Homemade Hot-wire Acrylic Bender

I threw some scrap together today; aluminum tape, wood, screws, and 20 AWG stainless steel wire. I power it with either a 12 volt battery or a battery charger. It draws about 7 amps at 13 volts, or about 90 watts. I twisted the wire using a drill to make it like a spring. This concentrates the heat in a smaller area and also allows for metal expansion and stops the drooping effect.

Here is a couple of laser cut acrylic stepper motor mounts bent on my hot wire bender.

Poor man's Homemade DIY CNC

Made some more progress. I have the upright fixed arms installed and I laser cut acrylic bearing blocks for the Y axis.

Homemade CNC machine

I did some work on my CNC machine. It will use heavy duty drawer slides for the linear bearings. And the framework is made of wood. The movement will be stepper motor driving threaded rod and a homemade delrin nut to minimize backlash.

I noticed that the bearings were tight for the first 10 inches of movement, so I modified them so that I could get 8 inches the back way as well. That way, I have it set for about 16 inches of movement, and NO PLAY AT ALL!

 The idea is to have one end of the threaded rod suspended in a bearing block. I used bearings from a used pair of roller blades. The threaded rod is 1/4 inch.

CNC - Poor Man Style

I've started a Poor Man Style CNC machine. It will have the capability to be converted to a 3d printer if I wish. Here is a video of the testing of a free stepper motor I got from a friend. I'm using the Arduino to test.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcihCJxfAyo&list=UUB-GOUPP6o9EPMy98GRNqRA&index=1

It will be made of wood and will use heavy duty drawer slides instead of linear bearings. The drawer slides have no play in them except when you extend them too far. So, I modified them so that they go forwards and backwards to split the difference and they stay tight.

Makerspaces on campus

The makerspace concept is really catching on. I am a member of the Victoria Makerspace as well.

http://hackeducation.com/2013/02/06/the-case-for-a-campus-makerspace/