This Mornings Machining Project

So sad!!

 

Wow! those parts are beautiful!!!

 

Your eye for detail is fantastic. Thank you for improving these for those of us who want to keep a stock Jeep
performing factory fresh.

I need to get metal cross shaft for the brake and clutch pedals off and check with you about rebuilding them.


Dave

 

Can you replace the top nut with a knurled knob? That way your knurler is making parts for itself.

 

About 3D printing parts for making casting patterns: I understand the printers can use a water soluble element for the negative parts of a project. Like the air space if you were to print a length of plastic chain. Provides structure during printing. Can you print an entire piece with just that stuff, including a riser, then pour plaster around it? Irrigate out the water soluble pattern to make a mould without bothering with a split line? Like lost wax or foam but using 3D printer material.

 

Yes I could but it would be a little harder to turn under load if you need an adjustment on the fly.

 

There are several guys on a machinist forum who have used printed parts for casting similar to lost wax casting, so yes parts can be made that way. Right now printer filament is available in PLA, TPU (flexible), Nylon, glass filled Nylon, ABS, the water soluble I think TPA is what its called and PETG which is what milk jugs are made from. Metal encased PLA which has either (iron, bronze, brass, copper or Stainless steel in it) you can also get carbon fibre filament. The flexible material is available in different durometer readings. There are several other specialty filaments but the ones listed are becoming very common and can be bought off Amazon or Ebay pretty much all day long.

 

Printed this last night, gonna sand it and paint it like the one on my wife's jeep. Gonna need to use some hi build primer to fill in the tiny gaps left by the filament alignment.

 

Waiting on my 3d printer kit as we speak.

 

What kind? The one I am currently using is a Creality Ender 3. I bought a Solidoodle press several years back but had lots of problems with it. Now that I am a little better in the know, I may try to fix it and use a different slicer program for g code.

I currently use Cura for a slicer program, it’s free and a great program. I also use Tinkercad for 3d drawing, good software and very easy to learn.

 

How about an Early CJ5 challenge coin out of brass?

 

prusa i 3 its a kit will print about 8x8x9 I have never tried it before and I love a challenge. plus it will make the rc hobby a little cheaper if I can just print those broken parts. thanks for the tip on software.

 

The Prusa is a very nice printer, pricey even for the kit. I think the MK3 built is around $750 to $799. About 3x what my Ender 3 was, but at my price range I had to do a few mods to make it print at that level. Don't think any amount of mods would ever get my Solidoodle to that level and if you did it wouldn't be a Solidoodle by then.

 

I think all this printed stuff is very cool . but cost wise . it is expensive to print isn't it
the machine shop had a big printer . shop manger said each roll of material was 250.00
and the printer had 6 rolls

I would hang out in machine shop . and watch the guys that programed CNC machines
"way over my skill level "
every now and then they would make trinkets . with spare time when they had some



one of the machinists that I knew would bring in aluminum valve covers from the hot rod shop that he worked part time in and have the tops custom engraved . the guys on the computers would write the program for it . and sent it to machine

 

Big difference between my $200 printer and an industrial printer that cost $5,000-$10,000. My filament is around $15-$45 a roll. I don’t count my time because I don’t monitor the machine. Take the drawing, process it thru the slicer program to get the G code, prep the machine, load it with the filament and program, press the start button and watch it for about 3-5 minutes and then walk off. I can make quite a few plastic parts with a 2lb roll of filament.

As far as CNC machines it depends on the shops, no shop I ever worked in had a specific programmer for the CNC machines, the guys that ran them programmed them. I did the same. Now part of this is because building molds you are a custom shop, not a production oriented shop. We would do hundreds of completely different jobs every year, year in and year out.
I have built so much custom stuff over the years it’s pathetic, from valve covers to hollow body aluminum guitars, airplane parts for experimental airplanes to boat parts to hot rod parts.

 

This is a project I have been working on for nearly 10 years off and on. The solid top piece is 16" x 22" x 1" thick. With the bracing and boxing adding another 2-1/2" to the height and after all fabricated up weighs around 135lbs. There are quite a few pieces that go with this to make an assembly around 600-700lbs total. I will be adding photos of the other parts and assemblies over the next few weeks. While its not all finished I have enough done that with all the photos I will be posting it should be obvious what it will make before its final iteration. This was all made from scrap material that was given to me which makes it even better. As you can see from the second photo there is more machine work to be done on the top side, but that is for another day in a few weeks.


Who can guess what this is?

 

Overbuilt Sap boiler?

 

Industrial chips and dip platter.