In 24 days from idea to finition

ultralajt · Fidèle Posteur Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2007 Âge: 65

I made a little helper for me, that will hopefully make better parts for my future aeroplanes, that me with bare hands.

The working area of the machine is 38 x 65 x 7,5 cm.

I set myself a goal, to build a machine from aluminum, but as cheap as possible. I made it for less as 500€ (without software)

Here is a video of machine cutting a sample balsa rib.
It is still not a proper tool, but shortly I expect to recieve some proper milling tools that I ordered.

VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGu465NSD8I&

You can read a story about building this machine from beginning to today in my blog:
http://ultralajt.webs.com/apps/blog/

I intend to publish the plans for the machine in future.

With best regards!

mitja

loopingfred · Posté le: 09/01/2009 20:38 Sujet du message:

Looking good Mitja !
Very clean build ! [good]

So, what is your next glider project ? Very Happy

ultralajt · Fidèle Posteur Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2007 Âge: 65

Lothar Mentz · Accro Posteur Inscrit le: 18 Oct 2006

Hey Mitja,

congratulations, You've done a great job.

[amen]

I am surprised and impressed by the easy solutions You found. Cool

I wished I had seen Your maschine two years ago. I would have saved a lot of money.... Wink

By the way, if You are able to make the engeneering for this machine, it should be an easy job for You to build a vintage glider. [good]

Regards

Lothar

ultralajt · Fidèle Posteur Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2007 Âge: 65

Thanks Lothar!

I was just wanted to build a simple machine and cheap too.
So I decided to use commercial aluminum square tubes 30x30x2mm, and some angles 30x30x3. Jou know, my friend allso build himself a CNC machine, but he use a proffessional aluminum tubes with those "T" shaped groves.....and he pay ten times more for them a s was my aluminum costs. O.K. he can probably mill metalls, but I am aiming to balsa and white poplar ply and maybe some PCB material.

You wouldnt believe, how many components I have got from old stuff I didnt throw away, but stack them in my workshop.

When some of my computer accessories die, I dismantle it, and keep components, that can be reused in something else. Some smooth and strong steel rodst from printers, can serve as wing joiners in larger gliders. Often is not a bad idea to got some broken stuff from friends allso.

From two broken printers Epson Stylus 1500 (A2 format) I use "Carriage Return" steppers and use them for X and Y axis, From an old A3 matrix Epson LQ ?? I take a similar motor for the Z axis.

As a source of multi wires electrical cables for end switches and allso for stepper motors, I use old PC mouse cables. (I never throw away any dead mice)

My dear Granpa (Good bless him) use to say: "Dont fhrow away a dead mouse! If you cant find its use in seven years, you can still throw it to jour cat!"

Y and Z axes railings are steel rods from previous mentioned printers.
I even use some connenctors taken from those printer PCB`s.

So, often it pays out if an old aparature is not just thrown away, but somehow recycle as I did it.

Even a cooling fan for the electronic is taken from an old PC power supply.

So thats way (as already said in pthe first post), my whole machine minus software costs me less than 500€.
I spend about 90 hours designing and assembling this machine.

The stepper controller I use is H1 , click HERE.

Think I can say: "Mission acomplished!"

I intend to publish plans tor this machine in near future on my website.

Regards!

Mitja

ultralajt · Fidèle Posteur Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2007 Âge: 65

Well, I just build another CNC machine. This time is a little bigger. The working area is 142x50cm.

I would like to add some photos, of this new machine and some model parts I made with, but frankly thesedays the image size of 600x600 pixels at 100 K is a little outdated...

So, see machine on my blog.

A wing I made recently:

Mitja