Eshmiel
Established Member
The brace in the attached pics was found in a junk shop years ago and has been employed to drill holes in work benches and, lately, down the grain of chunks of log to make a starting-hole or three to gouge out in creating shrink pots. It functions as it should apart from having a bodged pin through the rachet part that easily falls out, break/bends, jams or otherwise isn't what it should be. The original pin was missing when I acquired it and I've generally used some form of nail (see that in the pics) as a substitute.
It's about time I did a proper mend - but how and what with? As far as I can determine, no one sells spare pin for this specific brace; and I don't know either how to fix them in place so that they don't fall out, to get lost or to just jam the rachet.
Has anyone any advice how to make and fit a pin that'll last? It does need to be made of very hard but resilient metal as a lot of nails or other pieces of this & that I've tried just bend under the operating forces. Some modern rock 'ard nails work, as do some drill bits. The diameter of the hole is 2mm +/- 0.1mm; one side has a recess for a head of some sort to stop a pin just falling through. But how should one fix a pin in place at the tail end? Is there a recommended material for such a pin?
I can shape a nail like that in the pic so it's the right length and the head sits flush in that recess for a pin head at one side of the hole. But how to fix the pin in place at the other end? I'm reluctant to use glue as how to remove the whole thing if the nail snaps, since they have snapped in the past? Solder that could me melted out again? Something else that can be easily removed but is sticky enough not to let go of the pin end, such as some type of Loctite?
Any advice will be gratefully received. If I can get it working well, I'll also give it a refurb, with lots of cleaned and polished wood handle and plenty of good grease in the right spots. Any advice about refurbing such a thing will also be gratefully received.
It's about time I did a proper mend - but how and what with? As far as I can determine, no one sells spare pin for this specific brace; and I don't know either how to fix them in place so that they don't fall out, to get lost or to just jam the rachet.
Has anyone any advice how to make and fit a pin that'll last? It does need to be made of very hard but resilient metal as a lot of nails or other pieces of this & that I've tried just bend under the operating forces. Some modern rock 'ard nails work, as do some drill bits. The diameter of the hole is 2mm +/- 0.1mm; one side has a recess for a head of some sort to stop a pin just falling through. But how should one fix a pin in place at the tail end? Is there a recommended material for such a pin?
I can shape a nail like that in the pic so it's the right length and the head sits flush in that recess for a pin head at one side of the hole. But how to fix the pin in place at the other end? I'm reluctant to use glue as how to remove the whole thing if the nail snaps, since they have snapped in the past? Solder that could me melted out again? Something else that can be easily removed but is sticky enough not to let go of the pin end, such as some type of Loctite?
Any advice will be gratefully received. If I can get it working well, I'll also give it a refurb, with lots of cleaned and polished wood handle and plenty of good grease in the right spots. Any advice about refurbing such a thing will also be gratefully received.
