The Craftmans Shop > New from Old
Titivating A CNC Plasma Table
RodW:
--- Quote from: awemawson on March 15, 2018, 05:56:40 AM ---If I was doing mine again, the hopper would slope on three sides and have the fourth side vertical, allowing the drop catcher door to be near to the edge of the machine and hence far more accessible.
Mine is OK but clearing it out is a kneel on the floor job (which is getting increasingly difficult!) - had it been to one side it would be far easier.
--- End quote ---
Good feedback thanks Andrew. I'm tempted to try a false partition down one side so the air exits the cutting area from one side so the crud stays under the slats (in theory). If I get really ambitious, I could then zone the table using an air ram triggered based on the Y axis position to open and close shutters in the 2 zones. (Only because I have 4 beefy 300mm air rams looking for something to do so I thought I could spare one for this project.) I've played with the rams and they take about 0.6 seconds to extend or retract. So folding in your feedback, the false partition will be wedge shaped and just have a cupboard door for cleaning at the deep end. It actually sounds like a really cool design now with your idea!
:nrocks:
mattinker:
Andrew clearly explained some time ago why he didn't want a large volume of water where his tools are, but from what I understand, the water bath method removes a lot of the pollution created by plasma cutting.
Regards, Matthew.
RodW:
--- Quote from: mattinker on March 15, 2018, 08:13:20 AM ---Andrew clearly explained some time ago why he didn't want a large volume of water where his tools are, but from what I understand, the water bath method removes a lot of the pollution created by plasma cutting.
Regards, Matthew.
--- End quote ---
Everything I've read indicates that the down draft table design is superior to a water tray. Every commercial table I've seen (some up to 90 metres long) are down draft tables. The problem in cold climates is that you can pump all of the warm air inside the workshop outside. Filtering the expelled air to avoid this is very expensive. Heat loss is not a problem in my climate.
Andrew's recent feedback here after cleaning has been very helpful for me and I have been busy designing a downdraft system with a central duct and an air ram driven shutter to zone the table into two zones. Hopefully the attachment uploads.
EDIT: It did! Fan at one end, hatch for cleaning at the other with a "hat" on top of the duct to protect from dross with a "fence" each side to stop crud siding down into the duct!
awemawson:
Nice, but I'd advise to keep it simple as possible. Those bits of dross get everywhere and if you have sliding bits they'll act as abrasives and saw itself apart :bugeye:
RodW:
--- Quote from: awemawson on March 19, 2018, 03:37:49 AM ---Nice, but I'd advise to keep it simple as possible. Those bits of dross get everywhere and if you have sliding bits they'll act as abrasives and saw itself apart :bugeye:
--- End quote ---
Thanks Andrew, It will be a bit of fun trying out the idea. I redesigned this thing for the third time after your last bit of feedback so please don't make me do it again! :hammer:
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[*] Previous page
Go to full version