Hi All,

I have been absent for a while due to lack of internet. Sorry to anyone waiting for answers...

Besser, the aluminium pieces that I have posted pictures of previously were cut on my CNC milling machine. For the mill I use cutting fluid and I think the bit was 6mm diameter. More on cutting aluminium on the Mechmate soon...

Dale, I am glad that I have inspired you to take the plunge. Most of my parts were sourced locally, the only imported components were the spindle and VFD. Having said that, the price of the rack in Australia was by far the most surprising part of the whole exercise. If you can get the rack shipped to Australia economically I would suggest you do, unless things have changed a lot since I purchased mine. Other Australians currently building will be able to guide you on the current rack pricing here. If you don't want to make the V rollers yourself then I suggest you get these as well. I found the rollers to be around AU$75 each, a little too steep for me so I made mine.

Vladimir, I am very pleased with the spindle and the VFD. I do not have any complaints at all about them.

Tony, glad to see another Aussie. If you look carefully at some of the pictures on my thread as well as those of others it should help prevent making some of the mistakes that I and others have already. I look forward to reading your thread.

OK, housework out of the way here are a few more pics..

I was asked by a friend to see if I could cut some 0.063 inch T2024-T3 aluminium on the Mechmate. Always up for a challenge I gave it a try. I can not pertain to being an expert on cutting aluminium but so far my settings have worked. I used a feedrate of 1000mm/min spindle speed of 20,000rpm and a cut depth of 0.5mm per pass. These figures were/are very conservative but until I learn how hard I can push things they will do.

Attachment 5259 Attachment 5260 Attachment 5261

I was pleasantly surprised at the finished quality of the first panel. So were some other that saw it and within 2 days I was asked to make the other 2 panels. The pictures do not do them justice but the finish is very good. The aluminium has a protective plastic coating on it which tears a little when machining, giving the rough looking appearance. This is just the plastic not the aluminium. It looks like my machine is capable of cutting aluminium, that’s lucky since that’s what I wanted it to do.

Attachment 5262

I also tried see if I could do some small text on the Mechmate. It worked out fairly well. Next time I will try to go a little smaller.

Till next time,

Jayson.

Hi Jayson,
Have you offically stared construction of your plane?
What kind is it?
Nice alloy work, will you need thousands of cutting bits to finish plane or do you expect long life cutting alloy?
Cheers,
Basil
PS. have you chosen left hand drive?
Are you really an Aussie or did you relocate from the US
:)

Hi Basil,

I have not yet started my plane. I want to build a Zenith CH601HD however I have been unable to obtain the plans in CAD format and redrawing then will take months... Might have to try to find something else to build, something that CAD drawings are available for.

The panels were for existing aircraft that are being fitted with new GPS units and Autopilots. Its good to practice on someone elses planes before starting your own :)

I have no idea on how often I will need to replace the cutting bits yet. At present I am using ordinary 3.2mm carbide router bits. One has broken already but that was just because the machine operator let a piece of cutout hit the bit and jam after it broke free...

I am definately an Aussie but yes when I build my plane it will be left hand drive just to confise other Aussies that don't fly. "Sure you can fly it get in the drivers side" (right hand side for those in the rest of the world).

Jayson.

Sorry for the dumb question, but aren't all multi seat planes "left hand" piloted. In my experience only some helicopters had the pilot on the right. Every aircraft I flew in in the airforce had the pilot on the left (it was over 19 years ago so maybe my memory is failing me??)

Hi Alan,

you are correct. All multi seat aircraft I have seen are piloted from the left. Cars here are driven from the right hand side, so if someone asks if they can fly the plane you say sure get in the drivers side (right hand side). Well, it made sense to me when I originally typed it.

Got that :D, our vehicles are also driven on the correct side of the road. :rolleyes:

Alan,

Since you are upside down, does that make it on the left side?

Nils the army right hand side would also work:)

"I want to build a Zenith CH601HD."

I've also been interested in Zenith aircraft for a while and bounced back and forth between the 701 (or the new 750) and the 601 (or new 650). However, recently I've read that several of the 601s had structural failure while in flight. I think the UK and another country in Europe have grounded them until the exact problem is determined.

Hi Doug,

I have seen many reports on craches involving Zenith aircraft and i am not yet convinced that it is a fault of the aircraft. There seem that the aircraft in most of the cases may have been stressed beyond its limits beforehand and many have been the XL version and I want to build the HD. Recent testing by some wonderful Germans has determined that flutter is not to blame for the crashes.

Post #6 here

http://www.recreationalflying.org/fo...-aircraft.html

I am still keen to build one IF I can convince myself to buy the plans and then redraw them.

On another note, I have been thinking of building a 4 x 8 foot air hockey table on my machine, the only reason for wanting to do this is because I can and watching it drill more than 3500 0.8mm holes would be cool.

That's enough for this thread, back to the build thread...

Jayson.