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Introducing The Straight-Line Engine.

🕑 Added 2021-05-01 16:20:34 +0000 UTC

Comments

PeterT

I wonder what the other patterns are?

Kas Steel

Chris, when are you going to start holding classes?!!!

SA Sampson

Awesome 😎

Logan Newman

I've had to rewatch this several times to try to put the machine together in my head. I find myself zoning out, entranced by the music and visuals.

George Speake

Some things are so beautiful and/or beautifully captured on video, that commentary is unnecessary. Thanks

Spadge Fox

G'day Chris! Absolutely beautiful work as always, and what a great little teaser video for what's to come! Never heard of it before but looked into it now and what a fantastic little piece of technology.

Guy in a Garage

That's awesome Chris! And very expensive swarf ;) How do I find out more about the machine?

Axel

These were used by gunmakers to make patterns on ribs

Kenneth Carlile

oh... wow....

David Paterson

Very nice toy, - tool envy clearly apparent I had taken a bit of a break, trust you are well and raring to go now 'winter' has set in.

Kevin Reardon

Nice toy! I love old machines. They usually were designed by brilliant people.

Duncan Luddite

Sandra spotted your big print of Harrison's H4 on the wall :) Nice bit of inspiration.

Drew Keats

Another fantastic video and what a teaser. Please do a follow-up explaining the setup and control of the straight line engine. It seems much more manual, and potentially error prone, than I was expecting. your content is always so engaging and relaxing. The world needs a heavy dose of de-stressing at the moment. Your channel delivers that in spades. The nightly news should be replaced by any of your videos!

Alex Topfer

wow, that looks time consuming

Rene Schickbauer

Very beautiful machine! That being said, i myself have two left hands (and i'm sort of accident prone when it comes to handling machines), so personally i'd rather teach a computer how to do stuff like this for me.

Tom Wazny

I think you would stagger the pattern after a set number of passes. It's the only way I see

Brandon Macmillan

Beautiful work Chris

Jack Plant

This is going to be the most ridiculously over engineered indicator ever, I love it!

ShamWerks

is this a form of "guilloché" ?

TOM

I know I know, you said "no narration" but what's the point of a clickspring video without your soothing voice? (just kidding)

Jrandom Bob

ISTR the last update was the paper was getting peer reviewed, so presumably that's still ongoing.

Jrandom Bob

That's utterly gorgeous.

Leonard Solomon

That wondrous machine could not have come into better hands than yours. Use it in joy and good health, and thank you for showing it to us.

Russell Reckman

Anyone know the status of Anyikythera?

rolf redford

Amazing! Just wondering if there is anything spoken because seems no captions for now.

Will Josephson

I had no idea such a thing existed. Thank you so much for this. Can you speak a little on here about where you found a machine like this?

Steven Naslund

I wish someone had accurate blueprints or 3D models of these wonderful old machines. The work is beautiful but as a machinist I would be even more intrigued to try to reproduce that machine. Hopefully its design won’t be lost to the ages.

Jeff Jones

Chris, what did/do you think of the machinability of fine silver? My entry into metalworking was through jewelry fabrication, so I've always been curious about applying machining techniques to jewelry work.

Mike Michelizzi

Beautiful work! I still can't work out how the zig-zag tool path ends up creating the basket weave pattern, but I'm sure it'll become apparent eventually.

John S Dilsaver

Excellent!

veritanuda

That was surprisingly pleasant to watch. I mean I conceptually knew how it was done I just never imagined the machine that did it. But of course the principle would be based off a sewing machine why I never considered that I am not sure. Thanks Chris. Really appreciate it mate

veritanuda

Yes it is from England. Harborne Plant. Est 1857 Birmingham England. It is on the plate. All the quality machinery of that era and later had identifying plates on them. We had a compressor from 1962 built like you just never would today and would easily last 100 years or more if looked after properly. It is very true. They don't build them like they used to. *sighs*

Tim bennett

What a wonderful engine! Did you find it in Aus or is it from the UK? I don't imagine there's many around.

Justus Dehegovit

Everyone else: *tries to keep their sanity in the last phase of the pandemic* Chris: "So anyway, I bought this great new toy..."

owl3764

I've no idea what that gizmo is, but glad you have it and know how to use it.

Zachary Faragher

Stunning work as always, machinists have the coolest tools by far.

Bob Vines

Chris, is this fascinating machine a new acquisition or do you have a friend with one? Could you make a video explaining _how_ this machine is constructed and how it works?

Matt Syme

Wow, that is amazing. What a beautiful machine too. Looking forward to seeing more of this.

Benny

Amazing. Where do you find such things? At least now I know why chequer plate is so expensive :-)

Luke Pettit

Another fascinating and beautiful "Thing" thanks Chris. Are you following, fellow banana bender, "Presso" Mark Presling on youtube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYfDX1Gno-PuJ-QWLbH09Sg a collaboration would be interesting ;-D Not that I really expect you to have the time or even interest

Evan Crawford

Such a fascinating machine! Looks too big for the shop though, is that a corner of the living room?

Robert D

Not only that but this one: https://madelathe.com

Martin Anderson

You've probably seen this already, but if not: https://lindowmachineworks.com/lindow-rose-engine-menu/

Thomas Richards

Fascinating machine, never seen one before. Thank you for showing this process

Ludovic MOUROUVIN

A glorious tool isn't it? ;)

Tim Mullen

It's like a vertical shaper with a pattern matching arm. Very cool!

Kerry Benton

Very cool... would love to see some other patterns it can make. I guess it would be fairly easy to make others, if needed. Pretty fascinating.

Plamen Dimchevske

Probably I didn't phrased my initial comment correctly. But, the tool leaves a very slight mark/tack from the bottom to the top of the workpiece, and from left to the right. Let's say that this big metal plate, on which the workpiece is stuck with that "clay" is our zero point. And bottom left is x = 0 and y =0. Now if the tool moves straight up and left, like on a shaper ( or otherwise unrelated to the current position of the workpiece ) , If the tool is set to take a 0.01mm in corner x =0, y=0, but current x=1, y=1 (let's say the workplace is square with length 1), and this corner is 0.1mm towards the base plate (I already used 2, or 3 names for this plate on which the material is sticked to ) that will result of clear mark in one corner, and noting in the opposite corner. Or the entire set up have something that it's not shown in the video, or I don't get. I hope that I managed to explain my confusion with this attempt.

Graeme Brumfitt

That was just Bloody Awesome Chris! Nerve seen one in action before. TFS, GB :)

Robert D

I am jealous of you having a Straight line engine. They really are so incredibly rare these days and such fascinating machines. Part of me wants one along with a nice rose engine and just see how much guilloche engraving I could do....

Andy Weir

There's a clamp on the engine (you see him release it when he finishes the piece). I suspect you first mount the plate with pitch and let it harden. Then you position the block/pitch/workpiece chunk on the machine and use a squaring surface built into the machine or a framing square using the machine's ways as a reference point. Once the block is at the correct angle, you tighten the clamp.

Andy Weir

I don't think the work has to be square to the tool in this case. Because the end-result of the workpiece is a circular plate with a basketweave pattern on it, there's no immediate visual clue to pattern/workpiece alignment. So being off by a fraction of a degree won't matter.

Clickspring

I agree!

Andy Weir

Only Clickspring would put hours (days?) of work into a basket-weave pattern for the face of a micrometer. Honestly, I was surprised he didn't make the whole straight line engine from scratch just for this purpose.

Clickspring

You've got the gig :)

Clickspring

Will do mate :)

Clickspring

Cheers Evan!

Clickspring

Thank you mate :)

Clickspring

Its in great condition, now settled in its new home with me :)

Clickspring

Me either, this next project has had a long lead time!

Clickspring

So pleased to hear that mate :)

Thomas McGinnis

What a great machine! I'm sure alot of effort went into making it look so 'simple'. Anxious to see how much of a 'pain' it was to set-up. Looking forward to the new series!

PJ

That brings a whole new level of cool to incredible old machines and phenomenal machining. @¿@ Must take a bit of talent And patience to get the piece square and flat on the platen. Thanks for the chilled taste Chris, can't wait for more about it. ~PJ

George Speake

50 years ago, while in college, I ran two Heidelberg (Windmill) Platen presses. It was then that I realized I loved watching machines work. Your videos are enchanting, not just for the beauty of your work results, but also for the beauty of your choreographed videography. Thanks and God bless!

d j

How to use a straight-line engine to machine Steampunk silicone wafers for your difference engine.

Noah Orr

Agreed beautiful old machine, thanks for the sneak peek. I'm super hyped for this project and I'm not even sure what it is!

Daniel Bohrer

More like a Squiggly Line Engine in this case I guess 😁 But wow, I've never seen something like this before, this is an amazing machine!

Silver Hand Studios

Guilloché is what the art in general is called (engine turning in English). That particular pattern is a basket weave.

Robert Oswalt

That is a truly fascinating machine. Thanks for sharing it with us Chris.

Paul Grodt

I get that is equivalent to pitch. I dont get how you could use pitch to mount a plate parallel to a working surface...maybe it has tilt calibrations? Hmmm.

Brad Thayer

Pretty sure it’s pitch, often used in engraving as a resilient but firm holder for work.

Matt Waite

Very nice. Looking forward to more 👍 🇬🇧

Hogtown Pens

Wow so basically take a rose engine and flatten it out?!

Nate Sorensen

What is the name of that pattern? Would it be accurate to call it guilloche?

Brad Thayer

What a beautiful old machine, brought to life and used to make wonderful art again. Great seeing you back making new things.

Astro-Basti

Awesome Machine and work :)

Jason Monti

Wow! That's just so fascinating that someone figured out how to make a machine that does that.

Damian Sutter

That's fine, I'll just do my own narration "G'day, Chris here and welcome back to Clickspring..."

Paul Grodt

Beautiful video. I can't wait to learn about the plate mounting process with the red stuff. I can't currently wrap my brain around that. But take your time making a detail vid :)

Plamen Dimchevske

I really do hope you present in the upcoming video, how exactly you square the stock " the process of using it in detail ", because it start to get to me, I can't imagine exactly how a work holding will work and be square to the axes of the travel of the cutting tool. Nonetheless quite enjoyable video, and an excellent teaser for the upcoming project. PS. Sorry if my english is hard to understand, it's not my native

Evan Foster

Wow, what a crazy machine! I had always wondered how patterns like that were made. I'm really excited to learn how to use one. Thanks for sharing this with us. I can't wait to see the project progress!

Ramses Torres

Stunning work, as always.

Silver Hand Studios

Very nice. I have a similar Plant 14" SLE (I also had a 12" but sold it last year). Mine was made a bit later than this one, but the one you're working on has been very well maintained. Is it yours or do you have access to use it? ~Chris