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Years ago, when my heart ruled my head, I saved this Victorian lathe from the scrap man. It is a unique Hodgson of Cleckheaton, lathes.Co had never heard of it before my example. It is a 6” x 32” over the ways, with gap. Most of the important parts seem Ok, but my lathe knowledge is from school...

I have spent a couple of days restoring this little gadget, which is a hand operated threading machine with vice. It also has provision to fit attachments, an anvil style bick and position where you can bend about 5/16" bar around a two-inch radius. Someone made it some adaptors to take...

This specimen has come up the garden, its currently about 5' tall, nice leaf structure, but no real signs of flowers, probably came from commercial bird seed. It’s a nice-looking plant, but I should i.d. it. Thanks........Gareth.

I am considering getting one of this style of disc/belt sander, for light workshop duties, as I have the potential of some small paying jobs coming up and my palm sander is getting rather elderly. They appear to be a badge engineered product, the one illustrated is a SIP, but the Charnwood...

I found this we gadget in a corner of my shed. Its a German made Tarantella razor blade sharpener! You fix the blade as shown and there should be a stone or abrasive material fixed to the other portion and you spin it like a football rattle giving one assumes a new lease of life to your razor...

I acquired two of these NOS Allen West starters and promptly forgot about them for thirty years. So having rediscovered them in the back of a cupboard, my question is would one of these be suitable to use on the 1/2HP single phase motor on my slowly being rebuilt ML8? Seems a shame to throw...

I don't think I have seen this posted before, if it has been, well never mind.

I tried to get at my hotmail account this morning, only to be confronted with what appeared to be the latest demand by MS to upgrade to their newest all singing and dancing version with lots of advantages for the iphone wot I ain't not got. Trying to by-pass it by just signing in, I had to put...

I have Compton Parkinson 1/3HP motor where the capacitor has clearly failed. I can start the motor turning by hand in either direction, but once it is spinning the speed is a fraction of the expected 1425rpm. Is this a symptom of the same failed capacitor which looks ancient, or is there...

Twenty years ago I acquired this Victorian era lathe, and it has sat in my shed ever since. According to lathes.co its unique, being a Hodgeson of Cleckheaton, although it is very much like a Britannia of the period. It needs some work on the lead screw, the end thread that keeps it in place...

The Victorians knew how to deal with tool thieves!

My wife said she thought she had got a mild electric shock when touching the interior of the dishwasher and the s/s sink simultaneously. So armed with my multimeter and no other skill, I set the dial at 20v and sure enough I got a reading of about 0.3v, very low, but a reading non the less...

I've just been given a 1500 Watt x 4500rpm motor to replace the 3phase motor as fitted to my ML8. As I understand it 1500w equates to 2h.p., so I would assume thats man enough, but what is your thoughts on the rpm please. The motor was salvaged from a damaged Clark tablesaw. Gareth

All this week at regular intervals a Spitfire has flown across the Island, several times a day, occasionally obliging with a few aerobatics. This afternoon on site, I was able to enjoy him doing a loop or two as well as the usual turns and rolls almost directly overhead. Yesterday we had a...

Apparently Mozilla Firefox dumped Google in favour of Yahoo as its search engine in the U.S., as a result, since a recent update of Firefox my Gmail is now all but useless and for awhile the automatic search engine was Yahoo which I found dreadful. I was able to get Google back, by setting my...

I doubt if I have invented it, but I needed a simple way of having a bench planing stop, preferably one I could use in conjunction with my vice. I have got an old Woden screw raise type, but I didn't want all the hassle of letting it in, so I have improvised using an off cut of 50 x 6 f/b (other...

I have a large wooden side gate/door that I would like to fit with a Yale style lock or something similar. I don't want to use a padlock, I'm after something that closes when shut and can be locked, exactly like the action of a Yale, can these be used outdoors in all weathers, or is there...

I am trying to work out why my 1943 Morris Commercial C9 will not show a positive charge, I have tried three voltage regulators. One of the things that I am curios about is why on the diagram does both the D+ and D- on the dynamo show as going to earth, as well as to the Regulator for the D+ The...

I was sorting through some old photos the other day and came across this photograph I took of the last time the planking saw was worked in the Groves & Gutteridge boatyard in East Cowes. Sadly, very soon after this picture was taken I had to cut the machine up, shame! Gareth

I've been cleaning and learning to sharpen my modest collection of rusty saws, largely S&J with a couple of Tyzacks, I'm working up to the Disston, when I discovered an already dismantled and very rusty saw on the top of a cupboard, that hasn't been touched for years. Now that I have cleaned it...