Powerplus or Bust, Eh?

[fciron]

Well, there we go. Live and learn. Thank you.

[Captk]

Sounds right to me. Nearly everything on my Thor is 24tpi, from under 1/4" to over 2" Makes sense that threading on the older engine lathes would be as you say, a big job to change pitch.

[exeric]

Quick change gearboxes on lathes go way back into the 19th century, as does thread rolling. I don't thing that was an issue from a manufacturing point of view, but proprietary spare parts has always been a big money maker for every manufacturer. In manufacturing, the engineers have their world, and the accountants have theirs, and never shall the twain meet.

[fillibuster]

[QUOTE=exeric;146865]Quick change gearboxes on lathes go way back into the 19th century, as does thread rolling. I don't thing that was an issue from a manufacturing point of view, but proprietary spare parts has always been a big money maker for every manufacturer. In manufacturing, the engineers have their world, and the accountants have theirs, and never shall the twain meet.[/QUOTE

"lathes" ..... I like the little South Bend, just like the one I sold to a friend after I got my 14". Made a lot of little things on it, taper shafts even, threading, etc. Brings a smile to see another doing it's thing!

[Robert Luland]

Quick change gearboxes on lathes go way back into the 19th century, as does thread rolling. I don't thing that was an issue from a manufacturing point of view, but proprietary spare parts has always been a big money maker for every manufacturer. In manufacturing, the engineers have their world, and the accountants have theirs, and never shall the twain meet.

Eric, I have factory pictures of those banks of machines and they weren't the deluxe models. They were the cheap end. Labor was cheap. Bob L

[fciron]

I've owned change gear lathes and worked on screw machines. Changing thread gears is a matter of minutes for thread pitch on a lathe and only a minor part of a screw machine set up. I'm more inclined to believe the proprietary parts logic than the time savings.

[Shaky Jake]

Here's a paragraph that I copied from the sae.org website:

"By 1916 the Society of Automobile Engineers membership had grown to 1,800. At the annual meeting that year representatives from the American Society of Aeronautic Engineers, the Society of Tractor Engineers, as well as representatives from the power boating industry made a pitch to SAE for oversight of technical standards in their industries."

When I read that in 1916 people were just then "making a pitch to SAE for oversight of technical standards" it makes me feel like there really wasn't much in the way of bolt standards or standard bolts available at that time. I think that in the early 1900's manufacturers had to develop their own standards, and Indian chose 24 tpi as their thread standard. There weren't any Home Depots, Pep Boys, or Fastenals in 1916. I don't think there were even hardware stores like the one in my home town in the '60s, with bins of bolts in standard sizes. I think if you needed a bolt you had to either get it from the car or motorcycle dealer, or from a Black Smith or Mechanic that could either make one for you or pick one out of coffee cans full of parts that he had collected.

It's fun to think that corporate America is and has always been intent on sticking it to the common man, but in this case I guess I just don't feel like making money off of bolts would have been the main motivation when Indian was deciding what thread pitch to use for their bolts in the early 1900's. Thats mostly just based on my personal vision of what things must have been like at the time.

Either way, I'm enjoying the discussion.

Kevin

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[exeric]

SAE was an organization that agreed on certain standards, but that doesn't mean the industrial world was in a state of chaos. Probably the most advanced technology of the late 19th century was railroad, farm implement, gun making, and ship building. They used a lot of common fasteners that we have today, but out of necessity, they had to invent specialty hardware; just like today's space program. When an engineer chooses a particular size bolt, and thread pitch, it's based strictly on function, and engineers in the 19th century were very smart. 1/4 x 24 is still a standard nominal screw size, as is 1/4 x 32 but they are not a common size you will find at a hardware store. However, back at the turn of the century, hardware stores were quite big, and well stocked and they were the Home Depots of their day. Take a look at a Popular Mechanics magazine from that time period. People were very self-sufficient and made much of what they needed around the house, or farm. I'm always amazed when I look at an old P.M. magazine and see the complex, creative, and well made objects people constructed in their home basements, and shops.

[fciron]

Here is a page from the Todd Donigan Iron Co. 1983 catalog. As you can see, an array of threads are available. 24TPI is well represented, so it may just have been a compromise choice, rather than a proprietary money grab.

Let's not get too sentimental, the pages of Popular Mechanics do not represent the average American, then or now.

[fciron]

Oh, and standardization would have really started in the US a couple of decades earlier, during the Civil War.

[exeric]

[QUOTE=fciron;146891]
Let's not get too sentimental, the pages of Popular Mechanics do not represent the average American, then or now./QUOTE]

Good point and the more I think about it, it's true. However, without the distractions of t.v., vast disposable income, and easy transportation; people read more, played musical instruments, tinkered, and probably drank a hell of a lot more booze.

[T. Cotten]

My opinion Folks,

...for what that's worth,...
Not only did they want to avoid juggling gears, but for 1/4" fasteners, 24tpi is more appropriate than SAE 28tpi for use in an aluminum casting.

....Cotten

[Robert Luland]

Here is a page from the Todd Donigan Iron Co. 1983 catalog. As you can see, an array of threads are available. 24TPI is well represented, so it may just have been a compromise choice, rather than a proprietary money grab.

Let's not get too sentimental, the pages of Popular Mechanics do not represent the average American, then or now.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]14696[/ATTACH]

It wasn't the 24 thread count that was proprietary but that they would deliberately under size things so nobody else's would fit. Now that's proprietary. Bob L

[fciron]

Lots of things here I can agree with. Let's get back to that Power Plus. :-)

(While I was reading up on standards, so as not to make a bigger ass of myself, I learned that BA threads have an inch head, but metric threads. Wild. )

[BoschZEV]

I learned that BA threads have an inch head, but metric threads.

Not to continue off topic, but...

Both the pitch and the heads of BA fasteners are in metric-based geometric series rather than being simply metric. The pitch of each thread in the series is based on 0.9 mm with the actual pitch of a given fastener being 0.9 mm to the power of the BA number (e.g. 3BA is (0.9)^3 = 0.729 mm). Similarly, the distance across the flats of the heads also are in a metric-based geometric series starting with 10.5 mm for a 0BA fastener.

BA fasteners were developed for clocks and watches and adopted by the British for instruments in general. They were used in places on British motorcycles where small fasteners were required. Interestingly, though, the most common instrument where they "should" be used is in speedometers and tachometers, but the Smiths Chronometric units supplied until the early 1960s actually were designed by a French company that Smiths acquired so the fasteners in them are metric. However, these are not the modern ISO metric since prior to the mid-60s the French, Germans, Japanese, etc. each had their own version of metric whose pitch for a given bolt diameter didn't correspond with each other in every case.

But, we digress... Back to this very interesting Powerplus build.