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"Tips", from my shop work

18K views 24 replies 8 participants last post by  a1Jim 
#1 ·
TIP, using a LiL, Basic electronics to repair power tools

Hi guys,
Basic, electronics is another one of my hobbies for the past 30 some years, that allows me to be able to trouble shoot a lot of my power tools, when they act up.

Here is a quick tip, for those battery tools that won't charge up, first thing that comes to mind is probably a bad battery, or the charger is bad, in my case my B&D battery drill wouldn't charge up, when I went to wrap up the charger cord to take it home with me, from my job, I noticed that the polarity plug that goes into the drill from the charger had a broken wire, so that explains why it wouldn't charge the battery.

So I got it home and stripped the wires at the polarity plug, and temporarily connect jumpers to these wires back to the charger, and plugged the charger in to check for voltage output.
My meters showed no voltage out.

So the next procedure was to check to see if the circuit board is functioning properly, so I had to cut open the case and take out the little diode bridge circuit board, I put my volt meter on the secondary side of the transformer, to check for any AC output voltage, zero output, so I know that I can skip checking for any bad diodes, and go directly to the transformer itself, I put my meter on the secondary windings to check for resistance continuity, it showed continuity, so then I put my meter on the primary windings and there was no continuity, the primary windings has a break in it, so a quick check through my junk box of electronic components, and I found a radio shack 1.2A power xformer, the original B&D charger was using a 250mA. xformer, so my xformer is overly adequate, after replacing the xformer the battery drill charges fast and strong.

So the moral to this blog is, check all the major components when trouble shooting your power tools, because in my case, the wire broken wasn't the only culprit in a bad charger, it was the xformer itself, that made the charger not to work properly.

Had I not known to check further and what to check as well as what to expect in measurements, I would have thought it was a bad battery, but by investigating the whole charger from top to bottom, allowed me to keep the drill and its perfect working battery, without having to buy a new kit, because I really did not want to have to get rid of this drill because of a misinterpretation of a supposedly,bad battery.

An additional, note, it appears that I have upgraded my charger, my drill was totally dead, no power at all, but now within 5 to 10 min. my drill is fully charged, and very very strpong torque to it, like I never had before when it was new, this drill charges fast and strong, this is definately an upgraded charger for this drill.
 
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#2 ·
It sounds like you have a lot of very useful skills Hobby1. I went through a couple battery powered drills before I bought my deWalt with three battery packs. I really love it. It would be hopeless for me to trouble shoot and actually fix anything electrical more complicated the rewiring a plug.
 
#3 ·
Hi, Mike,
I'm glad your having good success with your Dewalt battery drill , after the frustrations of those other drills not working properly.

The Dewalt chargers are probably really good, to charge there batteries to maximum usage.
and 3 batteries, that is very generous of them to put that in there kit.

The only battery drill I got that came with an extra battery, was my metabo powermax drill kit, I like it for drilling pilot holes using finish nails, it came with 2 batteries total.
 
#4 ·
upgraded charger wow,

It looks like these cheap battery drills and batteries, aren't so cheap afterall, they don't hold a charge very long, thats what I used to think, but now I'm thinking its not so much the batteries but the minimal charger capacity they give you in these kits, if I can charge this drill so fast and strong charge, because the xformer, can carry a larger load, then with careful charging time, I can get maximum charging on these cheap battery tools, and get exceptional use out of them, insted of frustrations with there charge performance.

I'm glad I learned this from this broken charger, it opens up a whole new way of getting the maximum usage from cheap battery tools.
 
#9 ·
solving for slat width and length in a diagonal pattern in a frame.

I was given a job to build a frame with diagonal slats spanning the inside,
where the corner of the end slats fitted into the corner of the frame and the slats met equally throughout the frame, at a given angle.
It was easy doing it with three slats for this job, however, I thought there must be some kind of formula, that I could devise to be able to solve for the exact width of the slats, so as to save time and materials cutting and fitting trying t get an even array of angled slats.

So I drew up a scenario of a frame with a given number of slats, and began to geometrically break it down into singular shapes where I could write up equations describing the makeup of the individual pieces, and combining them together,

and I ended up with around six equations that take one step at a time to solve for th final exact width of the slat as well as I threw in a couple equations to solve for the exact length of a slat from short point to long point.

The quality of the video is poor focus at times, but I think there is enough information explained to show how this can be done, so if you have a project involving angular slats inside a frame, and are situated concentric with eachother, maybe this could be of some help.

Here is vedeo of a demonstration how I got these equations.



and
Here are the equations written here to better show the video details

given:

TL= total length of frame
W= total width of frame
(a)= the chosen angle of the slats referenced from vertical (90deg)
N= the number of slats chosen to be in the frame.

solve for:

eq1: EC=(TL / (2 x N))
eq2: O=(Tan(a) x (W / 2)
eq3: L=(EC - O)
eq4: ML=(2 x L)

these last two equations give the final width of the slats and the mitered length short pt. to long pt.
this value would be where to set the table saw fence to:

eq5: AW=(Sin(90 deg. - (a)) x ML)

read as (subtract your chosen angle from 90 deg. than take the Sine of that value, then multiply that new value by ML to aquaire the actual width of the slats.

Then finally and added bonus(haha)
the lenght from short pt. to long pt, of the slats is this

eq6: SL=(W / (cos(a)))

read as the slat length short point to long point is the Width of the frame divided by the Cosine value of yor chosen angle (a).

have fun in the shop…
 
#10 ·
A ,hurry up, quick, fast, router rail jig system



Hi guys, this is a video of a build and use of a shop made router jig rail system, that I needed to make in a hurry to get a part of a job done, my client gave me some 4" thick oak planks, very uneven, and wanted them put together to emulate an old butcher block top, with some heavy plank legs, well I did the best I could to fair them in with my scrub plane, to get straight lines, but I neded a good fastening system, he wanted the bottom to be flat with no showing crossbraces, because there will not be any apron in this build, so I initially tried 1" dowels but becuase I have to use a spade bit, I have no way to make a good dowel jig, for keeping the bit straight, due to the thin shanks with respect to the spade cutter itself.

So I tried free handing it, to no avail, If I was not pressed for time on this job, I could set up a drilling fixture for my drill press, that's what I did a while back with cupped planks, but they were not as wide, and could easily fit in my drill press, these planks are much wider, so I would need to devise something different to use my drill press.

Pocket screws would be the next choice, however screws in an angle are good for initial holding power, but with these heavy thick oak planks, there needs to be some sort of solid wood crossbracing, but because crossbracing exposed is out of the question in this build job, the next best method to use, is the method I show in the video.

This is an old time method, that works perfectly for this application as well, so in this video I show a quick build of a router guide rail system, that can be put together with scrap material quickly so as to get back to the task at hand to get it done and out the door.

Have fun in the shop people.
 
#11 ·
replacing and repositioning the batteries on my drill driver

I like my small drill driver, very convenient to use in tight spots, for fine drill work, however, it came with two nicad battery packs, which being nicad, eventually wear out quickly, so I converted this drill to a corded battery drill, by locating a set of NIMH batteries outside the drill case, and converting the charger cord into a supply cord to run the drill.

here is the video of this conversion.

 
#12 ·
making a wooden battery holder for a battery pack

My B&D drill battery went bye bye, awhile back, and I wasn't going to spend more money on another battery for it, so I waited until some cordless drill batteries would go on sale, then I bought a battery pack and its charger both on sale a couple weeks ago, and proceeded to replace the batteries for my drill with this battery pack, by machining a wooden holder for it.

video is here:


Have fun in the shop.
 
#13 ·
A knockdown, Portable Table Saw, for easy wall storage.

I do a lot of jobs that require, using old reclaimed lumber, and I really don't like using my good table saw to cut up junk wood.

So it was time to build a portable knockdown table saw, that can be assembled using only four clamps, and disassembled and put away for storage, and not use up a lot of wall space during storage.

This video is a demo, of it being assembled with 4 clamps. and cutting a test piece and it's portability it offers in storage.



Have fun in the shop…
 
#14 ·
installing deer antlers for drawer pulls

The client supplied deer antlers to use for his drawer pulls, this is video documenting a technique of making a template board for alignment and drilling perpendicular to the antler, as well as using it to mark out hole locations on the drawer front, and finally installing an antler, than while the antler is fastened to the drawer front, then drill a support standoff hole perpendicular to the antler, for extra top support in the pull.



...........................................
 
#17 ·
DIY, adding dust collector to tablesaw blade guard.

I do most of the dusty work outside my shop, but there are times, when its raining or too cold to go outside to cut a board, that I would like to have some dust collecting for my table saw. So I made a collector that attaches my shop vacume hose to the top of my saw gaurd, to catch most of the dust that comes out towards me in front of the saw.

Here is a video of the build of this project.



have fun in the shop.
 
#18 ·
kerfing to flatten the cupping of a board, for laminating to another surface

Showing the results of kerfing cupped boards.

I have some cupped flooring boards over 100yrs old, and these boards need to be glued together to make some thick panels, to be laminated to some barn board material, to make a 2" thiock panel to become leg blanks for some benches I'm building.

here is the video explanation.
 
#19 ·
instructional video, making wedge clamp units from scrap wood in the shop

A build video of making wedge clamp units, for woodworking jigs and clamping, these units are made from scrap wood found in the shop. I used 3 pieces of 1/4" luan, any material would work for the application needed.



Have fun in the shop.
 
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