Eyeball Engineering

[monkeyracer]

I could scare you with some of my engineering textbooks, lol.

I bet the rotary table doesn't have measurements in radians though, so that is tough to figure out even knowing that it is 2/7 * pi radians.

I haven't tried it, but I heard of some strange thing using a 7:1 (or some multiple of that) gear reduction to turn the table 1/7th of a turn. I may see if I can dig that up.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Along with the degree marks on the table itself, the crank assembly has a vernier scale on it. I'm not sure of the exact terminology, but it goes like this:

The wheel has two sets of marks on it, "hours" representing the 4* of table rotation and "minutes" representing the space in between the hours.

360/7 = 51.42

Spin the table until you get close to 51, then find the hour mark on the wheel that lines it up perfectly.

To find .42 in minutes, multiply 42 x .6 (60 minutes in an hour) and you'll get 25. Move past the hour mark to 25, lock the table down, and you're ready to go.

I wrote all this down on a strip of painters tape and stuck it to the mill table for easy reference. It looked something like this...

0 - 51.42 (25) - 102.84 (50) - 154.26 (15) - 205.68 (41) - 257.1 (6) - 308.52 (31)

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

All done. Didn't like the polished look, so hit them all with a scotchbrite pad. 2.3oz vs the 1.4oz delrin versions. Most of the work was still done on the mill, and I found out my cool little bead groove cutter doesn't at all work on aluminum. I ended up modifying a parting tool and doing most of the work with it.

When can we buy these?

[Duuuuuuuude]

Originally Posted by JatoTheRipper

When can we buy these?

Right now. Gearhead makes some.

Gear Head RC 1.9 Slot Mag V2 Beadlock Wheels (4)

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

Right now. Gearhead makes some.

Gear Head RC 1.9 Slot Mag V2 Beadlock Wheels (4)

Oh I thought you were making your own version of slots!

[Duuuuuuuude]

I only make aluminum wheels for myself.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Decided to take the day and address a couple issues. The first was to clean off my work bench, the second was to rebuild the work light on the mill.

Got about 10 minutes into #1, gave up, and started on #2.

This will be V2.1 of the work light. V1 being the square thing with led's plastered all over it, V2 wasn't documented, but was a much less intrusive piece of white abs with 2 strands of led's inside of it. Worked well, but the led's were starting to die and the light was getting pretty poor.

V2.1 is essentially a cleanup and rebuild. I stripped all of the led's off of it, chucked it up on the lathe to reduce its physical size just a bit more, and went to work prepping the new led's.

I was doing an inspection/repairs on a trade in rv a couple weeks ago, and found some of the interior bulbs had been upgraded with super bright led arrays. Since they were kind of oddball, they got yanked, and I knew exactly what I could use them for.

Das bulb:



Torn apart, ca glued to the newly refreshed light ring, and wired up.



Ambient light:



Work light doin' work:





I still have 3 or 4 bulbs left to play with...I'm pretty sure some will end up being light bars on one or two of my rigs.

[Die-Laughing]

The quality of the parts you're putting out is impressive with the tools that you're using. I read this back to myself a couple times and I just want to be clear that what I said is in fact a compliment.

[Duuuuuuuude]

My wife says something similar about an unrelated activity.



Further delaying the shop cleanup with some brake rotors for my wee Wraith.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Full set done. Sprung for the vented style.

[STANG KILLA SS]

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

My wife says something similar about an unrelated activity.

holy shit that's funny right there

[BigSki]

I've been waiting for someone to make axle shafts with a drive flange and wheel studs. Something like this could be the catalyst that makes it happen.

[CREEPERBOB]

Say Chris, are those bulbs soft white? I saw quite a few different types on fleabay, I'm guessing the nap lite type are less bright than say a tail/stop lite type.
wouldn't want too much glare, though I guess a guy could just use less of them if they were too bright.
a "daylite" spectrum would probally be optimum. I did see some that were like small panels, they would work over my lathe chuck and your contraption is perfect for the mill spindle.
Anyhow, great idea.

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

Decided to take the day and address a couple issues. The first was to clean off my work bench, the second was to rebuild the work light on the mill.

Got about 10 minutes into #1, gave up, and started on #2.

This will be V2.1 of the work light. V1 being the square thing with led's plastered all over it, V2 wasn't documented, but was a much less intrusive piece of white abs with 2 strands of led's inside of it. Worked well, but the led's were starting to die and the light was getting pretty poor.

V2.1 is essentially a cleanup and rebuild. I stripped all of the led's off of it, chucked it up on the lathe to reduce its physical size just a bit more, and went to work prepping the new led's.

I was doing an inspection/repairs on a trade in rv a couple weeks ago, and found some of the interior bulbs had been upgraded with super bright led arrays. Since they were kind of oddball, they got yanked, and I knew exactly what I could use them for.

Das bulb:



Torn apart, ca glued to the newly refreshed light ring, and wired up.



Ambient light:



Work light doin' work:





I still have 3 or 4 bulbs left to play with...I'm pretty sure some will end up being light bars on one or two of my rigs.

[Duuuuuuuude]

I believe they are bright white. There isn't much glare since you aren't able to directly see the leds. But yeah, the ones that weren't meant for tail lights would not be as bright.

The bulbs I got ahold of run about $25 each.

[CREEPERBOB]

Whoa, that's pretty pricey. All the ones I had looked at on fleabay were around 10 for $25.00 shipped. There was quite a selection.

Originally Posted by Duuuuuuuude

I believe they are bright white. There isn't much glare since you aren't able to directly see the leds. But yeah, the ones that weren't meant for tail lights would not be as bright.

The bulbs I got ahold of run about $25 each.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Yeah, not something I would run out and buy myself.

Still, I like them better so far than the cheap led strips you can get from ebay. The light is better, and they don't run as warm. The only thing I need to do to wrap them up is make a clear cover for them. I was drilling some steel this weekend and had a nice long chip work its way up the bit and start whipping around inside the light ring, making the lights flicker and shoot sparks. Mildly entertaining, but not something I want to do very often.

[Crawling Calvin]

If you check Ebay you can find "LED Light strips" for really cheap including waterproof ones. My 3D printer uses some "regular white" ones which are somewhat blue-ish in color but you ca also get warm white which is more of a yellowish incandescent like white. All a personal taste thing really plus the price per spool is pretty fair and they are self-adhesive albeit the adhesive tape isn't the worlds best

Adequate lighting is a must especially when doing manual machining! A shadow can easily hide small stuff

[Duuuuuuuude]

The cheap waterproof led strips are what I was using previously. Tried zenon and soft white. Both worked ok for a while, but after a few months some of the leds started dying, and the silicon covering became stiff and turned a light brown. Can't complain for the price though.

[Duuuuuuuude]

So now I'm raising money for this...

Zenbot 1216 CNC Router

Cutting mostly delrin, with some light aluminum work. I'm thinking it'll seriously open up some more opportunities for me, and probably be faster and cheaper than trying to rebuild/convert my mill to cnc.

Anyone have experience with this particular machine?

[Szczerba]

Nice. I looked hard at the zenbot but was too lazy to learn CAD. There are tons of threads out there on it. Not sure if something better is around or not.