August 24, 2003

The sheave blanks. Made almost twice as many as the rig plans called for. Spares in case of failure will be nice.

Sheave blank mounted on a mandrel made from a bolt with the head cut off and a couple of nuts and washers.

The mandrel mounted in a drill press running at slow speed.

Of the tools I had, this one, which resembles a rounded cold chisel and is, I'm told, a "die sinkers chisel" worked best for cutting the rope groove in the sheave. The action is more scraping than cutting. Sanding is pointless, and files clog up very fast.

Spent a few hours fabricating pulley sheaves for the running rigging. Holding off on the next big materials purchase until after the first of the month. The household budget will only allow a certain rate of spending, and I'm quite capable of doing that in one trip-which seems to be the pattern. Buy a big pile of stuff, work it all down in the first week or two, twiddle thumbs and do small tasks until next month. So, today is a small task day.

Fabricating Sheaves

The sintered-bronze bearings I had were 3/8" outside diameter. I drilled 3/8" holes down the centerline of each strip of 1/2" HDPE, and squeezed the bearings into place. The hole saw was modified by replacing the 1/4" drill in its center with a short section of 1/4" rod, so as not to chew up the inside of the bearings.