The Violette Makerspace

Our family makerspace is something that all of us use when making stuff. We have a wide collection of tools and can build or fix just about anything. Just a listing of things at the moment, I hope to add more pics and perhaps videos in the future (once it is clean, which is almost never...)

Metal working Machines:

CNC Bridgeport 4 axes - Originally a 1993 V2XT 3 axis CNC mill from the factory, I purchased this around 2002 from a friend. The original PC and screen was dead, so I started from scratch, removing the refrigerator sized control cabinet and all original electronics. I replaced the cabinet with a far smaller salvaged electrical cabinet mounted high on the wall behind to save space, replaced the motors, drives, cabling, monitor, keyboard & mouse, and rewired a new pendant. The computer now runs Mach3 software to control the 3 standard axes and the custom built rotary axis. I used a VFD for the spindle drive, as I only have single phase power. I had set up the electronics with a 4th motor drive, and I can swap between a worm drive rotary table, or a recently built belt drive 5C collet.
Johannesson 6" x 26" Mill - This is a beautiful little antique manual milling machine. It's perfect for small projects, and my kids love to use it. It'll only take up to a 1/2" shank in the #2 morse taper, but that is plenty for this little machine. UPDATE: This machine has been moved to my parent's lake house in Maine.
9" South Bend Lathe - Another antique, but very well equipped. A quick change gearbox, taper attachment, micrometer stop, collet attachment, 3 & 4 jaw chucks, pedestal grinder attachment and quick change tooling make this little machine a workhorse.
Emco Slant Bed CNC Lathe - This is a work in progress. Purchased from a friend, I now have the X and Z axes under power, but I need to mount a spindle motor and complete the enclosure and wiring. I will be running Mach4 lathe edition on this. One of the challenges with this machine is the 8 position tool turret. I need to create a new way to index and sense what tool is presented to the work.
MiniMill - This too is a work in process. I wanted a small CNC with as much accuracy as possible, and my former employer was throwing away some very accurate old sales model linear slides. I salvaged them from the dumpster, rewired some of the discarded drives. I need to complete this so my kids can play with CNC, and so that I can do finer engraving with a high speed spindle.
Delta variable speed drill press - with 5 chucks - This was salvaged from a previous employer. It was one of three variable speed drill press heads mounted to a 5/8" thick steel plate bench. I gave a couple heads to friends, and kept the one with 5 jacobs chucks. It looks like a microscope crossed with a drill press. Converted from 3 phase to single phase by changing the motor.

Fabrication:

Lincoln 180 Mig Welder - This was a birthday gift from my wife. Have I mentioned she is an enabler? :-)
Simple welding table - 3/8" thick plate on thick 2" angle legs. 24 x 30" top. Could use some clean-up and modifications to allow more clamping. Recently added an old Bridgeport milling vise to the welding table. It's 60+ pounds of cast iron that helps position smaller items.
Rollin EF1459 Vertical Metal Cutting Band Saw - When purchased, it was missing a table and a few other parts. Fabricated a table, counter-weighted power feed, clamping system, repainted and rewired. The ability to clamp something to the table and allow the weight of the saw to cut through it like a horizontal band saw is one of my favorite things about this saw. The table doesn't tilt, but this thing is built like a tank and will cut anything.
Delta 6 x 48 belt & disc sander - 40's vintage - Restored from junk, and built a pedestal to mount it. Pedestal also contains a couple grinders fitted with a deburring wheel, scotch brite wheel, buffing wheel and a wire wheel.
Milwaukee hand held band saw - One of my favorite tools as it works like a power hack saw. Purchased for $10 at an antique store. :-)
Milwaukee Angle Grinder - 110VAC 4.5" but quite powerful
Milwaukee Angle Grinder - 18V battery
Milwaukee sheet metal shears
Hoping to expand to add sheet metal machinery in the future. Planning for a plasma cutter and a TIG welder.

Woodworking:

Delta 10" classic cabinet saw - Rebuilt by a friend, this is a classic machine, and has plenty of power with a 3HP motor.
6" Delta Jointer - Antique purchased from my uncle when he upgraded - solid well built machine.
13" planer - Cheap import that is insanely noisy and messy. I only use this thing outdoors. Gets the job done - most of the time.
10" Atlas Metal Lathe - converted to 16" wood lathe - A friend had an old 10" atlas metal lathe that was given to him - it was missing the motor assembly and the carriage, but the flat ways easily let me add 3" riser blocks to the headstock and tailstock, and mount a traditional wood lathe tool rest. Also converted to use as low speed rotary system for welding around parts.
Milwaukee body grip router - Soft start and quite powerful. Great tool. Have a clamp attachment to use as an alternate spindle on my CNC Bridgeport for 3 axis wood carving.
Milwaukee Circular saw - Good solid tool. Powers through most anything. Need to upgrade the guide to something like a Festool.
Milwaukee Reciprocating Saw - An older model, but built like a tank.
Milwaukee 12" Dual-Bevel Sliding Compound Miter Saw & Stand - Love this saw, can cut almost any angle and can even cut dados using the depth stop.
Belt sander, pad sander, jig saw, etc.

Laser Cutting:

Glowforge Plus - UPDATE - I sold it - This was a major let-down. The machine sat idle much of the time, and SUCKS for trying to use for semi-production work as you can't repeat a program without using their software and having it regenerate the g-code for EVERY RUN. Better off buying a good quality Chinese laser at half the price.

Urethane/Silicone Casting:

Vacuum pump degasser - A Harbor Freight vacuum pump and a stainless steel container with a 3/4" lexan/plexi/lexan clear top makes for a crude yet effective vacuum degassing system. Also used to torture peeps. Clear top is large enough to fit a 2 gallon paint pot for larger batches.
2.5 Gallon Paint Pot - Another Harbor Freight special, this is used to vacuum degas and pressure cure cast urethane and silicone parts.
3D printed molds - A variety of 3D printed PLA molds are used to make castings. Primarily used for casting urethane rocket noses or custom rubber bracelets.
Digital Scale - Another great take home from work, a miligram scale with stainless platter and plastic protector. Given away because it was missing the power supply.
Syringes, mixing pots, etc.

3D Printing:

Bambu X1 Carbon - This thing just works. It's fantastic! ≈7X faster than the Ultimaker, more accurate, and with automatic material handling of 4 spools, a MASSIVE improvement! Love this machine.
Ultimaker 2+ - This is a real workhorse. I have printed over 35,000 parts on this machine. I have only had to replace the stepper motor bearings in 10(!) years of operation and over 5000 hours of run time.
Thing-O-Matic - This is what got me into 3D printing at home. I spent more time fixing and upgrading this printer than I ever did running it. Given to an adventurous friend at work.
Tiko - All hype, I was one of the "lucky" customers to actually receive a printer, however it was broken before I opened the box, and they went bankrupt 2 days after I received it. It's still in the original box, never having printed a single part. Given to a friend at work to tinker with. Hope he can figure out how to get it going.

Electronics:

Soldering stations - A couple variable temp Wellers, and a no-name - all dead... Replaced with this new iron.
Antique heat gun - This thing is the hairdryer from hell.
Bench Power Supply - Another great piece salvaged from the dumpster at work.
Other - Fluke meters, Mushimeter, clips, crimpers, strippers, test leads, Arduino stuff, etc. I hope to find an oscilloscope at some point.

Automotive:

I'm still one of those crazy people who does almost all of their own automotive work. Oil changes, brakes, timing belts, clutches, steering racks, ball joints, suspension, rear end, engine work, etc. I have found that google searching online forums is a very effective way to troubleshoot an automotive problem.
Tons of hand tools, pneumatic tools, etc. for working on my own cars and for friends in need.
I hope to do a hot rod at some point, but I may just invest that money in a Tesla instead... *Update* Bought a Tesla Model 3 Performance in November 2018 - Completely life changing. Perhaps an electric hot rod?

Sherline Lathe/Mill Feb 2023

A friend at work had an old (and crusty) Sherline Lathe/Milling machine available for sale.

It is a Sherline 4000 series lathe with the optional head stock attachment. It was made in July of 1977, so it's almost as old as I am!

I fully disassembled the entire machine, degreased and scrubbed everything. Whatever had been used for grease/oil had long ago turned to a sticky varnish.

I oiled and reassembled all the parts for the X and Z axes on the lathe. The tapered gibs needed adjustment, and a couple missing parts needed to be made. There were several dings in the dovetail way which were stoned out. I believe the ways are bronze.

The tailstock had the original locking screws removed and were replaced with an eyebolt and a wing nut. The tailstock ram was rotated out of position and dinged due to the wrong locking screw. I repurposed a couple small indexing handles, and cleaned up the ram, and got it working smoothly and locking properly.

The headstock was also checked, and the bearings were found to have some lumpiness, and will need to be replaced. The motor was mounted on what appeared to be a weird erector set type plate. The V drive belt was replaced with a large o-ring. The motor switch and variable speed were hanging off the rear of the motor, and the L bracket that mounts the motor was bent. I was able to straighten the weak die cast aluminum (?) L bracket, remove the weird plate, rewire the motor and shift the switch to the other end to make it more compact. I also cleaned and refurbished the motor while I had it disassembled.

The 3 jaw chuck appears to be in decent shape, and was disassembled, cleaned and oiled.

The vertical axis was also disassembled, cleaned and oiled.

The Z axis lathe power feed appears to be a synchronous AC gear motor. It only buzzes when the switch is turned on. It no longer rotates, so it will have to be replaced.

It is missing a few parts that will be needed to get it operational, but they are all still available for purchase: https://www.sherline.com/

I need a tailstock chuck and #0 Morse adapter, I'll need a set of collets for the head stock and some end mill holders, lathe tooling, additional lathe tool holders, I may use a tiny Palmgren vise I already have as a milling vise, but it's really tiny - I will likely have to make something larger. I'll also need to make a larger tooling plate and some small clamps to hold workpieces.

12 Ton Press Design & Build

I have long wanted a 12-20 ton press for the shop, but due to the size of their traditional footprint and the ≈$200+ price tag, I have never bought one. I have a upcoming project to upgrade the front suspension in our Tesla Model 3 Performance (the pretty blue anodized upper A arms), so I wanted to put together a proper press that I could build from scrap steel from the dump, and would fold up to fit in my tiny shop. In the composite shop picture above, behind the arbor press, you can see the hack of threaded rod and square steel & aluminum tube that I used to swap out the suspension bushings on our old Camaro. Not again...

I had "sourced" some 7 foot long pieces of 2" x 3" rectangular steel and some 8 foot lengths of 1.5" x 3" steel channel from the scrap metal pile at the local transfer station (town dump). I am always on the lookout for material like this for many projects. These pieces happen to be ideal for this design. I designed the press to work with the material I had on hand, so it is 24" wide and 6 feet tall. I also had some 1/2" plate and a Ø1" steel bar on hand to make the pins for the movable lower shelf. I had a single garage door spring left over from somewhere, so I can cut it in half to make the return springs. I am planning a rotating lower foot that allows the whole stand to fold down to 6" thick so I can tuck it in a corner when not in use. I plan to use some hammered finish paint, or some simple brush on black paint.

UPDATE 3/25/22:

The Press is complete, except for the foot. For the time being, I simply clamp it to the column in the middle of my garage when in use. I already used it to press in a couple of the new suspension bushings, the first task for this machine. I have a couple more to press this weekend, and will get Jarvis set up for street or track use.

I still need to complete the rotating lower foot and also get some paint on it, but I am very pleased with how this project came together just using scrap material and stuff I had on hand.

Glowforge Setup

So, the Glowforge is the most recent addition to our Makerspace. It's a very capable 40 Watt laser cutter that works on a variety of non-metallic materials. As the warmer weather has arrived here in the early summer of 2020, I needed to install a new air conditioner in the same window where I had been venting the laser. I decided to combine a AC mount with a sliding door vent for the Glowforge into one assembly. I started with a 7.5" wide 8' long PVC board that is 0.75" thick. I trimmed the length down to the width of the window. I trimmed a second piece to fill the 1.5" wide groove where the window typically seals, and attached it to the bottom of the vertical board. I then CNC machined a hole in the vertical board to suit the dryer vent hood, and removed the sheet metal section and screw mounted the hood in the hole. I then 3D printed a slider with the same features as the vent hood, and popped the sheet metal tube into the slider. A remaining piece of board was used as a shelf to mount the AC unit, adding a simple dado cut. Finally, the last piece of the PVC board was machined to have an oval slot and a slider relief to allow the slider to shift from the closed to open position by simply shifting the exhaust hose. I am very pleased with the result, and it should also function well with the AC unit removed for the winter.

Organization...

Like most Makers, I tend to have a "Collection" of stuff to be used to fix things, improve things, or combine together into new stuff. Trying to keep this stuff organized and easily accessible is important, especially when you have other makers using the same space. I have recently started watching the YouTube "Tested" channel, specifically Adam Savage's one-day builds. In this episode, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OPSbF6kM9k&t=159s Adam shows his Sortimo cases and racks. I love the idea, but can't afford the Sortimo brand cases. Plus, I already had a collection of about 10 Stanley Sortmaster cases, which while not quite as fancy, they work for me. I designed up a welded steel rack, made of angle steel, and finally had time to construct it over the 2018 holiday vacation break. To make the foot print and caster wheeled base more stable, I added a steel rack onto the rear of the unit for larger plastic bins of less often used larger hardware.

Overall, I'm quite happy with the way it turned out. It holds all 30 of my cases, and it's beyond strong enough.

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