Interested in building a fly press

[Zylogue]

Doees anyone have any suggestions on how to make one that may satisfy Civil War era re-enactments?

Thanks

Daniel

[Ed Thomas]

Daniel: I was about to suggest some reading of a previous post, but it looks like it's gone from when the server died. Dang. Several of us posted information on flypress construction.

The upshot of it was that making a flypress is VERY difficult for the average home shop. A fly press is not just an acme threaded rod in a nut inside a 'C' clamp looking thing. It is a fairly radical thread tooth, with several leads... at least three, though new presses are more typically four now. So you have to machine a multi-lead squarish thread, and then make a substantial nut in a fairly massive frame somehow to withstand the pressures generated by the throw of the press.

A simple single-lead acme threaded rod will not work. All you will succeed in doing is making a vertical vise. When the tool bottoms out it will bind, just as a vise is supposed to do because the thread TPI is too high. More specifically, the throw is not radical enough to let the screw rebound at the bottom.

If you can get an aggressive 3 or 4 lead acme rod, and can make the frame, you CAN cast the nut. The nut in mine, for instance, is made of high-strength tin babbitt and has held up quite well from my last rebuild.

Having said all that... I'm still trying to figure out how the flypress is part of civil war reenactments. I wasn't aware they were even used outside of machine shops during that time.

[Chris Pook]

A couple links I found on the nwba website ...no idea how it worked out.

EDIT:

Ok try these and let me know if they work

http://www.blacksmith.org/drupal/fil...ss_Article.pdf

http://www.blacksmith.org/drupal/fil...a_Flypress.pdf

[Ed Thomas]

Chris,

That link isn't any good unless you are a member of NWBA, apparently.

[Chris Pook]

Ok I changed it so it goes right to the pdf...let me know if it works. It works on mine but that might be because I am a member and the cookies must be saved

[RegionalChaos]

It works for me, and I'm not a member.

[Ed Thomas]

Chris: Thanks; that did it.

I would like to hear a follow-up evaluation sometime. My suspicion is that they were able to develop significant pressure, but not real speed and I would be surprised if it didn't bind at the bottom. I've never seen a real single-lead flypress. Screw-press yes; but not 'fly' press.

[irnsrgn]

look closely at the threads on a factory fly squeezer. One turn of the wheel on this is 4 full turns on the pdf one.

[Chris Pook]

Originally Posted by Ed Thomas

Chris: Thanks; that did it.

I would like to hear a follow-up evaluation sometime. My suspicion is that they were able to develop significant pressure, but not real speed and I would be surprised if it didn't bind at the bottom. I've never seen a real single-lead flypress. Screw-press yes; but not 'fly' press.

Thats what I figure too....but like I said above I'm not sure how it worked out.I'll keep an I out for more info.