After six installments of “Making Stuff,” we had a garage full of machine tools and the basic skills to draw and build almost anything we could ever want. And if you know anything about machining, you’ve probably been screaming at every page: “WHAT ABOUT THE TOOLING!? TALK ABOUT THE TOOLING!”
What’s Tooling?
What exactly do we mean when we say “tooling?” It’s a broad term in machining circles that basically means “all the accessories you use to make your parts.”
End mills? Tooling. That vise? Tooling. Parallels? Collet blocks? Rotary table? Tapping head? Right angle attachment? Yes, yes and yes: That’s all considered tooling, and we’ve only scratched the surface with that list.
The common saying is, “You’ll spend far more on tooling than you will on any machine,” and if you buy new that’s absolutely correct. End mills can cost hundreds of dollars apiece, a decent vise is a nearly four-figure purchase, and that’s before you even get to the specialized stuff.
But if you’re already working on cars, none of this will be too surprising. Sure, you can do basic maintenance with that $200 toolkit, but any lifelong mechanic will have a toolbox they’ve invested tens of thousands of dollars into over the years.
Machine tooling works much the same way, with pieces being slowly bought, repurposed or made over time as each project calls for it. This story will cover our tooling journey over the first year or so, and at this point we’ve finally stopped buying stuff every time we turn on a machine. Call this the basics for getting started.
Tooling Shopping Basics
So where do you find all this tooling? If your uniform says “NASA” on it, then you probably buy it all new from trusted sources selling quality brands. A bunch of industrial suppliers specialize in this sort of customer, and McMaster-Carr is our favorite source when we’re feeling bougie.
Take a few steps down from industrial suppliers and you’ll find a plethora of inexpensive imported tooling on sites like Amazon and eBay. Is it any good? Generally, no–the name-brand tooling is usually more durable and more accurate–but we still have a fair bit of stuff we bought new from random imported brands.
In many cases, “not as accurate”…
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