Can I make a lift powder with no ball mill?

[Swede]

I can't help but notice that rod in the bottom left hand corner of your mill. Is this a rod that attaches to a swing for the motor? It's hard to tell if it is connected to the motor platform.

 

Do you mean to the right, Mumbles? The bottom front of the homemade mill in this picture is two pieces of 3/4" stainless threaded rod, nuts, and washers. One main long piece forms a structural support for the mill, and it extends about 3" to the right. A hexagonal coupler section is threaded on that, and another piece of threaded rod added, which acts as a motor platform pivot point. The motor platform uses 4 "Adell" clamps that are slightly larger than the threaded rod so that the motor weight creates belt tension.

 

On the driven shaft, I've left a large extension which can accept additional pulleys, or one of those pulley stacks that have different sizes, like a drill press. There's plenty of slop so that the motor can move a few inches when moving the belt to a different pulley.

 

This is the mill I conceived as a "kit" and was designed to be as simple as possible. The kit concept never went beyond this prototype, which is now my main mill.

 

The hardest part is finding a good, tacky, non-slip surface for the shafts. The stuff in this picture is foam pipe insulation, and that didn't work well. The best I've found so far (thanks to Frank R.) is a section of racing bicycle inner tube, slipped onto the shafts, and held by friction. That works very well, and can be cleaned and made tacky with iso alcohol.

[mike_au]

The bearings can be tricky to find in some places as well as massively overpriced. None of my local hardware stores carry pillowblock bearings. I found some at an industrial transmission place and they quoted me about $20 each. I got a mate to call up and organise them through the company he works for and I got them for $6 each.

 

Have you tried automotive heater hose to cover the rollers? I haven't used anything else so I can't really compare it, but it works for me and it is fairly thick so it shouldn't wear out too quickly (I imagine that would be a problem with the bike tubes). Although I should probably mention that I drive both rollers, so my grip requirements are probably quite a bit less than yours.

[Stockwood]

Yes! Ball mill is cheaper than a divore lawyer! Look for a rubber barrel too, they are much quieter.

Dont panic, I did ask.

If it went Ker-thwapf!, it only cost 50 bucks.

But it wont.

[Swede]

Have you tried automotive heater hose to cover the rollers? I haven't used anything else so I can't really compare it, but it works for me and it is fairly thick so it shouldn't wear out too quickly (I imagine that would be a problem with the bike tubes). Although I should probably mention that I drive both rollers, so my grip requirements are probably quite a bit less than yours.

 

Good idea on the heater hose. My shafts are either 1/2" or 5/8" OD. I don't know if they make heater hose that small, but it's definitely worth a try, as is linking the two shafts so that both are driven.

[lostfido]

Good idea on the heater hose. My shafts are either 1/2" or 5/8" OD. I don't know if they make heater hose that small, but it's definitely worth a try, as is linking the two shafts so that both are driven.

 

 

Swede,

 

The standard automotive heater hose sizes are 1/2, 5/8 and 3/4 inside diameter.

 

Any auto parts store will have these sizes and possibly 1 inch in stock.

[FrankRizzo]

I used the heater hose as a structural support under the layer of inner-tube. I had a problem with using just the heater hose in that the hose was too hard to effectively grip the heavy jar. The drive roller would basically just spin under the loaded jar.

 

I've since rebuilt my mill, and switched to natural rubber garden hose as a covering for my 5/8" rollers.

Edited December 1, 2009 by FrankRizzo

[cds333]

Hey Swede, do you have any pics of your container? Nice mill BTW!

[Swede]

Hey Swede, do you have any pics of your container? Nice mill BTW!

 

Thank you. Do you mean the mill jar? I use the same homemade PVC jars that are commonly seen, and use a rubber cap that is hose-clamped to the neck. Interestingly, the PVC jar components are pretty expensive overall, and a 1 gallon jar ends up costing $20 or $30 for just the raw materials.

 

There are other methods. I like the idea of using a short section of 6" pipe with internal lids. A good winter project would be 2 or 3 jars with a bolt-circle drilled and tapped, plus a lid, again using simple, straight pipe sections. The standard PVC mill jars work OK but there are some serious crevices at both ends that can gather unground material, and on occasion (usually when milling a single chem like perchlorate) thay can cause some grief.

 

 

http://www.5bears.com/firew/tbmblg09.jpg

[alaskablast]

I have not made my mind up yet about which ball mill. So for now, I am doing everyting with a mortar/coffee grinder. I made up a batch of basic black powder (75:15:10). I added 5% dextrin and just enough water from what I have learned. I used my pestle to push it through a $1.97 kitchen drain strainer(which fits perfectly in the upper lip of the plastic tubs from across the wal mat in hardware.) I now have small grains of low grade black powder. The charcoal was airfloat from skylighter and the KNO3 was ground to pass a 100 mesh screen. It burns suprisingly fast and clean. My question is can I use this mix to test some stars? I dont need alot of height, and I am not lifting alot of weight? What if I change my mix ratios? I know not being milled will really hurt the performance, but for what I am wanting to do I am thinking It will work. Maybe I need to use a bit more in my star mine?

 

Thanks, Robert

 

it will take a lot more than if it was good quality but will work ok. i made a bunch of shells that way when i started out and it took about 2-3x more.

akblast