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Pulley blocks and Deck Rigging Screw Eyes

Been away on holiday for a few weeks so not been doing much but back at it again - Pulley blocks The mast has a small pulley block on each end of the cross bar, but I wanted to have a go at making them so using some 0.5mm I marked out the profile and then bent the flat pieces into a channel this was followed by drilling an 8BA clearance hole through both sides. Next I machined the centre pulley out of brass with a 2mm rad to suit the rope I will be using; I also did an extra round dummy pulley in steel to use as the template to file the radius on the frame and use as a guide for the width of the block. Using a smooth file I carefully filed the radius on each piece using the dummy pulley as a guide and trimmed the width, this was followed using wet and dry paper to finish. To fasten the blocks to the cross bar they need a screw fastening on the top, this was done by soldering an 8BA nut on the top. Finally the brass pulley wheel was secured in place with an 8BA nut and bolt, with a threaded stud in the top. Deck rigging screw eyes - can be bought, but again, I had to have a go, so first I ground a tool to form the end ball which would also part the piece off after it had been turned and threaded. The bar was turned down to the thread o/d and then using an 8BA die the diameter was threaded. I then used the form tool to produce the ball end, this worked OK but could be improved on as the final turned finish wasn’t as good as I’d hoped for, but I don’t have time to spend on this as I only wanted six eyes so the diameters will be finished with a small file and wet and dry. Turned pieces finished, next I set up a gang of slitting saws to mill the flats, holding each part in a split threaded clamp in the machine vice the flats were milled in parallel. Finally using the same clamp jig the ball was drilled with a 2mm hole again to suit the . There’s some final dressing to do before the parts are clear lacquered.

5 years ago by mturpin013