Building The Solsylva CNC Machine Video Part 1

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  After spending the last couple of days gathering emails, drawings, notes, tools, parts and my video camera I started building another Solsylva CNC machine.  The video posted here will hopefully be one of the first of many videos that will step you through the process of putting one of these wonderful machines together designed by David Steele. 
   A lot of what is on this blog already is because of this machine.  Check out the video and follow along in the coming weeks and hopefully I will give you a good idea of how to put one of these together for your shop.  I will not give you all the particulars concerning this design as you will have to buy a set of plans from David Steele from his website. http://solsylva.com/   It will be the best money you ever spent for a tool that you will love to build and make things with.  I'm a big fan for sure.

Building The Solsylva CNC Machine....... Again

   
 This past Saturday I was once again in Davenport Iowa for a group meeting at the QC Co-Lab maker space. As usual I enjoy rubbing elbows with the guys  and ladies at the Co-Lab and compare notes, projects, and ideas that everyone has.  It has been finally decided to start the build of another Solsylva CNC machine for the Co-Lab and I am to be the driving force behind this project. This is all well and good as having built the same machine for The Tinker's Workshop I am considered the expert in our little group at the Co-Lab.  
  I spent all day today going over old emails and notes to figure out where I ordered all the intricate obscure miscellaneous parts that will go into the machine that you can't buy at your local hardware store.  Luckily so far this has been the least of my worries about this project.  I will build the more intricate parts of the machine in my little workshop and then haul them down to Davenport to do the final build.  The guys at the Co-Lab will do the major construction, painting and electronics.  With my guidance of course.  Then we'll get it up and running, dial it in, and start making more interesting stuff at the Co-Lab.
  My plan is to document the build here on my blog to give you a good idea as to what it will take to put this wonderful machine together. I have a lot of photos of my first build and so as I progress with this build I will lay out what needs to be done step by step.  I do not plan on giving away the plans or the detailed information that is in them as I did not design this CNC machine and do not have the right to give this information out freely.  It was the ingenious work of a gentleman by the name of David Steele.  I do not wish to take away anything from Mr. Steele so you will have to check out his website for information on how to get your own set of plans for his design.  http://solsylva.com/ 
   I think with the information I plan on passing along to you in the coming weeks will better show you what it takes to put his wonderful machine together.  After having already built this design once before I can tell you that it will take some work but it is far from difficult.   I give a gold star to David Steele for the information that he lays out in his plans that makes it all doable by anyone that is just a little bit mechanically inclined.  I also can give everyone some ideas that I have come up with to make his design a little easier to build and use.  If you like my ideas then go ahead and use them.  If not build the machine the way David Steele designed it.  That's up to you. No biggie.
  So check back here over the coming weeks and you'll see the process that I will lay out for you to build your own Solsylva CNC machine.

A Wide Load Ready For Area 51

  After six months of work I spent this past week making a big push to finally complete my Makerbot Semi tractor and trailer assembly.  Last Friday I printed parts for eight hours to make the cradle for the UFO and all of the tires for the Lowboy trailer. Today I spent an additional six hours to print the rims and hubs for these tires. Here is the end result.

  This last photo gives you a good idea of the scale of this model.  It's big to say the least.  That's a five dollar bill laying next to the model. The model from bumper to bumper is 30.5 inches long.  The tractor is 7 inches tall and is 4.25 inches wide.  The scale for the model is exactly 1/24th scale. The UFO also made on a Makerbot 3D printer is ten inches in diameter and has been coated with fiberglass resin, then sanded and sanded and sanded some more to make it smoooooth and painted silver. (See earlier posts on how this was built.)  The complete model took over six months to design, print, and assemble. It would have taken less time if I had my own Makerbot as I have to travel 70 miles just to use one at the QC Co-Lab maker space in Davenport Iowa.   The complete model has close to 500 parts in it and took almost 90 hours to print. This does not include the time it took to print out the parts for the UFO which has 133 parts in it. 
  This has been a great project to design and build.  It could also have different trailers made for the model.  It could have a regular flat bed, a tanker, or a cargo box trailer.  Or even a car carrier.  This would be great as a lot of different cars could be made on the Makerbot to be displayed along with the carrier.  Probably would be another six months at least to do the eight or so cars that would be on the carrier.  Something to think about for future projects.

  

In these two photos you can see the detail that was put into the assembly of the Lowboy trailer to make it align properly and be strong at the same time.  1/4 inch wooden dowel pins were cut and inserted into alignment holes for the rear chassis.

These photos show some of the intricate locking parts that make up the Lowboy trailer.  Again all of the components are tied together using 1/4 inch dowel pins that were cut and sanded to fit into mating holes.  All of these components were epoxied together to add additional strength to the assembly.

These three photos show all the work that went into the front of the Lowboy trailer that make up the hitch.  Lots and lots of dowel pins had to be hand cut and fitted then as before epoxied to the rest of the trailer for strength. Time well spent as the trailer now is quite strong and more then able to hold up the weight of the UFO sitting on it.  

  
Additional wooden bracing was added to the underside of the low section of the Lowboy trailer.  I painted the wood gloss black to make it stand out and then epoxied this in to position.  This stiffened up the trailer a great deal and it still looks good underneath. 

Rediscovered Projects From The Past

  During my yearly Christmas routine of putting up and taking down ornaments, trees, and various decorations I came across a folder with a lot of old photographs in it.  What made this find even worth looking at was the fact that the photos were of projects that I had worked on decades ago.  I thought the photos were long gone and forgotten.  So to show off some very early designs long before the Tinker's workshop even was a fleeting thought I present them to you here now. 

  The four photos here are of the airplane that I built from 1982 to 1984.  A long two years in a workshop of a friend of mine that I just recently have been in contact again with.  The plane is a Mitchel U-2 and was a real project to say the least.  It had a 35 foot wingspan and was of wood and cloth construction.  With the wings folded up it was still eighteen feet across. The engine was a converted Zenoah snowmobile engine. Complete with instruments and electric start.  A lot of people had asked me if the plane was a kit.  It was a kit only in the littlest sense.  If you can call a pile of wood and a set of blueprints a kit than I guess that's what it was.  The only thing that I did not build on the plane was the engine, wheels, instruments, and bubble canopy.  Everything else was built by hand with little or no support from the company that produced it.  Was a pain at times but also one of the best projects that I ever took on.  I learned a lot about airplanes and how to build them. 
  I never flew the plane.  I just did the ground testing on the plane and then donated it to an aircraft school in southern Iowa.  A lot of people are surprised that I never flew it.  I simply got burned out on the project before I got that far.  That and the costs to just keep it were getting higher each month it just sat in an open hangar at an airport 30 miles away from home.
  I read some place about guys who build airplanes and the statistics about the subject.  It stated that if 100 guys each started building an airplane only 20 of them will ever complete it.  So just the fact that I accomplished that much in this project I felt good about.

  This project turned out very well and took a lot less time than the airplane.  I still have this beautiful cedar chest at home and have had more than just a few people want to buy it from me.  The chest is four feet long, two feet from front to  back, and around three feet high.  It is all solid cedar that I hauled all the way from a mountain in Tennessee to Iowa and then planed down to one inch thickness. It is heavy!  It takes two people to pick it up and move it. 
  This was built in 1985 and still looks as good as it does here. Under each wooden button is a wood screw.  Over 300 were put in.  A lot of drilling to say the least.

  These two photos are of my drafting table that I designed and built in 1993.  My son at the time was four years old and is a good indication as to how big the table is.  I still have it but now is collecting dust in a storage room in my home.  It is solid oak and can be completely dismantled so that it can be moved from one place to the next without a lot of hassle.  
  I used the table to do engineering drawings for my brother for a couple of years and then later to create British sports car pen and ink drawings for a business that I ran for seven years.  That was another very successful project that actually made real money too!

  This photo is of my king sized canopy waterbed that I designed and built in 1979.  It took an entire day to put the bed up or take it down.  So you had to figure out where you wanted it and then measured the room very carefully because you would not even want to think about moving it once it was in place. It stood seven feet tall and was made out of pine stained in oak.  The waterbed as I said was king size which measured out at six feet by seven feet just for the mattress. So with the framework it now measured closer to seven feet by eight feet.  It was a beautiful bed complete with a mirrored canopy but very big to be sure.  I had it for a lot of years and then moved on to something a lot less time consuming to move.
  
  All of these projects were a lot of fun to build and now that I have the Tinker's Workshop up and running it just gives me a lot more chance to work on even more and exciting projects.  So keep checking in and hopefully you'll be even more entertained and encouraged to work on some ideas that you have been putting off in your own workshop.

I've Brighten Hearts And Living Rooms With My Christmas Angel Light Display

  
  Now that Christmas has come and gone I'm able to get this post put together and show off another project that I had worked on for a couple of Christmas presents.  I didn't want this shown until my sisters each had gotten a Christmas angel light.  The angel image I created using Corel software and it was engraved into a 1/4 inch piece of acrylic plastic.  I then cut it out using my band saw and sanded the edges smooth.  Also the bottom edge of the acrylic was heated with a butane torch to clear the plastic of the foggy effect you get when you cut it or sand on it.  This allows the light to shine through the finished piece better. In the rest of this post you see how I put everything else together.

   I started this project with a very nice piece of poplar wood.  I selected this simply because it is a very easy work to work with and as you can see it has no knots in it.  I machined the three wooden parts using my CNC machine to allow placement of the light and the electronics to run it and engraved the word "Peace" on the top face of the outer cover.

  

Here you can see how I clamped the two bottom pieces together to  drill out the hole for the light switch using my drill press.  The pieces were  held on the drill press using a small vise. This made it a lot easier to hold the parts tight enough to make the perfectly straight clean hole.  Another smaller hole was added to allow the wire for the power cord to be feed into the base of the display.

 A small slot was cut out of the center top groove that is used to hold the acrylic angel.  This allows the light to shine through the clear plastic.

The two lower pieces of the base were glued together at this point and allowed to dry.  I realized after I had drilled the holes for the switch and wiring that I could have glued these parts together first and it would have been a lot easier.  Live and learn.

 Two small wooden pieces made from 1/4 inch plywood were drilled out to accept the small led light that was used in the display. 

  

The light, light mounts, power switch, and a small 12 volt transformer were then installed into the base of the display. I set up grooves on the outer edge of the large pocket to accept the wooden light mounts.  This made for quick and easy assembly of the electronic components. 

Once I was satisfied with how the electronics were going to fit into the base I removed all of it to go onto the next step in the assembly. The top lid was screwed on to the light base using wood screws that were recessed into holes on the bottom of the base unit.  This made for a very clean look when the base was completed.  The parts were left assembled and then sanded smooth on a drum sander on my drill press.  

 The wooden parts at this time were removed from one another and four coats of polyurethane varnish was applied to each piece.  Between each coat I sanded it very lightly to get a good clean smooth finish.

  
The electronics were then reinstalled into the base unit and tested.  At this point I could breathe a sigh of relief as I am just a day one rookie when it comes to electronics.  Even if I only had to solder a couple of wires together.  Like every other tinkerer I am learning new things every day in my workshop.  Just have to put a little effort into trying something new once in a while.  I think my efforts have paid off very nicely.  My sisters think so too!