Billet Birth Jan 19th Update
Well last update the majority of the Billet Boxes guts got all carved out, but they were still attached and needed their face sides machined... Well, the first run of billet boxes were made on temporary jigs that aren't really up to the task of full time production (some will be fine for a while, but not all of um.), the white plastic board below was used to hold the Boxes into position as they go their little faces milled...
It was a tired little jig, and time to retire (on a plane to florda now
(actually, its in the trash can)).. So I had to make a super mega Jig to hold everybody into place... Behold,,,
Excali-Jig!!!
Well I forgot to take any pictures of separating the boxes from each other, probably because i was busy separating the boxes from each other. oh well, it was boring anyway. But here you can see the little box still getting ready to go into excali_jig.
ok, so the box goes into the pocket and then gets love tap'd with a little hammer...
the little brass hex on Excali-jig, is attached by a cam head screw thingy, when you turn the screw they get locked into place.. neat-O
keep your arms and legs inside Excali-Jig at all times until the ride has come to a complete stop.
the ride has started..
...all done
now we let um out of Excali-Jig by unscrewing that screw thingy i was talking about earlier..... that box on the right looks ready to barf... poor little guy.
The main bodies still have two more rounds to go inside Dev. One to cut the air slots into the side, and another to cut the hole in the top where the brass screw goes.. That will be in the next update, but as a side note because it's quick and boring. I would like to make some new jigs for those operations too, but I think I'll wait until later and just use the ones I have as they are still in good shape...
Ok, next up are the slide covers..
this is pretty much like the main body, we cut up some stock and drill and tap holes to mount it to the workboard...
then stick it all into Dev and let her rip... this was all new code as well so it was pretty exciting for me,, there was one little hick-up in the fist try of the final code that i had to repair, but nothing major.. The first time I wrote all this stuff I was trowing away massive amounts of stuff that got cut wrong.. this time, nothing!!! all good.
pretty lines..
the next update will have the second operation of the slide covers... this will be a cool one as I'm building the new jig for that today and will have it finished up tonight... it will used vacuum suction to hold the parts into place.. ZOMG NeAt-
O (if it works)
K-all for now... i'ma go make that new jig, got to come up with a good name for this on too...