CAD/CAM/CNC
Chips
The metal machining area and tools of my workshop have seen some action today. The Taig CNC mill has been busy cutting the 6061-T6 aluminum making 1 inch wrenches I designed for the Taig ER16 spindle and collet nut. I have been selling them under the KautzCraft brand in my store. It seems appropriate that the machine the wrenches are designed to fit are also making the wrenches.
The aluminum was purchased from Online Metals. They have a distributor in Grand Prairie, TX which is southwest of Dallas. Round trip from my studio was exactly one hour 30 minutes. Tolls and gas were probably almost as much as shipping would have been. I had the time and I wanted to see the supplier. I didn’t get past the will-call, but it is a large impressive warehouse and cut to order shop. It’s actual business name here is ThyssenKrupp. I don’t know anything beyond that.
Win 10 was giving me a bit of a struggle running CNC as I forgot to disconnect the LAN connection and WIN 10 decided it needed to do an update in the middle of my wrench making. No choice. It just corrupted MACH3 and locked it up, luckily just after I finished a part. Only choice offered was load update and quit or load update and reboot. No wait until later.
I had to find something else to do for about an hour as Microsoft did its thing. I won’t forget to pull the LAN connection next time. I did just that when I resumed work. Next upgrade will be on MY terms. Grrr… I think there is a way to block internet connection while letting the computer access and share files on the LAN. That’s all I need it to do.
The wrench… Continue reading
Adding and Subtracting
Taig CNC Mill with 3D Parts.
I purchased a new 3D printer I have been using intensively for a few weeks. It is a low end hobbyist machine of what is called a RepRap design. You can read much more about it in Ramblin’ Dan’s Workshop. Here is a link to the section on 3D Printing.
What’s so cool is that now I am capable of both additive and subtractive creating. I have put the two together in an article, Taig Mill Swarf Blower, in the THMS main web site. The resulting combination is shown in the picture on the right.
I have a little struggle with where I should publish my efforts with the 3D printer. Does it really belong in with the regular “old school” machine shop? It’s certainly not old school but I think it would fit in well here. I have chosen to publish what I do with 3D printing over in Ramblin’ Dan’s Workshop as I include all my nonspecific to machining activities there.
The 3D printer I own and wish to afford cannot compete with the precision I can obtain with conventional machining. It’s the second reason I don’t publish it here. My output surface quality with the printer is a little bit in conflict with the “perfect” in my slogan, “One Perfect Part at a Time.” But that doesn’t make it a bad tool.
3D printing, as I can produce it with my machine, will have a lot of application in the machine shop. The first practical application I developed is linked in the second paragraph above. I can make plastic parts I would not try to do otherwise. The entire process is based on slicing a 3D object into 0.1 mm, 0.2 mm, or 0.3 mm layers. Then building… Continue reading
Killer Heat
I operate three PC type computers in my workshop and each controls a separate CNC machine. I have two Taig CNC mills and a home brew (HB2) CNC gantry router. Two of the computers are refurbished., small form factor size. I paid no more than $100 for each of them. One is an HP Compaq and the other is labeled a Compaq. Their styles are different. The third is very similar but larger bare bones built up. Probably $250 invested in it.
None of them have great internal cooling as they were designed to operate in conditioned spaces. My shop operates at outdoor temperature. It’s been running 95 degrees in there for the last two weeks. Outside it has been very near 100.
The larger case unit running the HB2 has stopped suddenly twice in the middle of a long run. It ruined one piece and almost ruined the re-run second. It is not going to be put back into service again in this hot weather.
The HP-Compaq computer is a sweet little machine, or at least it was. I just let it upgrade from Windows 7 pro to Windows 10. I use it with a smooth stepper so I don’t have to be concerned about pulse timing. The upgrade took many hours of loading and saving files. It converted just fine and MACH3 and the Smooth Stepper were performing well with Win10.
HP-Compaq
I left it on for a day with it doing nothing but staying on the network. I wanted to see if WIN 10 was going to do any self-updating since the install. When I came back to it the computer was dead. There is a single blinking LED on the motherboard constantly flashing at about 1 Hz with a slight audible click.
I did a lot… Continue reading
Micro Machining
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- 10 degree 0.005 ball end mill (and #2 pencil)
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- Ball End
I am using my Taig CNC micro mill making 3D carvings in wax for my jewelry work. The very sharp pointy thing is my go-to end mill bit for doing the fine and highly detailed work. The squares are 5 x5 MM. It is a TEB10-005 Tapered Ball End Mill 1/8 x 1-1/2 10° .005. Not cheap at $37.00 each. It does excellent carving with the Taig and the results show the Taig is up for running bits this small. There is actually a ball on the end.Follow the link to BitsBits.com where I get these tiny mill bits.
The other item is of course a common #2 pencil point just for comparison. I have a digital microscope I operate on my Linux box and it is great for inspecting the ends of these tools and taking pictures. I also find the scope useful for examining SMT components on today’s very small circuit boards.
Machine tools this small are rather fragile but wax is a wonderful medium for machining. Bits & Bits has a huge selection of these micro mill buts if you are in need of doing very tiny and precise milling.
MACH4 Thoughts
I am interested in giving the new MACH4 a spin. (Pun intended.) Not that I am so excited about plunking down $200 for a single computer license. The days of the MACH3 single license but multiple copies for a single hobby user are still here but it doesn’t work that way for MACH4.
I currently have three CNC machines in my single shop and a computer for each of them. It’s perfectly “legal” for me to load MACH3 on each computer under one MACH3 license.
I have purchased three very nice refurbished PCs from Newegg for $80.00 (yes eighty) each and dedicated each to their own CNC controller.
The same setup with MACH4 would cost me $600.00 just for the licenses. As I have told my friend José, “No way!”
MACH3 has been ripped-off so many times, I completely understand the reasons. Also most hobbyist don’t have three PC’s and three controllers in their shop. One solution could be to put the MACH4 computer on a cart and just wheel it to each controller. A serious alternative for a hobby user. I only run one machine at a time anyway.
I am willing to pick one machine and controller to be a test system with MACH4. In reality I don’t believe I will see any real earth shattering improvement in my CNC operations. However, there is a very good chance that MACH3 may go into a totally unavailable and unsupported hibernation. Probably never to awake again. I think it has already entered into the sleeping den.
MACH3 retirement is a matter of economics and competition to MACH4 growth.
MACH4
MACH4 will really need to interface to an external pulse generator for best performance. There is a parallel port plug in (+$25.00) but MACH4 will then perform no better than MACH3.
One… Continue reading