Who else has had to make a set of these?

[ryand]

Hey all.

Just finished my basic engineering course at Woodbourne.
Ofcourse, this came with:
a filed to size machinists vice
a lathe turned soft face hammer
a folded/welded steel tool box

Wondering who else also has these 3?It seems everywhere I go people ask about the 4 months of filing etc, even my uncle who did his training years ago in Zimbabwe has a near identical vice apparently..
Can upload photos if anyones interested as to how theyve changed (if)

Ryan

[Dave Homewood]

Hi Ryan, congratulations on completing the course mate, I'm really pleased to hear that.

Yes, like many here I too made all three items on my 1989 course. I painted the toolbox gold and added a Kiwis Can Fly sticker at the time, and today it is still with me, acting as container to all my model paints.

My bench vice I gave to my Dad who had many years use out of it as he was a precision engineer. When he died I claimed it back, and it is now used mainly for opening macadamia nuts off Mum's tree. ;D

I have got no idea what happened to the hammer. I don't recall ever finding a use for it. I think I mist have given it to Dad too, and so it may well be still in his workshop.

I am pleased to say after finsshing that course I never had to use a bloody file again in my RNZAF career as far as I recall. I also never did any welding, lathe turning or metal foldng. Basically it was four long miserable months I will never get back, made worse by my Nana dying during it.

[ryand]

Cheers Dave, another 14 months now and ill be back in the work force hopefully..

Awesome you found a use for it..So far the tool box has only come in use to hold the other 2 items.. Although I did smack a bolt on my car with the hammer the other day..the head proceeded to spin off the thread -__-

Im glad you share the same hatred for filing as I seem to now, sadly i used one yesterday though hahaha

[Dave Homewood]

Haha, yes that's right, now I remember, the hammer head did start to unwind when you used it, no wonder I never used it. ;D

I have used files here and there since but never in my RNZAF job. I do still remember the grades of file, Rough, Course, Bastard... hmm what are the other three? Was it Smooth, Dead Smooth and something else? I know the way they told us to remember was a Rough Course Bastard was an Armourer, and the Smooth, Dead Smooth and whatever were the Pilots. True story. Most of the Armourers I knew were nothing of the sort.

[jonesy]

Yeah-had my basic around 20 years ago. There was word at the time that a great deal of newly-finished trainees threw their pieces of work off the ferry into Cook Straight on the way home!
Instead I had the vise electroplated at Woody,and still have the toolbox. The hammer was still in good nick, but the handle rusted and lost a head, so was disposed of.
However tedious and seemingly meaningless the course was it certainly helped me after I left, one of my jobs was selling engineering spares for nearly 15 years so had to know my tools!
As far as hand files go theres a great deal more than that....Flat Bastard, 2nd Cut, Smooth....1/2 round, Round, Square,Warding,Chainsaw,Long angle lathe file, Single cut, Double cut, Millsaw, Dreadnought...and so on!
I still remember the (seemingly) hours spend with a mic and flat file trying to square things up. Most detailed work I've ever done!

Keep these if you can, the vise will get surface corrosion fairly quickly if not treated. If possible disassemble and get the bits plated by the Electroplaters on base. replace the cap screws with stainless ones if you want it to stay nice. I just spraypainted the toolbox inside and out....

[phil]

I too made these on 96/3 BENG course.

I use my vice for model making.

We had our tool boxes Cad plated and the hammer handle nickle plated by the platers in Woody, who were air force back then.

[shorty]

I made those items at Hobsonville in 1967 and still have the tool box and vice. We also did a plumb bob and a dust pan but I no longer have those. The basic course has been of immense use over the years, the welding and lathe skills have been very useful, only draw back was that we didn't do any TIG or MIG welding.
Our main instructor was an ex PBY Flight Engineer.

[paddy]

I did my basic engineering in 74. We made the toolbox and plumb bob (I'd forgotten about the plumb bob) and our filing was a G Clamp.

Long gone though into the mists of time.

[Dave Homewood]

I can certainly see why the Basic Engineering would be useful for the Aircraft Technician trade, and for those who were to be Machinists and Metal Workers, etc. And I did find the theory stuff about tools and metallurgy and all that both interesting and useful. It's just funny how I never used those main practical skills again, as my job was packing parachutes, liferafts, life preservers, etc and fabric work and there was just no call for the heavy metal stuff.

Our course had the disadvantage of going through three course instructors in the four months as they kept getting posted out. I don't understand why they'd post instructors away during a course they were taking. All our instructors were good guys and good teachers, but it was disruptive to the class a bit.

And the fact that my Nana died near the end of the course when everyone was all out filing to get their trade test piece vice finished, I was at her funeral. Then Hamilton was fogged in for two days and I was late getting back, so I missed three full days of finish filing. I had been told by the kinly Warrant Officer at No. 4TTS that I shouldn't worry as they would ensure I got extra time to finish. When I got back there he was on leave and some jumped up junior officer told me I wouild not be allowed any after hours work bench time, and I had to catch up in lunchtimes and Joe times. So here was I left with three days work to catch up and only two days to finish the bloody vice. My course mates were sympathetic but could do nothing to help. In the end I got it all together, the dimensions were almost all spot on and within tolerences in all dimendions, but I ran out of time to do the nice fine filing to make it pretty. I had to either hand it in as is or repeat the four month course. I handed it in, it was marked and it passed. But on that last afternoon all the calsses (there were five or six different classes doing Basic Eng at that same time) came together and Sgt Steve Holtum who was an instructor there but hadn't had anything to do with us, did a very funny presentation of various awards. I was awarded the Golden File Award for the Gashest Presentation. As I moved from the back ofthe crowd up to recieve it from Steve, who had no idea of the circumstances, the tears welled up in my eyes as all the other courses were laughing at me. My course knew the circumstances and my frustration with the 4TTS heirachy at the time. I accepted it graciously, Steve hung it round my neck, and I had to wear it till dismissed later. It still really irks me now as before Nana died I was doing a bloody good job on it. It still worked in the end and the really telling thing was sometime after I'd given it to Dad he said, "You know that bench vice you made? It's a bloody brilliant little tool, I use it all the time now." That is all that matters to me.

Another thing at 4TTS that annoys me is the welding instructor there at the time, who I'm certain was the prototype for Mr Garrison on South Park, mmm ok, continually warned us about lighting the gas right because if we didn't the whole base would go up and the shockwave would be felt in wellington, as the gas lines went past some bath of something explosive in the hangar next door or something. All it did was make me, a first timer at using gas, bloody nervous of the whole affair. I had no confidence in my welding at all and was somewhat terrified that I might be the idiot who blew the base and half of Marlborough up.

I liked the machining phase. I didn't enjoy getting hit in the back of the head by someone's (from memory Reon Snellgrove's) chuck key though. I managed to catch it before the Sgt saw so he didn't have to go for a run that time, but he and several others did. From memory I never had to run round the hangar with the huge chuck key, but I did run once round 1TTS's buildings with a blue bomb, I can't remember why though. Do they still have the big chiuck key and the run of shame for the defaulters Ryan?

[jonesy]

Dec 8, 2011 10:55:24 GMT 12 Dave Homewood said:

I can certainly see why the Basic Engineering would be useful for the Aircraft Technician trade, and for those who were to be Machinists and Metal Workers, etc. And I did find the theory stuff about tools and metallurgy and all that both interesting and useful. It's just funny how I never used those main practical skills again, as my job was packing parachutes, liferafts, life preservers, etc and fabric work and there was just no call for the heavy metal stuff.

The purpose was probably to instill an idea of taking pride in a technical job, regardless of the trade.

[ryand]

Wow a fair few of them out there then eh..
Yup Dave the big pink chuck key is still there, bloody good idea if you ask me

[phil]

Well Dave, it was less about teaching you to file as it was instilling in you attention to detail and the ability to follow instructions to produce work to a required standard.

A bit like making bedpacks on recruit course, can't say I've ever needed that skill either! At least the things we made on BENG are useful many years after we made them.

[nuuumannn]

Ryand, good on you for fininshing the course; I did mine through Air New Zealand in Chch a awhile back now, but essentially the same stuff. We had to make a dolly out of a chunk of steel using prussian blue to make sure it was almost perfectly flat on each face before we could progress onto the next one.

These things reflect the degree of precision in the aircraft engineering industry; when you are working to tolerances of = or - one thou of an inch, you've got to make sure you get it right. The dolly has actually proved its work in skin work I've done, so depending on if you continue in the industry, the things you make could be of use.

Good luck in applying for a job; get yourself an apprenticeship and look at getting your licence as soon as you can; the money's better.

[jonesy]

Dec 8, 2011 18:46:38 GMT 12 nuuumannn said:

. We had to make a dolly out of a chunk of steel using prussian blue to make sure it was almost perfectly flat on each face before we could progress onto the next one.

Prussian blue=marking blue. get em on someone's earmuffs just before they put them on. The result is both hilarious and somewhat long-lasting!

[Dave Homewood]

I am fairly certain that all the RNZAF engineering trainees made the same bench vice in WWII too. I have either read that somewhere or one of the veterans I have interviewed told me.

Phil, yes I agree and was aware of that aspect of it. We made bedpacks at 4TTS and 1TTS for inspections, but that was the last time. When i was at Wigram my entire bedpack was in my closet for the whole time, all made up just in case, whilst my own bedding was on the bed. Everyone else in the barracks did the same thing.

[shorty]

My dad told me that when theywere doing their training at the Rongotai TTS they had to produce a a piece of steel with a triangular hole in it and a piece that would fit into the hole, with no light showing, in 6 different ways.
The test pieces weren't kept and were thrown on the rubbish heap. Trainees who were having difficulty with them had been known to fossick through the heap fo0r rejects that were better than their own efforts.

[nuuumannn]

Dec 8, 2011 19:13:04 GMT 12 jonesy said:

Prussian blue=marking blue. get em on someone's earmuffs just before they put them on. The result is both hilarious and somewhat long-lasting!

[general]

Well done, Ryan!
Good to hear some continuity still exists in the world.
1/85 Basic Eng. @ 4TTS. Still vividly recall the dread of that giant chuck key. And the inevitable "Who's lathe is this? What's this in the chuck?"
Not that fazed about the filing thing although it did take forever to get it to specs. I do recall trying to get the outer corner of the vice end piece down, then checked with the mic on the inside corner.
Bleedin' thing was under! File had been askew.
Still passed, around 80% I think.
Gave the vice to a mate, off another TTS course, for his garage w/shop.
Can't recall what I did with the welded box. That's odd. If habits die hard it probably 'went to a good home', too. The hammer suffered the same fate as the majority.

Still recall the Joe-wagon: pies in small, white paper bags and squares of choc-iced cake. Back when life wasn't hard.

Regards

Ross

[kiwirotorwrench]

Well done on passing Basic Eng. I was 5/78, and we made the vice and the metal toolbox, which my Dad still has. Instead of a hammer we made a Tap (as in Tap and Die) Wrench on the lathe. Still have it in my toolbox and take it out and disassemble it occasionally.

Say Hi to Snay, Louie and Steve Holtum at 4TTS or whatever they call it these days.

Cheers
Coop's