Aug 15 2010

Fuel Probes Fiasco

I have been getting more orders for fuel probes almost exclusively through word of mouth.  Today I decided to mass produce a bunch of them to have an inventory of parts.  I have changed my original design somewhat to account for the spacers I am now getting from Princeton Probes.  It is supposed to save me building time.   What a fiasco!

I made about 75 bases which took about 3 hrs.  They looked great but unfortunately the holes ended up being too big even though I had drilled them severely undersized.  Shit….

They are now trash.   I even tried welding the tubes into the bases, but was not happy with the results.  Welding the tubes to the bases is still a possibility, but I can not use the ones I made.

I did end up making about 14 probe bases (4 of which are sold).

Sum total of 8 hrs of work…. two probes completed. 

My next step is to get some very small reamers and try liquid nitrogen to chill the tubes prior to insertion into the hot bases (creates a very tight bond of the two parts).   Might also try threading the tubes.   I hope that I can eventually come up with a better production methodology or I wont be able to make them at an affordable price.  It wont be worth my time….

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