All professional engineers have a little book in which they jot down those notes of fact, figures and formulae which they feel that they are likely to need on future occasions. It is always more convenient to look up one's own records than to wade through a lot of associated, but irrelevant material, especially as this may mean a trip to the reference library. Over a period of years, the contents of such notebooks grow to cover a wealth of vital information, and the time saved can be considerable. During his professional life, Tubal Cain filled three such books and, as a lifelong engineer, he is in a unique position to select (and add to) the material most useful to the amateur engineer. Model Engineer's Handbook comprises a compilation of those tables, facts, procedures and data which the author himself found valuable in his model engineering activities and it provides a real mine of information to which you will return again and again. Not the least of its attributes is the use, where appropriate, of data and calculations in both Imperial and SI units, so that all generations of model engineers can feel at home. In this third edition, all the existing data has been updated or re-arranged for greater clarity and much new matter has been added to provide an even more comprehensive book, indispensable to the expert and beginner alike.

A considerable amount of engineering work takes place on the bench, using hand tools and techniques which are second nature to those who earn their living in an engineering environment; they probably learned at a technical college, as an apprentice, or possibly by the example of older and more experienced workmates. The amateur or hobbyist engineer may not have enjoyed such advantages and, for example, may break a lot of hacksaw blades because he has not been shown how to use the saw or what sort of blades he should be using. This book sets out to cover all the normal bench processes in a simple but informative manner which should help all who have come to enjoy working with metals but whose education did not include a grounding in the basics of engineering benchwork.

The increasing appearance of vertical milling machines in model engineers' and other small workshops has brought the versatility of this type of machine to the notice of a large and growing group of potential users, but until the first edition of this book was published in 1977 there was little available guidance for the average amateur or small user. This third revised edition includes descriptions of many of the very wide range of operations possible with photographed examples, plus information on machines, accessories, cutters, chucks, requirements and methods of work-holding.