Before I pay a machinist or spend lots of money to order from multiple (many) USA online sites, looking for connectors that go from metric to imperial, here’s my wish list below. The items are for hooking up various ham radio antenna pieces. These are for HF antennas and in particular different telescoping whips for better reception, particularly on 80m.
I have the first item on the list which I picked up at Pacific Fasteners, but they said they carry very few metric parts and most of what they have is male only and using M10 Coarse thread while the gear I am using is M10 Fine thread.
They suggested a machinist in North Van as my best option.
I’ve browsed websites and talked to folks at Home Depot, Home Hardware, Lee Valley, Amazon USA and Canada and nobody has what I am looking for. To whit"
3/8×24 female to 3/8×24 female (got this one already)
3/8×24 male to 3/8×24 male
(all M10’s are fine threaded)
3/8×24 male to M10 female
3/8×24 male to M10 male
3/8×24 female to M10 female
M10 female to M10 female
M10 male to M10 male
M10 female to M10 male
If anyone has any suggestions on where to acquire these parts in the GVRD would love to know. If you can recommend a reliable online store where I can get some or most of these items, that would also be appreciated.
Have you tried MRO Electronics on Boundary? Somebody else pointed me to them for weird connector stuff before. Likely taking pieces in person will get a better result than their website.
Beyond that, if you want to focus on just the fastener side, start looking at more niche/long-running fastener places. I was astounded by the selection available here in Gibsons, at Gibsons Fasteners. I understand that it’s very out of the way for you, but I did see a lot of metric in their back room on a tour.
Punched into AliExpress gets results, and I’ve had such great results on this type of esoteric small technical but not mechanically demanding parts like this. I’d order them all and they’ll likely be with you long before the stated delivery windows. Find a shop with something you need and likely they’ll have lots of the other bits too … their search is truly inscrutable but sometimes works?)
(For context I’ve also decided to cut out the middle-Amazon and shop direct from the source, two years and running of no Amazon at all, but I’m not a better person for it )
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