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If you acquire enough tools you never use...


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Posted

eventually you can put two of them together and do something useful. LOL.

 

Finally got around to making something for the car after it sat around so long :-/

 

This particular attempt failed because the torch dragged the piece - 2nd attempt moved a tiny bit too, but the piece was useable :)

 

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Posted

Hey Mazda, Cool idea !!! Looks like its going to hold the rad in place ???

 

Post more photos Man !!!!!! LOL

Posted

So are the two tools a plasma cutter and a CNC mill? Also, it looks like the tip of the torch is angled. Is it really or is it just an optical concussion?

 

Tom

Posted

The things I would build if I had such a shop! Bwahahahahah!

 

I spent some time last fall building a fiberglass fan shroud for my Birkin. The whole plug-to-mold-to-final piece process. It got cold before I could attach it (and I cant get the car up to temp in this kind of cold anyhow to test it) so it will have to wait till spring to try out. But I sure know how it feels to make something yourself that turns out great.

Posted
So are the two tools a plasma cutter and a CNC mill? Also, it looks like the tip of the torch is angled. Is it really or is it just an optical concussion?

 

Tom

It's very slightly angled... only because I wanted to fit it in between those white plastic pieces... those are my holders for the dremel, when i want to use that.

 

The torch is mounted on a piece of metal with U bolts, and that piece of steel is connected to the router using 4 little magnets, so if the tip hits an immoveable object, it falls off the gantry. If I wanna get fancy, I could put a kill switch for the torch trigger as part of that too, but I wanna get busy building actual parts for the car and move the project along.

Posted

Shameless plug and thread hijack:

 

We have a 5' X 10" CNC plasma cutter with a watertable. We built it from a kit from Torchmate, and designed and fabricated our own water table. If anyone needs parts, we can make them.

 

Here's what we make:

http://www.custommetalprod.com

 

Here's a pic of the table, being filled with water for the first time.....make that second time, we had some leaks the first time. We also built the crane to lift the sheets on and off the table.

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Posted

 

I gotta put some marks on the bender... the bottom bends on the main part are just slightly off from each other :-/ but it should work. These will get riveted to the floor once it goes in.

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Posted

That is sick(meaning great)!!! Looks like someone is missing a cookie baking sheet or am I mistaken? Russ

Posted
That is sick(meaning great)!!! Looks like someone is missing a cookie baking sheet or am I mistaken? Russ

Russ, I have realized I will need regular delivery of sheetmetal now. LOL

Posted

Jerry, I do everything the hard way. LOL.

 

These are simple enough where I did the bends with ruler and a protractor.

 

I don't even have any software like you get with torchmate.

 

I use CamBam, which is a basic 2D cad/cam software to generate the GCode. Then I wrote a little script that does the torch on/off functions at the right places as well as the little delay when the torch is turned on. It's still not nearly as nice as what torchmate does - things like starting the cut slightly inside the hole, but good enough for my home-made operation (matches the rest of my tools).

Posted

I love to see innovation! You're WAY more advanced than my shop! (condo sized garage) In the rare chance I need quantities of something cut, I email a DXF drawing to the laser cutting shop. One-offs, prototypes and my Lotus parts are all made with a hole- saw, band-saw and hand-files. My plasma cutter sits on a shelf.

Posted

I love all of the cool work that a CNC program can turn out, especially compared to my tools which are a felt tip pen, a hammer, a bigger hammer and my great BIG hammer. LOL. Oh, and lots of spare raw materials.

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