Press Brake Update

After successfully test assembling one cylinder I could not get the piston into the second.   Looking at the old rings I found one set to be .087" and the other .110" along the dimension in the plane of the ring.   Discovered this by substituting parts between the good and bad.  

The good piston and rings went easily into both cylinder.  

The bad piston would not go into either cylinder. so not the cylinders.

This forced me to measure the rings and I found the difference.  I could have deepened the grooves on the bad piston to accommodate the new rings but I will move ahead and reuse the old rings.  At some point in the future I may choose to deepen the grooves, and hone the cylinders, but not till I get the machine working and determine if I want to keep it.

Why might I not want to keep it?  The machine is on the crude side.  There is no back stop to position the work.  There is no way to limit travel on the top die.  And it only came with the one die set.

Now if I can figure out how to limit travel I could try 3D printed dies.  A backstop should not be all that difficult to add.  But its another project or six.  Time will tell.