Work log - Week 11 - April 6, 2022¶
Wednesday - 4/6¶
Class Links¶
https://blog.rectorsquid.com/linkage-mechanism-designer-and-simulator/
I love this guy’s work. https://fabacademy.org/2022/labs/kitakagaya/students/yusuke-takahashi/
This guy is also doing a digitizer arm! https://fabacademy.org/2022/labs/fct/students/ricardo-marques/projects/FinalProject/Week10/
https://cllom.gitlab.io/mynotes/PID
https://gitlab.fabcloud.org/pub/project/bootcamp-2022
https://www.inmachines.net/products
http://fab.cba.mit.edu/classes/863.17/Architecture/people/djmm/0.html
https://fabacademy.org/2019/labs/irbid/machine.html
Notes¶
Attended class this morning, finished up a few documentation issues.
Immediately started thinking of a project to build for machine building week.
I wanted to originally build a 4th axis attachment for the epilog lasers in the Fablab, but a bit of researching made this feel like it would be difficult to get it to interface with the machine. Because of the nature of the Epilog engravers and their software, I abandoned this idea.
I had a few criteria that I focused on:
- Useful for the lab.
- Teaching or learning tool for students.
- A machine to build with.
I saw the examples that Neil showed, and there were a number that I appreciated. A couple that I thought would be interesting for us were the Hot Wire Foam cutter, and an optical scanner. The hot wire foam cutter however, has limited applications for us (at least at the moment.)
The optical scanner would be cool, but we have a nice one already, and the software side of things scared me off a bit. I’m more hardware/mechanics than I am software/electronics.
I finally struck on making a mill. But I wasn’t sure if I wanted a mini-mill or something like a tabletop CNC router. The router would have been better for the lab, but it also required more material to create.
So I decided it was going to be a mini-mill. I started thinking (never a good thing.)
Thursday - 4/7¶
I came in today and started seriously designing a mini-mill. I started looking through the fablab and machine shop to see what parts we had. I found almost nothing that would pertain to the mini-mill project.
However, I spent the large part of the day designing and re-designing the mill.
I finally stuck upon designing a horizontal mill, because I thought it’d be neat to build. (Yay, “neat factor.”)
Also, I took a lot of inspiration from the PocketNC mini 5 axis mill.
Friday - 4/8¶
Came in today and met with Cori. We worked for a very long time on designing the mini-mill. We also met with Adam Harris and went on a scavenger hunt for parts. It was fun seeing Adam dig through all the detritus of the electronics department, and how much was from former clubs, and even a bunch that was from his own garage.
Unfortunately, we didn’t really find nearly as much as I would have liked.
In a rush, I had to find and order parts that we could receive in a few days.
Saturday 4/9¶
Spent a large part of the day machining key components of the frame. Managed to get them done, but wasn’t exactly the best machining/designing I’ve ever done. Making parts while you’re still designing something, and not having key components that you need, makes for a very inefficient, error prone process. That said, moving forward.
Monday 4/11¶
Worked a bit on piecing the frame together and cleaing up some features
Tuesday 4/12¶
Met with Denny to work on the electronics portion. We’ve got a good game plan for what we’re going to use. A GRBL shield/arduino combination of MKS board, along with our stepper drivers, and optical limit switches. We’ve still got to figure out what to do for a spindle, but we’re making progress in the electronics avenue.
Also met with Denny and Cori. Cori helped fix many of my mistakes.
David distracted us from getting work done.