foot..
+Richard Freeze Actually she was only 17, but still a big un :) Even I had to use a corral gate to get mounted up, and I'm no pipsqueak.
Shadon HKW Just in the past few days I saw a picture of a Percheron that was 19 hands He was a beautiful animal but huge, and that image came to mind when I saw the remark about your horse.
I can easily imagine that you would need a leg up on the gate to get aboard your 17 hands mare. Share some photos of her. We'd love to see her.
That's a bunch of granite that is super smooth and super flat. Amazing to see such unique things.
Wow, I would have thought it would be. "It;s out, we need to take it back to shop for resurfacing"
You did not say how much. I had assumed even a 12x18 plate would take hours so the cost would only be for high-dollar production shops.
Thanks for the great vid. Those guys make it seem so simple. ;)
Cool video Tom, glad you need to get flat so we could see this process in action, quite interesting and the low tech in itself was a surprise.
Blimey!!! We need more of these sanding guys in South Africa. Guy is enthusiatic.
I got an 2x3 plate last summer. At some point, I'll be doing this too.
Thanks for giving us a blow by blow. That was very cool.
Great video! I'm a metrologist for the DOD...good memories of using the auto-collimator /w mirrors to cal rocks. We now use electronic leveling heads...not as glamorous as the optical way. Very, very cool vid. We have that same H/W collimator on the shelf...it's a beaut.
+Michael Dodge Hi Michael,
I am fond of Hilger Watts equipment. I have a level that has a bakelite case lined with leather. Every time I open it up it smells like instruments and precision. Thanks for the comment.
Cheers,
Tom
Extremely cool! Thank you for sharing that! I'm gonna have to get mine looked at!
Hey Tom, I have the same model autocollimator (with the same light mod ha ha), they're not as expensive as you might think, and a bit of shopping around can get one for what I think is a good price. The guy is quite right about the 90 degree eyepiece however; impossible to find!
It was interesting to see them split the plate, as they split the lines in half instead of using a second mirror. The Rahn repeat-o-meters are typically expensive and now you see how they're made, somewhat pointless for many applications. It wouldn't take a rocket scientist to make one up, as he said, they're just a height gauge with an oversized gauge block.
Thanks for sharing that, very cool to see some pros at work, and it sounds as if the price is right up there.
Absolutely fascinating. A recently deceased neighbour was a metrologist before he retired, you should see his kit.
As an ex glazier and amateur optician I love to see this kind of absolute accuracy. I have a couple of Hilger & Watts diffraction gratings and a clinometer, fine tools.
I now know what to look for when mine are reconditioned, good timing and thanks for sharing.
I've seen this done once, a few years back.
I do recall seeing a repeat-o-meter used, but instead of lasers or an autocollimator, they used some other device. I recall it squeaking against the palate. I was too busy working to get what was going on, unfortunately.
Cool process, same realm as hand scrapping. Very neat video!
Great demonstration of the process, thanks for making that video.
that was time well spent, thanks to everyone for this video!
Fascinating episode, Tom. I started out in hobby machining because of my interest in making my own telescopes, and the mirrors had to be ground and figured to within 0.25 of a wavelength of light (~125 nanometers). I built my own Foucault knife edge tester (wikipedia has a good article on them) and used it to test my mirrors. I've always gotten jazzed about super precision stuff!
Thanks for posting this, it was great!
Muito bom, Brasil.
Ancient video but awesome. Having surface plates so accurate gives you the ability to do precision machining that is hard for me to imagine as a hobbyiest
Nice to know how this is done. I too, expected some elaborate process. It's all in the knowing. Thanks for sharing.
I have avoided this video for months thinking , '"how boring". CZcams has been trying for months to get me to watch it as a top level recommendation. Today I ran out of stuff I wanted to watch. So, here I am. Great video Tom, I learned a bunch and no longer intimidated by the prospect of buying a used granite. I would love to know how much three pieces cost to re-certify and/or lap.
Learned a lot on this one. Great point to cover. Thanks Tom!!
i'd love to see your shop tom, I used to work at myfords, noticed the grinder in the background..i have to make do with an old cast iron plate ..interesting to watch the boys that know how thanks
What a cool process to watch. Thanks for making the video.
Great video, I learned something new tonight. Never too old to learn something.
Tom, that was very interesting, thanks for sharing it with us. Craig
really interesting video thanks Tom. I thought it would a lot more high tech to achieve improvements. The two guys were very accommodating and a credit to the company. Very knowledgeable and willing to share that knowledge. Thanks very much.