Herbie & Friends The New York City Machine & Prototyping shop!

Milling Aluminum mold & Casting Urethane

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 22:08:41 -0500

Here are two videos which are a complete walk-through of milling a mold out of 6061 aluminum and then using PMC-744 urethane rubber from www.smooth-on.com to cast the parts!

New Mill! Atlas MFC Horizontal Mill

Sat, 6 Feb 2010 23:09:26 -0500

Here it is folks! My new, yet quite old, Atlas MFC Horizontal mill. As I mention in the video below, I’m excited to have the mill for quite a few reasons:
1) Pound for pound, it’s a very rigid mill
2) I’m excited to have a manual mill for both convenience and to become a better machinist
3) The arbor-style cutting will be great for facing stock and for slotting and parting

Enjoy!

As usual, much more to come. I currently have the power feed and backgear removed, so once those are back up and running, I’ll have more footage up.

4” 5C Collet Chuck for my 7x14 Mini-lathe

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 11:56:57 -0500

Here’s a video overview of my Bison 4” 5C Collet Chuck which I use on my 7x14 Mini-lathe. I purchased the chuck from brassandtool.com and the requisite adapter plate from Little Machine Shop Part #1692 (which required the face to be turned down to fit the Bison Chuck).

Big news! Herbie has a big brother!

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 00:12:45 -0500

Big news folks. Herbie has a big brother! Details (and, of course, videos) to come. I’ll keep everyone in suspense for now... but will say that this mill is very old and, compared to herbie, very heavy! Stay tuned!

Tapping Head Demonstration

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:18:00 -0500

Check out the video demonstration of my ‘new’ tapping head!

Pen Plotter! New (well, old...) Roland DXY-1150

Fri, 15 Jan 2010 23:11:23 -0500

Check out the video of my new (well, very old, actually) Roland DXY-1150 Pen Plotter.

I was inspired by the Chiplotle.org library which allows a modern PC/Mac/Linux computer to connect to many of these pen plotters and either control them directly or work with images, vectors, EPS, DXY, etc.
 Aside from being fun and cool, I think this plotter has the potential for many uses:
1) Printing drawings on 11x17” paper (normally not possibly by home PC printers
2) Print directly onto thin sheet metal and aluminum
3) Use for home PCB etching where the plotter will apply the ‘resist’
4) Did I say fun?

Internal Combustion Engine

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:23:42 -0500

This was posted by Terry over on the Tormach Yahoo Group and is a beautiful piece of work. I’ll let him do the talking on the details - http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/tormach1100/message/4392 but there’s a video below showing it in action.

Updated Shop Video!

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:21:16 -0500

Here’s an updated shop video which shows some of my new equipment:
1) A 12-Ton Harbor Freight shop press
2) A Procunier 2E tapping head
3) Heinrich No. 6 8” Bench Punch

Tweaking the 7x14 Mini-lathe

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:19:24 -0500

Here’s a great write-up by a guy who put quite a bit of work into improving his 7x14 mini-lathe. Also just a generally good read re: machining terms and examples.

http://madmodder.net/index.php?topic=627.0

Rapid prototype - Arduino + Servo + LCD...

Sun, 6 Dec 2009 23:55:52 -0500

In this video tutorial, I’m building a rapid prototype project which uses an Arduino, a servo, an optical sensor and a 16x2 LCD screen to track a cumulative count (a count occurs each time the opto is interrupted) and a servo to simulate usage.

Milling AR500

Wed, 2 Dec 2009 20:58:45 -0500

Another testament to the capability of the TAIG mill. I needed to mill out two holes which were originally EDM’d for 0.25” bolts to accommodate 0.375” bolts. Because it was too much hassle to send them out for EDM or waterjet, I decided to try on my TAIG. A quick google research of “mill AR500” resulted in mixed opinions; some people claimed it milled fine with the correct feeds & speeds while others said it was disastrous.

For those of you unfamiliar with AR500, it stands for “abrasion resistant” and 500 is the hardness rating (of which 500 is the top notch). It is most commonly used in military applications (armor, targets, etc) and in construction equipment (e.g. gravel buckets for front-end loaders).

Anyways, I had little-to-no trouble cutting this material on my take. Granted I took small steps; my recipe was 0.01” DOC, small stepover (probably the equivalent of 0.03”), 2,200 RPM and 8 IPM with a 4-flute altrax 1/4” carbide end mill. I don’t know how long my end mill would last if I milled a substantial amount of AR500, but it seemed to hold up fine with these cuts (which took about 30 minutes in total). The finish quality was great. I was using my usual coolant rig.

It’s important to remember with any material, especially “tough to mill” materials to keep the feeds & speeds appropriate and increase/decrease the DOC per your mill rigidity. For AR500 with a carbide cutter, you need to keep the feeds & speeds high relative to the mill’s rigidity, which results in the small DOC and stepover.

Arduino and Physical Computing Tutorials

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 09:58:55 -0500

This is a link to a company which offers some of the best Arduino and physical computing tutorials out there. Want to learn about writing code for Arduino? Want to learn how to implement LEDs, motors, sensors and more? Or even how to use a multimeter or how to solder? Check it all out at http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=tutorials.

They also sell some great Arduino & related equipment. In fact, my first Arduino ever was from their Arduino Starter Pack - http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=17&products_id=68

BobART - Creating Toolpaths from Images

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 09:39:23 -0500

In the video below, I show a few tips and tricks on how to use the BobART software (an optional package within BobCAD/CAM V23) to import a JPG image and then turn it into a millable toolpath. The focus on this video is less about using the automated features within BobART and more about using BobART + manual corrections/tweaks via the drag corner and deform contour tools. This method takes more time, but will result in a much more accurate and professional vectorized image / toolpath.

Tormach Blog!

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:26:29 -0500

I am a big fan of the Tormach PCNC. If you aren’t familiar with it, you should check out their website at www.tormach.com. They make one of the highest quality home CNC mills along with slew of great accessories. In my opinion, it’s a great value (tooled up and with accessories for around $13,000) and they offer very thorough customer service. Another GREAT read is their 13 page “Design Analysis” PDF which describes how they designed their CNC Mill. It’s available at http://www.tormach.com/documents.html.

The other reason I’m posting this today is that I won a recent competition on their new blog - “Milling Around” which can be read at http://www.tormach.com/blog/. The competition was to suggest a topic which you’d like to see them cover. My request was:

As a prospective customer looking to upgrade from a benchtop setup, I would love to see a video of a Tormach making a setup fixture for a 2.5x part and then using the fixture to make the part. Since my current mill is too small to make fixturing practical, this will be one of the biggest ‘upgrades’ for me. Being able to mill a fixture, program the fixture offsets, and the use the TTS is a HUGE step towards efficient and accurate machining.

So I am looking forward to seeing Tormach’s post on my winning suggestion!

BobCAD / CAM V23

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 07:35:34 -0500

I finally upgraded from BobCAD V22 to V23 and am very excited to see how the software performs. I’ve only used it a few hours so far but like what I see re: improvements and stability. Here’s a quick video of some thoughts on the new version; let me know if you have a specific question or request.