Hi everyone,
Well since the Phlatprinter was born I have always wanted to do a mod to keep the dust down and after seeing Fozzy work his magic I went ahead and finished my mod here are some pics!!
I still need to fine tune the large hose placement as it hung up on the flex shaft of the rotozip and actually stopped the bits rotation... hence causing some ripping and tearing of my foam sheet
Non the less once I find a down cut bit I hope to be able to contain some of the foam and more importantly the smaller pieces from jumping up on the foam and causing divits :?
So here it is and now time for some foam shredding


John Attached files

 

COOOOOOOL!!!!! That's a great Mod John.... I like the split pipe so that you're pulling air from both sides. It's great to inspire somebody else to have a go at something. I'm really pleased you did this.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

 

Nice !!! I'll have to add this to the list.

 

I just checked the clearence, and the Z gantry can move high enough to hit the tubes if you run them across to the bit, but the collet is above table level before the gantry hits the tubes, so unless you are doing some serious 3D carving the gantry never gets that high. There is still room for bit changes. The tubes will hit the sides of the cabinet before the Y gantry hits it's stops, so you lose about 3/8" travel on each end, no big deal to me.

 

Thanks Guys, you have all inspired me to make the most of the MKII!!! Great Idea Randy, This would be the best application but I was afraid of binding issues but I am looking at it now to see what I can do!! It works very well but where it enlarges to the 1/14" vacuum hose it kinda binds up(once in a while) with the roto zip flex shaft to where at one point stopped the rotation of the bit and was ripping apart the foam .I am going to down size this hose until it is outside of the cabinet!! .. Also my biggest issue is still relavant and that is the plane I am cutting has 1000 tiny circles for drag holes at the tail of each surface and some of these pop up on top of the foam leaving divits all over from the pressure roller. So I need to make a mod for the top that will blow air down forcing these pieces below the cut surface!!! So many Ideas so little time

John

 

OK guyz, I went ahead and made a nice working Blow tube to help push any larger pieces below surface level, this ( in theory) will help in keeping the piece of depron looking nice with out divits from little chunks getting caught under the pressure rollers!!
Oh , and yes, the holes are facing the cut path, this was just to show you how they look!!
John Attached files

 

Neat idea John.... I might have to steal this one from you and fit one on the Monster....

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

 

Thanks Shaun and Foz, I think I used like $5 in material making the both modes, The vacuum tubes are made from a poly pipe called sharkbite at Home Depot and the Blow tube is just a 3/4" piece of pvc with about 36 holes drilled into it and a coupling I cut two slip fittings out of!! I use a 1 1/8" hole saw in the lid but you have to be careful to make the center cut just right so you dont infringe on the plexi glass are you have about 1/8" clearance !!!Oh and Fozzy I owe you this one LOL

John

 

WOW, this Mod was well worth the effort, very little if any dust ever reached the surface and maybe one small piece escaped the blow tube I am very excited how well it worked I may have to patent this LOL I will get video of this and it sounds like a tornado blowing between the two pressure rollers, as a matter of fact , that is how I determine the exact location of the blow holes !!!!

John

 

I am starting my vacuum Modification. It will be the same one done for the MKI but applied to the MKII. I want to keep it very light as to not add any weight that the steppers needs to push. Will post pictures this week - starting the modification tonight

 

I know it is a long shot, but does anyone have the pictures from the posts above. they dont show up