The Craftmans Shop > New from Old
Titivating A CNC Plasma Table
awemawson:
Well at long last I've been able to place an order for the duct to be bent up. The company I'd discovered very close to here didn't get their quote to me until this morning, and they can't start work until the new year :bang:
So my 'second line of defence' is a small outfit a few miles away that are apparently less well set up looking at their rather shambolic workshop, but were very slightly cheaper and could start next week :ddb:
Mean while I'm catching up on a few 'round tuits'
awemawson:
Still waiting for the duct to arrive, so I decided to make a start on the central third slat support rail. 40 mm square box section fixed on height adjustable brackets at top and bottom of the table, and carrying a 40 x 40 mm x 3 mm angle iron slotted every 50 mm to take the slats. I made the brackets a while back.
Now I'd been wondering what was the best way to cut the slots - the slats are 3 mm thick so a 4 mm slot would be ideal. The original pair of angles are rather uneven and look to have been cut with an angle grinder. I decided to use my Pedrazzoli cold saw, but it has a 2 mm blade, so each slot consists of two cuts carefully spaced - rather fiddly but it seems to have worked OK. I cannot cut the 40x40 support rail yet as it's length depends on how thick the duct ends up.
Then I thought I'd better get a bit of paint on the side rail where I'd cut off the previous owners alignment plate to allow the duct to fit when it comes (I'll bolt a plate back rather than weld it). This is really just to stop things rusting as most of the top of the side rail was bare metal.
Turns out that 'Ford Tractor Blue' in not too bad a match for whatever the frame has been painted in - at least it doesn't shout 'I'm different' and I had 5 litres on the shelf :lol:
awemawson:
A little bit of progress this morning that is actually a big psychological boost as I wasn't looking forward to it -
I've down loaded a legal copy of Mach3 onto a Dell Optiplex Ultra Small Form Factor PC running Windows 7 that I've fitted with a solid state drive, and managed to transfer all the settings from his original set up on a wacking great Dell tower system he was using, AND IT WORKS - happily driving his original electronics. (These will be re-engineered in the electrical enclosure)
All this because at the moment my intention is to house the PC safely within the new electrical enclosure to keep it out of harms way - with just the monitor and keyboard on a stalk somewhere.
Having proved it works I'm now more motivated to plough on with the electrical enclosure.
mattinker:
I'm looking forward to seeing this when I come over to the UK!
See ya, Matthew
Pete.:
I have an enclosure here that I believe will suit that, if you want it Andrew.
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