Quickie Tire Tumbler

Works well, will be slowed down a little more though. This is cleaning local turquoise. Notice the rolling action, a lot depends on getting the slurry right, and not overloading it.....it will throw some material sticking to the inside of tire, use a drop cloth or board to catch until the load adjusts itself.....b

Latest Beads

The diamond core bits on ebay are real cheap from china and some work well.  I used them to punch these beads out and drilled the holes by eye, some you can tell, some not.  The material is stuff I collected in Hachita.  I then used pins in small pin vises to hold the bead against a vertical 6" diamond flat from Lopackis rotating at about 600 rpm to rough them in and homemade sanding wheels of the flap design to sand down to level where I could finish with diamond powders.  See his bead tutorial at lopacki.com for information on how the bead works.  The bottom pix is before polish at about 200 grit sanding level....b

Making Saw Blade Shaft Adaptors

One thing everyone has had to come to grips with are saw blade adaptors, now that the majority of the diamond tooling we buy is made in China.  There have been problems with consistency and other things, things like arbitrary shaft hole sizes in the same lot, et al.   Sometimes, even most of the time, a Chinese item will work ok, as long as you fix it first.  Remember that natural law, rocky-san.

When you put your new sawblade up to the shaft of your saw, and the hole in the blade is too big for the shaft, you are in need of a shaft adaptor.  There are some commercial adaptors available and if you can find those that work (Good Luck!) stick with them.  Otherwise, fashion your own from thin cut cross sections of pvc pipe, sanded and/or filed and/or cut down; or punched out of leather or plastic with round punches of varying sizes.  That last I have been recently successful with.  Tape your adaptor into the blades hole from one or both sides of the blade.  Lighters can come in handy during these operations as well.

You want the blade to rotate without wobble, so it has to be centered on the shaft pretty closely.  It can be done, perhaps not easily, but correctly.  When doing these make 4-6, use the best one.

Cost Savings

I happened to pick up a catalog from the most well known manufacturer of lapidary equipment here in the states, and it was driven home to me once again the value of this book I sell, and I am glad to do it.  When I first began cutting rocks, it was long before the net, and there were no alternatives to buying the equipment as it was manufactured, usually used, though I have bought a new machine or two in my life, and they were not worth the money.  Some of the old timers built their own machines, and I owned a few of them over time too.  Mostly though, I began experimenting early with my own devices.  It was because of things like I saw in this catalog I picked up:  6" trim saw with arbor $270.00+ (see the photo-plans in this blog where you make one of those for about ten dollars),  10 pound capacity vibrating tumblers start around $500.00, Bench Lathe Electric Arbor Systems $700.00 and up,and even a flat lap near 2 grand!  Some people might think the 50 bux for the plan sets/lesson plans/how-to book is steep, it is not.  It will get you working stone quickly and cheaply, and perhaps even inspire you.  That is the wished for result.

The Ad For My Book On Building Lapidary Equipment

Now with FREE SHIPPING WORLDWIDE !!! 

Save Big Dollars all the way around on this killer resource. $ 49.95 per book.

How To Build Diamond Trim Saws, Large Sized Diamond Drop Saws, Vibrating Tumblers, Giant Rock Saws For Cutting Decorative Tiles and Facings, Great Flat Laps, Bench Grinders, A Portable and Trouble Free water source for all Lapidary Operations, and much more.
This Self Published book is comprised of five plan sets which have consistently sold for 20 dollars each over the last three years or so, plus one plan set usually priced at 10 dollars, PLUS quite a few tricks and tips concerning other bench tools, methodology, and efficiency in the Lapidary Shop which have never been offered before.
These plan sets have been entirely redone with computer drawings and rewrites to the text which incorporate new information from R & D over the last 7 years. The book is over 45 pages of cut-and-dried and easy-to-understand How To Build Better Lapidary Equipment information, which will save the buyer THOUSANDS of dollars in equipment costs. I have many many happy customers who have purchased this information as individual plan sets, and do not even consider the cost of the plans themselves, because of the money they saved. Now, you can possess the entire inventory of plan sets as the book How To Build Better Lapidary Equipment, by Bill Gallagher, for a savings of over half, and with this information you can set up a full service lapidary shop for literally pennies on the dollar. With this information you can go into production, if you desire.
My diamond saw plans are the easiest, safest, and most effective plans for this type of equipment anywhere. The Vibrating Tumbler plans introduce a whole new way of achieving vibratory energy for abrasion, and unlike so many of the manufactured competitions machines, my design lasts and lasts and lasts. AND it is a lot simpler than anything out there. Over 3 years of long-hours and self-financed R & D went into that design, and it is a better way. The Flat Laps and Bench Grinders are two good chapters with three or four different designs for the grinders, some mine, some gotten from seeing old timers machines. The Giant Rock Saw is a machine I had only heard about 15 years ago, but I built one about 4 years ago, and it worx. These plans tell how to make the Giant Rock Saw, as well as my improvements made to the basic idea. The only thing not in the book is a facetor plan set, and that is because you would need a machine shop to build a facetor, whereas all the machines included here can be built from salvaged parts and lumber easily, safely, and with very little hassle, and they WORK well for a LONG time! Here is the Table of Contents:
I. How To Build A 6" 8" or 10" Diamond Saw
II. How To Build A Better Vibrating Tumbler
III. How To Build A Flat Laps for Grinding Sanding Polishing
IV. How To Build Bench Grinders From Old Car Parts
V. How To Build A Giant Rock Saw
VI. Trouble Free and Portable Water Source For ALL Lapidary
VII. Abrasion Theory and Application
VIII. Lapidary Shop Tips, Mounting Motors, Motor Attachments, Stone Holders and Jewelers Vise You Can Make Easily, Obtaining Free Abrasives, MORE.
IX. NEW! Build a nice large sized slabbing diamond blade drop saw. Excellent and easy design. Perfect for many things, including splitting geodes, preforming spheres, slabbing larger sized materials. Save big dollars by building this awesome saw.
X. Bill Gallaghers American Jamb Peg Faceting Configuration.  A better way.
This is a book of plan sets which usually sell for 20.00 each.  Special attention has been paid throughout the book to highlight sourcing of materials by salvage, and modification of the plans to match the particular materials at hand. Building these machines is not hard to do, and do right, for anyone with good mechanical and electrical aptitude. Once you have built a machine you never need worry about breakdown again, because you will know it inside and out, and repair is a breeze. 
Please see my other auctions for more.  Write with questions. FREE SHIPPING WORLDWIDE.