Production
 

I have been making some male and female silhouettes.
At first I made them singly.
Then I progressed to a pair.
Yesterday I sub programmed the job, now I can cut 3 pair.

Good to have a machine with a big table.
All I want for Christmas is a proper spindle and a dust extractor.

I hope you get them too. Dust Collector first.

I second Pete's proposal, Dust Collector 1st.

Some knobs from Padauk offcuts made on the MM to replace the unsightly bolts on my lathe.

Nice wood grains. Apparently, Paduak is hard to come by in my part of the world which is relatively nearby...

I see the stuff all the time, used to use it quite a bit in a line of furniture I was making years ago. Beautiful stuff but really rough on the lungs, ooh-wee. Oh and don't get a splinter either!

Merry Christmas
 

A Merry Christmas to all you MechMates wherever you may be.

Same to you and yours.

Self cleaning V rails
 

When my machine is running I sometimes sit and think about things.
Sometimes I clean it while it is running.
Today I cleaned it then sat down and thought, can it clean itself.

Yes it can.
I had an offcut of a draught excluder strip.
Cut to length. Crimp the ends. Superglue a rare earth magnet to the aluminium strip.
Put in place over the V rail.
Just a small step but it works.

There was concern expressed about the flexible conduit staying in place.
I taped both together.
I also taped an old tape measure to both sections of conduit.
After 3 months it still works very well.
No problems at all.

Very nice, Al.
Rare earth magnets are fun to play with.
Thanks for the update on the flex conduit.

I have been busy with other things for a while.
6 weeks doing a course at a University took a chunk of time and cash.

Here is most but not all of this weeks production.

Good to see how the other builds are coming along.
Some numbers to be issued soon methinks.:)

Time gentlemen please !
 

After a hard day on the MechMate what could be better than a beer on the Mechmate.

A few clocks this week.

Looking good. I like the clocks. Keep up the good work.

Cheers :D

A happy St. Patricks Day to one and all.

Thank you ;) May the Good Lord take a liking to you... but not too soon!

Started up my machine this morning after a 5 weeks of enforced absence.
Perfect response. (I expected nothing less).

After sitting on the dust collection fence I decided it was time to do something.
Thein separator 90% complete.
Dust foot 90% also.
Hope to have the funds for a Wet/dry Vac tomorrow.:D

I do not know why the photos would not upload but here they are.

OH YEAH! That's what I call engineering on the fly. Thumbs up

EXCELLENT!! I've never thought of a clear lid to check bin levels.
Dust (even just chip) Collection will make your operation way more enjoyable.

A happy accident Darren.
It is made from an offcut I had.

The funds came through, so I am now the owner of a shiny new Wet/dry vacuum cleaner.
I also found some Velcro to attach the skirt to the foot.
I was looking for some clear plastic strip to make the skirt from.
I found some 95% clear plastic mats for car's.
That will do nicely thank you.

Dust foot finished and installed.
Extraction pipe fitted to foot and attached to the rear of the Z axis.
A good day.
Hope for a finish tomorrow.
Night all.:D

Thick foam double side tape will be great as your lid gasket. Mine still survive after 3 years of use. :)

You might need something sturdier than that plastic trash can. I collapsed a metal trash can with a shop vac and a dust deputy cyclone.

Skyhook
 

Thanks for the tip on the foam tape KenC.
You might be right about the can Barry.
I saw the lid bow about 3mm when I fired it up.
The separator seems to have worked well.
Early days.
Hope it works.

Some other progress.
I was worried about the hose trailing on the table.
Since nobody has invented a working Skyhook yet I had to improvise.
Strung a wire wall to wall over the machine.
Put a keyring on the wire.
Bungee from keyring to hose.
I will get a longer hose so I can reach full travel.
Waiting for the skirt to come back from the sewing shop.

Decided to put in some additional electric power points.
More work for the working man to do.:D

Could you find some kind of fence made with heavy gauge wire to line the inside of the can with to prevent it collapsing. Maybe something like hog wire.

The best value for money I reckon
only about 500Baht, used.
http://images01.olx-st.com/ui/5/19/5...vable-Lids.jpg

Back Up
 

After reading Regnar's account of problems, I will share my problems from this week.
11 month's ago my hard drive died.
I had some warning it was on the way out so I dumped everything onto some USB Sticks.
When he drive failed it was not a total disaster.
About 2 weeks ago there was some odd behavior from the replacement drive.
Just to be on the safe side I did a back up.

On Monday I was working on the computer and a folder vanished.
When I found it, it said it was empty but it would not open.

I ran a file recovery program, it was working.
I went to get my supper and when I came back the drive was dead.
Lucky that I did that back up.
I have the loan of a drive while the warranty is sorted out.

I had lost some drawings, but I had the n.c. programs.
I downloaded a n.c. to dxf converter, so I have the drawings back.
Some photos were lost but I have happy memories.

As a further twist, when I booted up my Mechmate control computer it would not work.
After 2 hours of swapping drives, monitors, cables and Uncle Tom Cobley and all, I was despairing.
One final try and it worked.

I have had a boot up failure on this computer before if it has not been used for a few days, but none as bad as this.
If possible I will turn the computer on every day for a few minutes if the machine is not being used.

At the end of the day the mouse jammed on right click.
Pulled it to bits, cleaned it, it worked.

Moral of the story, 'Put not your faith in computers. Back it up or else you will have no hair.'(Like me)

Just as a reminder of how things can change.
There was a younger man who had a repair business for electrical goods, note the past tense!
He has been to our house on several occasions.

My wife phoned him today about an an A.C. unit.
After several calls one of his workers answered.

The owner had gone out on a call yesterday, something went wrong and he was electrocuted. (Dead).
My wife is at the Temple saying prayers for him now.

Problems come in different sizes.
Take care out there.

Al
I have always said that life is short (even if you live to be 100). But we don't know what the end date will be...so live each day as if there will be no more.
All the best to you.
Mark

Al, post 238 is the very reason why I try to caution everyone when building this machine. I always like to tell people "Electricity is not dangerous in its normal state, it is the people playing with electricity that make it dangerous".