Scale Nuts and Bolts How to I make ?

http://www.spc.org.uk/gallery/albums/uploads/Workshop/workshop-018.jpg

I'd love to see a 'How To' on making scale nuts and bolts
Basically it's machining round bar in to a Hex shape, but I mean really small ones
The tools I have avaliable are a Clarke Mini Lathe and Mini Milling Machine as shown above.

Any help with photos would be great

Steve, I machine blanks on my lathe first. The blanks are the correct size for the bolt and head. From there I use my pin vice with an indexing "hex" on it. I put the blank in the pin vise, and file on each side of the hex. Lay the file flat on your table and put the bolt head against the file.

It usually takes about 30seconds to do the flats. I will get some pictures of my pinvise that I modified with the "indexing hex" soon.

Nice work space too!

Steve, I machine blanks on my lathe first. The blanks are the correct size for the bolt and head. From there I use my pin vice with an indexing "hex" on it. I put the blank in the pin vise, and file on each side of the hex. Lay the file flat on your table and put the bolt head against the file.

It usually takes about 30seconds to do the flats. I will get some pictures of my pinvise that I modified with the "indexing hex" soon.

Nice work space too!
Thanks Mike: pics will be useful: I tried to do it by turning the blank shape and than putting those in the milling with divisor but w/out a great result and... I admit 5 eurs for 10 skatsu bolts is not much compare.... :p:p but I like to know well ho to.. too :)

Rotary table. Ya gots ta get a rotary table.

http://www.sherline.com/images/3700pic.jpg

There are some other ways to do it, but a rotary table is by far the best. With it, you can easily do stuff like this:

http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/9324/3600418nt.jpg

http://img336.imageshack.us/img336/5633/11515362hp.jpg

http://img336.imageshack.us/img336/932/11515377hg.jpg

http://img350.imageshack.us/img350/1111/11414722tu.jpg

http://img449.imageshack.us/img449/4733/11414561rv.jpg

http://img282.imageshack.us/img282/5271/11414591co.jpg

http://img345.imageshack.us/img345/1323/11515911bw.jpg

With cleverness and patience, there are some other techniques- but nothing that wouldn't be considered a stop-gap measure. For doing scale automotive parts, I'd say a rotary table is almost as necessary as a lathe.

You're really super Andy: looks like a good thing for me we're togheter in the TT: a great chance to improove my basic skills and find out motivations: this disc're amazing and also the other stuff. Well I can't wait guys to see some your fabrication WIP right here.
Also I guess my rotating table is like crap compare your: mine have a chuck in teh center so it's impossible to do some "out of center" radial jobs like in your discs: could be an idea do a tool to mount the 2axis table over the rot.table.

Here's a link to a tutorial I did awhile ago

http://www.automotiveforums.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=476090

I do mine the same way Ken.

K & S have been making brass hex bar for years, lots easier to use K & S for the bolts than making them by hand.

http://www.ksmetals.com/

Go to the SPECIAL SHAPES section and look for hex bar, lots of different sizes available.

couple methods I use:

- I use K&S Metal Hex bars and cut them to appropiate sizes when I need them to be metal.
- If plastic is suficient I use Raboesch hex plastics and cut them to size.
- If I need special size hex heads I use bar stock and convert it to a hex using a dividing head as explained above.
- If I am in a hurry, or I need a special and detailed bolt, and plastic works again, I make a master of the bolt head then make a mold of it out of resin. then I press melted sprue in them. think of it as a poor mans injection machine... (I use this method for Armor and Gundam building)