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When people learn that I have a machine shop in my basement, they naturally ask why. I tend to freeze up a bit, then mumble about making tools with tools. The lathe is to make tools for the mill, the mill is to make tools for the 3d printer, the 3d printer is to make tools for the lathe, etc.

I tend to forget the practical things I do.

This morning, my wife brought me the springform pan. Two of the rivets had blown out, so the clasp no longer worked, and it was part of our plans for cooking our thanksgiving meal. "Can you fix this in an hour?" It's not like we could easily buy a new one on thanksgiving morning, and it sucks to throw things away that are otherwise good because something trivial and repairable has broken.

I drilled out the blown-out rivets, confirming that they were aluminum, worked out the sizes with a few test cuts, used the lathe to make some aluminum rivets that were like the rivets it came with, bucked them with my vise while setting the with my prick punch, flattened them down with a few more hammer touches, and we were back in business.

Because we were in a hurry, I didn't crown the rivet heads, so you can tell the difference between the two remaining original rivets and the new ones. If I'd had more time, I could have made them nearly indistinguishable.

#DIY #repair #machining #3DPrinting