Home Built Machinery

Hi Matt,
I hear you about Google Sketch Up : ) Are you still using Geomagic Design?

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Yes, for the cost its pretty decent software, well at least is was back when we paid for it. I think cost is much higher now.

There is a new cloud based CAD software available that blows sketchup away.

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Howdy Andrew,
Do you know what model that welder is, it it a Lincoln?
Been trying to find some info on the one I recently acquired. Looks very similar
Here is a link to it
You can see it at 6:15 into the video…

Thanks, hope things are going well for you.

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Hello Terry, yes thats the same family as mine. I dont have it any more, but i think it was called Wizzard or something like that. Maybe wilson wizzard?
It was agood machine.

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Hey Andrew thanks for the reply.
I’ll try that name and see what comes up…
So far it seems to be a pretty good welder, especially for being 70 years old.

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Hey, Terry, I’ve been doing a little looking on the interweb. Wilson was right, I can’t find the wizard. Mybe it was the wasp? Yes, in fact now i look at the picture again i can read wasp on the top of the plate.

This looks like the exact one i had.

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Hey Andrew,
Thanks!
That helped a lot, Got a whole bunch of new rabbit holes to go down :slight_smile:
I’m really liking the welder so far… I hope it likes the woodgas :slight_smile:

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I suppose this would be a good place to put this. The corner shrouds on the machine, by design needed a forming jig of sorts to make. They needed to be rolled first and then the mnt flanges formed. So today I went out and bought an HF 2 ton press and built tooling to create a press break to form the two angles in one process…

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These pics are pretty bad, a lot of smoke in the shop. Anyways I spent all day building this fixture system, this is the generic fixture to replicate all corner sections as they all share the same architecture. However each individual one serves its own purpose and have specific features. But this fixture allows to build all them and drive them exactly the same geometrically. Then specific features can be added in later process. What you are witnessing is my company transitioning from development to commercialization. :fire:

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Matt, respect. You make the machinery yourself!
Up there is a photo of my retrofitted plasmatable. We use UCcnc, recently upgraded the proma thc to Neuron, plasma is Hypertherm powermax 45. The Esab was doing 3 m/min when it left the factory, now 15 m/min. Working super, the uccnc, neuron, hypertherm and sheetcam combo!

And I am able the upload photo on the forum now.

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I own VersiFire CNC. This is the next generation table for 2020. It should be able to run a router head as well as a torch.

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Nice! Any specs? Controller? Plasmaunit? Thc? Steppers? Servos?

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It is a 60" table, with precision ways, ball screw drives w/ anti inertia back drives on the Y axis gantry. The motors are stepper motors, plenty good enough for a Plasma cutter.

A servo will operate exactly the same, except it feeds back its actual rotational position verses the step count. High end machines only use the servo potion for reference and use precision glass scales for actual position. Way to elaborate for a plasma cutter and adds to much cost for the intended market.

This uses a USB CNC breakout board with LattePanda V1 with Mach 3 front end running on Windows. Each motor has its own drive and power source and are Nema 34 1600 oz motors.

The ways are inverted, the forces are upward not downward. It will have the promo THC for now Until I learn how the Hypertherm alternative works.

Side rails and ball screws are designed to be shielded as you see in render. The lower section is enclosed to keep dust at bay and local to the machine. The electrical enclosure is built into the back, lots of room for cooling back there. Any enclosure in this environment will need to be cleaned daily. So this is designed so this can be blown off easily.

The turnkey unit comes with a Hypertherm 65 and I deliver anywhere in the USA lower 48 for $15,000.00. Providing aid in machine set up and on the spot training. I can also do this internationally for additional cost.

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Top, looks good. Nice price if plasma is included. Proma does the job. I worked with it for a few years without real problems. So you design or resel this? Building a gasifier with this equipment is much easier!

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I design and build it. This is my actual roots, Im a master machine builder and worked for a high precision CNC machine tool company before starting my own business… If you have flown on a commercial jet airliner, the engine parts are precision ground on a Campbell Grinder. .These machines are specked by all jet engine manufactures. All vendors are required to own a Campbell to do the work on.

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A fun fact, on the James Webb Telescope; the octagon shaped mirrors were profiled on a giant specially built Campbell Grinder. I have been to the Northrop Grumman ( cant divulge actual name of affiliate) facility numerous times to repair the Z axis ball screw drive. I think I replaced those screws twice before uncovering the issue causing the failure. The Z Axis drive the entire screw moved with the head and the ball nut was stationary. This head with the grinder spindle and massive grinding wheel weight in excess of 10,000 lbs. It had something like 3 or 4 feet of travel and the ball nut was attached to a 1" thick solid plate that spanned the X axis rails where the glides for the X slide were also attached too. When the Z axis was moved from one end to the other, I put a dial indicator on the X rail touching off the backside of the Z axis plate and could watch the indicator move 0.0010" as the Z axis would travel up and down. This is a huge amount of movement; when you factor in the angular alignment of the relationship of the ball screw and the ball nut. This mis alignment was causing the ball nut to basically shape the screw into an “S” shape causing lots of heat and then finally failure causing the servo motor to fault the machine out. When this happens in a process; this equals expensive broken part.

Once I found that, we installed a hydraulic counter balance. As far as I know it worked.

The Hubble Mirror or might have been the lenz was also ground on a Campbell. That machine predated me by many years though.

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Matt,
The mention of the “James Webb Telescope” got my attention. James Webb, once head of NASA, after which the telescope was named, was the son of James F. Webb once school superintendent of schools in Granville County, NC, where I live. the local J.F. Webb High school was named after the school superintendent.

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