Photography

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Homemade Egg McMuffins

A touch of butter on a properly seasoned cast iron griddle… medium heat… eggs…. firm up… flip over and press down… finish up to perfect doneness.

Served with pan fried bacon and toasted english muffins.

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The dogs chewed my toaster cord in half so until it is repaired, I’ve been toasting on a flat cast iron griddle.  I actually like it a lot better.

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Stain Dipper Machine – Lathe Work

In the Stain Dipper Machine, we have a top pulley which is mounted on a 10mm shaft that is seated in 10x26x8mm bearings.  In the last post on this topic, I showed the pulley holder assembly.  In this post I’ll show the pulley and the final assembly.

Here is the finished pulley, made from a 1″ long by 1.5″ diameter piece of brass.

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Here is the pulley mounted on the top of the machine.  This is a satisfying point in the project because of all the ways this could have been solved, we chose an elegant, smooth, and accurate one.  You can’t buy this specific part anywhere in the world – we designed and made it just for this purpose.

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Here is a picture of tapping the pulley for a M5 set screw.

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This is a picture after the first operation was complete.  Now we need to turn it around in the lathe, recenter it, and finish the other side.

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Here is a picture of the part in the lathe.  Notice the difference in surface finish?  The shiny area is freshly cut.  The dull area was original surface.  The semi-dull area was shiny just an hour before, but oxidization got to it that quickly.

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A view of the spinning 4-jaw chuck and quick change tool post.

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Stain Dipper Slider Guide

In my last post I had an image of one of the guides and the slider in the background.  The slider is an aluminum extrusion and the guide is 0.75″ thick Oil Filled Nylon.  Nylon is resistant to stain and other chemicals we are using as well as having a low friction coefficient.

Here is a close up of the 3D Assembly taken straight from my computer screen.

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Here is a photograph taken with my phone of the actual part that has been machined and installed.  There is something satisfying about designing something and then making it exactly (within tolerance) to the size and shape you wanted.

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Baked Mac ‘n Cheese

So the other day we cooked up a couple of pounds of macaroni, strained it, and added a little bit of butter to keep it from sticking together.  Then into a pot with milk, several bags of shredded cheese, some bbq seasoning, salt, pepper, and a can of cream of celery soup.  Then it got baked for about an hour with cheese and breadcrumbs sprinkled on top.

It was pretty good.  Not bad at all, but not amazing.

Leftovers went in fridge.  A couple of days later, I needed a quick dinner for some of the kids, so I threw some of the leftovers in a well seasoned cast iron skillet and heated it up on high heat until it was nicely sizzled.

Best.Mac.And.Cheese.Ever.Period

In my whole life I never had better mac ‘n cheese.  I’m not sure exactly what made it the best, but here is a picture, and we’re going to have to try this again sometime.

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