Gearhead88
Super User
A couple of months ago I bought a nice old Van Norman 944 boring bar , complete and in great shape. I'm no stranger to this type of equipment , my reason for purchasing this is , as a career and as a hobby , I rebuild engines , primarily motorcycle engines , I've rebuilt several automotive and a few Diesel engines as well . Rather than outsource cylinder bore work , I've decided to equip my home workshop to do this type of work. In addition to the Boring bar a couple of months ago , in 2020 I bought a used Sunnen Honing machine and have been outfitting it since then to equip it for doing several types of bore sizes , bushings , rod fitting etc.
In the past I've worked at a few shops that do engine machining , re-bores , valve & seat work , crank rebuilding , at those places , I was the guy that did much of that kind of work . I'm semi retired at this point and over time have been equipping my home workshop to expand my capabilities to include precision cylinder boring & honing . When boring motorcycle cylinders , most of those engines have removable cylinders that need to be mounted in a stand or fixture of some kind and a portable boring bar is then used to re-size the bore . Smaller , more compact cylinders can be bored out using a bench mounted boring bar such as a boremaster , I've worked at a couple of shops that have those machines , including the shop where I work now.
I have been trying to find a used boring bar stand for a few months now , knowing that this was not going to be easy to find , my back up plan was to build one , so that is what I am going to do.
I started by finding a slab of steel , 15 1/2" X 15 1/2" X 1 5/16" thick , it was torch cut on two sides but roughed in to the size I wanted as a top for the table.
I used one of the milling machines at work to square up & surface the "chunk"
At this point I could take it home to finish it on my smaller machines , I have a mill / drill and a small knee mill . The mill drill can be run slow enough to bore a hole with a hole saw , don't laugh guys , some of you are not gonna believe this but I used a hole saw to cut two 4 1/4" holes and a 4 1/2" hole in this plate , which is now , after being surfaced on both sides , is 1 1/4" thick . I took my time ( lots of it ! ) and I wasn't cheap with the cutting fluid . The hole saws survived ! and can be used another day.
I moved over to the knee mill for the next bit , which consisted of , drill and thread two holes for the jacking mechanism that will be below the table , drill three holes and thread them , for the hold down / anchor bolts that hold the boring bar to the table , and then drill / counter bore the four corners to attach some legs.
In the past I've worked at a few shops that do engine machining , re-bores , valve & seat work , crank rebuilding , at those places , I was the guy that did much of that kind of work . I'm semi retired at this point and over time have been equipping my home workshop to expand my capabilities to include precision cylinder boring & honing . When boring motorcycle cylinders , most of those engines have removable cylinders that need to be mounted in a stand or fixture of some kind and a portable boring bar is then used to re-size the bore . Smaller , more compact cylinders can be bored out using a bench mounted boring bar such as a boremaster , I've worked at a couple of shops that have those machines , including the shop where I work now.
I have been trying to find a used boring bar stand for a few months now , knowing that this was not going to be easy to find , my back up plan was to build one , so that is what I am going to do.
I started by finding a slab of steel , 15 1/2" X 15 1/2" X 1 5/16" thick , it was torch cut on two sides but roughed in to the size I wanted as a top for the table.
I used one of the milling machines at work to square up & surface the "chunk"
At this point I could take it home to finish it on my smaller machines , I have a mill / drill and a small knee mill . The mill drill can be run slow enough to bore a hole with a hole saw , don't laugh guys , some of you are not gonna believe this but I used a hole saw to cut two 4 1/4" holes and a 4 1/2" hole in this plate , which is now , after being surfaced on both sides , is 1 1/4" thick . I took my time ( lots of it ! ) and I wasn't cheap with the cutting fluid . The hole saws survived ! and can be used another day.
I moved over to the knee mill for the next bit , which consisted of , drill and thread two holes for the jacking mechanism that will be below the table , drill three holes and thread them , for the hold down / anchor bolts that hold the boring bar to the table , and then drill / counter bore the four corners to attach some legs.
Last edited:
