The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning

Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.

The New Hotness

  • Ersatz 5.5 mm Nut Driver

    A tiny 1/4 inch hex driver handle appeared from the far reaches of a drawer, sporting a handle better suited for tweaking the 3 mm adjusting nuts on the bottom of the M2’s platform than applying actual torque to real fasteners. Rather than breaking a set of nut drivers, I made a simple brass shim to soak up the difference between the handle’s 6.5 mm ID hex and the 5.5 mm OD of the nuts:

    Hex driver shim - installed
    Hex driver shim – installed

    That’s 15 mil = 0.40 mm shimstock to leave enough clearance for my crude forming technique.

    Which technique consisted of making a “mandrel” by lining up a trio of Nyloc nuts on a screw, snipping off a suitable shimstock rectangle, and squashing it into shape with parallel-jaw pliers:

    Hex driver shim - forming
    Hex driver shim – forming

    As you’d expect, the shimstock hex came out larger & uglier than the mandrel:

    Hex driver shim - formed
    Hex driver shim – formed

    But that doesn’t matter after it’s tucked inside the driver; it works perfectly.

    Took less time to do than to write up …