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  #331  
Old Fri 21 August 2009, 00:30
hennie
Just call me: Hennie #23
 
Roodepoort JHB
South Africa
I like the bookshelve, see you next week, will be in town from Wednesday.
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  #332  
Old Fri 21 August 2009, 06:39
domino11
Just call me: Heath
 
Cornwall, Ontario
Canada
Nice work Alan, thanks for sharing.
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  #333  
Old Fri 04 September 2009, 03:28
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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A quick job for one of my suppliers (My first export order...)

trophy 1.jpg
Base is of African Mahogany (I think )

trophy 2.jpg

trophy 3.jpg
3D engraved text

trophy 4.jpg
close up of the text - still with direct drive motors
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  #334  
Old Fri 04 September 2009, 03:39
hennie
Just call me: Hennie #23
 
Roodepoort JHB
South Africa
I see you also went and visited PTR in Woodstock.Better watch Kobus don`t like it when we do small cutting.What was your feeding speed?
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  #335  
Old Fri 04 September 2009, 05:18
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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Actually I used a ProTech 30deg V groove I picked up at Hardware Centre CT. Feed speed was 1000mm/min, time to machine about 8 min. I also machined the bevel base with the MechMate. Clamped the block upside down at an angle and ran the head up and down across the block feeding Z down a little bit at a time manually - like one would do on a milling machine, writing the code would have taken me longer .
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  #336  
Old Fri 04 September 2009, 12:26
Kobus_Joubert
Just call me: Kobus #6
 
Riversdale Western Cape
South Africa
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Hey you guys, what about RETURN on INVESTMENT...you are not suppose to have FUN
Pragtig
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  #337  
Old Fri 04 September 2009, 17:12
Doug_Ford
Just call me: Doug #3
 
Conway (Arkansas)
United States of America
Beautiful work Alan.
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  #338  
Old Mon 21 September 2009, 18:39
Robert M
Just call me: Robert
 
Lac-Brome, Qc
Canada
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Copy from another thread :
I have just returned from Johannesburg where I was offered a position at a very large fruniture manufacturer managing the maintenance at two plants (turned it down even though the salary offered was astranomical by my standards - all the money in the world cant justify an abusive boss!)
Alan ….. Felicitation on your values
Money helps making MM and pay important bills. But values & principals make a person. He's one of those not their yet !
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  #339  
Old Tue 22 September 2009, 02:33
Khalid
Just call me: khalid
 
Sadiqabad
Pakistan
very nice work on the trophy..
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  #340  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 15:52
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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Now for some return on the investment...

Challenge for the week (actually it will take about a month at 8 hours per day). Machine a steak board from material supplied; outside cut to shape and a 3D ramp with groove to catch the juices without costing too much?

finished board.jpg
Finished steakboard before oiling (the client is doing the round over and sanding)

The original sample as supplied had a ramp machined with a ball nose cutter. the ramp runs along the length of the board from the surface down to a depth of about 10mm with a 30mm border around the edge of the board. Initial estimates of the cost to machine 900 of these was quite high as the 3D machining would be a slooow process, so I had to come up with another solution.

I decided to do the job in two stages, stage one would be the outside and groove at the end (actually the groove first of course) and stage two would be the ramp.

stages of process.jpg
Left: Blank in position on Jig1, Centre: Slot and outside cut, Right: ramp cutting jig

To machine stage one required a fairly simple jig that held the board at the bottom edge and at the two corners that would be cut off. A vacuum would have been easier, but I don't have a sufficiently powerful pump. There are three cuts, #1 for the groove in two passes, #2 for the right side of the board from the bottom edge up to the handle and #3 for the left edge up to the handle both in two passes with an 8mm tungsten slot drill - speed 2000mm/min. Doing it this way in seperate paths prevents the corners breaking out as the grain changes direction. its a little slower but with a better end result. The hold down clamps are 20 x 5 mild steel flat held down by furniture screws attached to rumper nuts fixed in the jig from below. Cycle time about 4 min (I could shorten that if I make a better clamp system that locks down faster but there is a height restriction because of my dust foot)


To cut the ramp required a slightly more complicated jig. I decided to hold the work at an angle and just do a straight pocket cut in the area required. The ramp angles were calculated by doing a drawing in CAD of the section and then cut on the machine. Slots were also cut in the jig base for location purposes. There are two ramp supports and one edge locating fence. At the end of the ramps are hold down fingers as part of the jig and two toggle clamps with modified feet to hold the bottom edge down. Cycle time is also about 4 min but most of that is actual cutting as the toggle clamps make for very fast change overs. This is cut with a 12mm slot drill also at 2000m/min.

ramp.jpg
Ramp angle jig with edge locating fence in the background

hold down fingers.jpg
Hold down fingers at the bottom of the ramps

cutting ramp.jpg
Cutting the ramp with a pocket cut (this one is just trimming a mistake in depth setting, it is usually cut in one pass to full depth of 10mm)

The machine is running from 08:00 to 16:45 everyday with breaks at tea time and lunch time. What a pleasure to watch it racking up the Rands at every pass.

The Bosch router that I was a little concerned about at the start regarding heat is cool to the touch at the end of the day (hardly above ambient). The cooling fan produces an extremely strong blast of air that obviously aids in cooling. A cool tool means longer bearing life - I like it.

When cutting the ramp the X motors get quite hot to the touch, (not too painfull to hold but still within reason) the other two are only just slightly warm.

The dust extraction system is working very nicely, it does not put any strain on the Y car that I can see and follows the machine around like an obedient dog. I had to take it apart at the main pivot to remove a plug of wood slivers and fluffy offcuts this afternoon so I think I may have to change that elbow for one with a clean out panel. This is the first time it has happened but I think it is because of the pocket cutting of the ramp, it produces quite long wooly bits that get sucked up by the foot.
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  #341  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 16:37
cncb
Just call me: Brian
 
Connecticut
United States of America
Sweet fixture Alan. The thing I've always loved about these machines is they are so raw and simple to the point that there are very few boundaries and the only limit usually is ones creativity in the process. While simple it shows if you can't find a reasonable program for the part think out side the box to find a simpler, better way to achieve the same results in less time.
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  #342  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 17:58
jhiggins7
Just call me: John #26
 
Hebron, Ohio
United States of America
Alan,

Nice work. Thanks for sharing. So how many steak boards can you cut in an 8 hour day...if it's not proprietary?
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  #343  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 18:07
domino11
Just call me: Heath
 
Cornwall, Ontario
Canada
Alan,
Excellent job. So how many are you able to do in a day? Im surprised the customer did not want a name or logo engraved in the board as well.
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  #344  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 22:02
hennie
Just call me: Hennie #23
 
Roodepoort JHB
South Africa
Gee, I didn`t know the MM can eat and have tea !Nice going
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  #345  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 22:35
Kobus_Joubert
Just call me: Kobus #6
 
Riversdale Western Cape
South Africa
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900, this sounds like 'WORK' Nice going
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  #346  
Old Tue 13 October 2009, 23:23
CAM Craft
Just call me: Sean D
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Nice order congrats. pity about all the clamping on off (painful). Job like that with my Makita 3612c (MM1) the bearings will need a change after 30-40 days wear and tear. After time the housing for base and topside for both bearings need replacement to reduce play and vibrations (6months). We keep a full spare armature, top bearing housing/locator and brushes on the shelf for a quick 20min change over before sending the old armature for a +-2week service.
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  #347  
Old Wed 14 October 2009, 00:17
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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I can do about 100 loadings a day which equates to 50 complete units per day. 900 units = 18 days without any holdups.

Hennie, thankfully the MechMate does not eat or drink but the operator seems to insist on it...can't understand why
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  #348  
Old Wed 14 October 2009, 01:30
hennie
Just call me: Hennie #23
 
Roodepoort JHB
South Africa
Alan, something that I have done the other day with the same thing of having to load and then restart is that I had the machine cut 3 of the same items along the y-axis.I had it cut 3 items and as the machine were at no 2 I reloaded the first one thus when it got to finish no3 and it went back to home I just started it again.It saved a lot of time.Talking about tea?I think it is time.
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  #349  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 01:31
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
Send a message via Skype™ to Alan_c
My business has been keeping me very busy lately (busy trying to get more work!!!) so have not posted much here, but I have managed to get my website up at last - only an interim version but have a look and give some feedback please (visual appeal, loading times etc) tufftoys.co.za
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  #350  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 02:21
Kobus_Joubert
Just call me: Kobus #6
 
Riversdale Western Cape
South Africa
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Nice selection there Alan. Speed from my work that is sometimes slow is good...nothing wrong with you server and page setup. I find Hennie's pages very slow from here.

I think your prices are to cheap... You must be buying wood from a oke like me to get things done for those prices.
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  #351  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 02:23
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Site not uploaded yet?:

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  #352  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 02:24
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Second attempt worked okay
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  #353  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 02:37
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Okay, you were probably changing the index.html when I looked.

I think you need pics at the home page and next level . . . . . it took 3 clicks before I could see your products and that is just too many clicks for some people.
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  #354  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 04:34
hennie
Just call me: Hennie #23
 
Roodepoort JHB
South Africa
Kobus you are used to slow
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  #355  
Old Thu 29 April 2010, 14:58
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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Thanks for the comments guys, Gerald, the front page is not to my liking yet so will get a make over soon.

To the SA guys, check out the latest issue of the "Home Handyman Magazine" from page 40 onwards - I've been published
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  #356  
Old Fri 30 April 2010, 11:45
dragonfinder1
Just call me: Dave #49
 
Astoria, Oregon
United States of America
Alan

You should post a link to the article on your web site, if it's on line, or scan it and put it on your web site if it's allowed. I think it would be good for business.


( second post, first one didn't show up after a couple of hours )
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  #357  
Old Sat 01 May 2010, 10:02
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
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Smile

Been doing some product development - made a collection of side tables and a wine rack system

table selection.jpg

They are all done with MDF, the coloured ones on the left are basecoated with clear than sprayed with tinted lacquer.

Dave, the article is not business related, but hopefully the start of a new line of income for me, magazine article writer...
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  #358  
Old Wed 09 June 2010, 11:39
Alan_c
Just call me: Alan (#11)
 
Cape Town (Western Cape)
South Africa
Send a message via Skype™ to Alan_c
A few jobs I have been up to lately

Firstly a presentation shield, machined in Rhodesian Teak (I only did the engraving - the client had already cut the shape by the time the job got to me)
shield complete.jpg

Proyotype media shelf sized to accept cd's and dvd's
media shelf.jpg media shelf back.jpg

tab joints.jpg
Tabbed joints - all knock down

Landed a nice job to replace existing indoor benches at the local casino complex - the originals had been made with MDF but have not fared very well in a very demanding environment - very high traffic.

They are a modified version of Lutyens bench without the extra curve that it usually has in the back rail - again to match the ones they are replacing, I would have preferred to make them accurate to the traditional design but the customer who pays gets to make the decisions

Besides the obvious cutting of the complex shapes I tried to do as many of the mortises on the MM as possible (all the simple one were done on a horizontal mortiser) In total there are nearly 100 joints in this bench (200 mortises - using loose tennons) The seat slats are attached with pocket hole screws from below so no visible screws or plugged holes anywhere to be seen from above.

front legs cut.jpg
Front legs with mortises and dowel holes.

rail cut.jpg
Cutting the back rail.

parts cut.jpg
Legs and rails for two benches.

top rail glue up.jpg
Top rail glue up.

back glue up.jpg
Back sub assembly glue up - starting to get tricky...

main glue up.jpg
Main glue up - not to be attempted without doing a dry run first.

frame stained.jpg
Assembled bench after staining.

Finished bench.jpg
Completed bench with AC Lacquer.

logo cu.jpg
Close up of logo engraved into the front legs.
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  #359  
Old Wed 09 June 2010, 12:42
Kobus_Joubert
Just call me: Kobus #6
 
Riversdale Western Cape
South Africa
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Nice Alan...I like it, pity they wanted it stained that dark.

How many benches are you doing ?

Last edited by Kobus_Joubert; Wed 09 June 2010 at 12:44..
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  #360  
Old Wed 09 June 2010, 12:55
PEU
Just call me: Pablo
 
Buenos Aires
Argentina
Alan, amazing job!
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