Step on It...

I'm sitting writing this post having just returned from the workshop. This evening I drilled the three 120 degree spaced bolt holes that enable the motor mount to be fixed to the rotary table. I know what you are thinking...how do you drill three holes on a pitch circle without a rotary table (because your rotary table is in pieces...)? Well, it was a simple matter of removing the threaded portion on the table and using it as a drilling template. The work of a few minutes.

I said yesterday that I was moving away from using welding to join the components. An aluminium TIG weld bead is a broad thing at the best of times, and I feel that it would detract from the look of the part, as well as possibly being overkill.

This is quite a departure for me, since I would normally look to my TIG welder before any other option. I have decided, in this instance, to use two part epoxy. I mixed some up and wet assembled the three parts with it. Here is a photograph of the unit clamped in the milling vice while the epoxy cures:-

I have to admit a certain level of anxiety about this experiment in bonding; will the epoxy have sufficient mechanical strength to do the job? I see you shiver with antici...