Comment

Comment by carverman on April 6, 2011 at 9:50am

Well yes, I understand that the carving rotates on an axis, but as I mentioned

previously, it is totally independent of the actual parallelogram swing box

so it can be considered an ancillilary axis.

 

ancillary:  Of secondary importance:

Comment by Jay D. Wyant on April 6, 2011 at 7:17am

The fact that it is a way to rotate your work piece, technically makes it an axis.

Comment by carverman on April 4, 2011 at 9:13am

But the indexed mount(s) are not an actual intergral part of my copy carver..

I don't know enough about yours or Bobs..but the way I see it..those index

mounts simply rotate the model that the stylus is following  and the blank

that the cutter head/router is maching to faciliate the up/down motion (depth

of cut) and longitudinal motion and the arc of travel of both the stylus and

router bit.  Yes there are 4 90 degree quadrants in the rotation of both

mounts, but only to present a "fresh face" to both stylus and cutter,

and I still am having trouble seeing that a 5th axis in relation to the

geometric operation of the copier. 

Comment by Jay D. Wyant on April 4, 2011 at 2:27am

I am referring to the front face as in this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DytNtu2dbcY

That would be considered a 4th axis, and still the idea of your indexing head would be the fifth.

Comment by carverman on April 4, 2011 at 2:20am

Ok, a small correction here to my previous comment.

The router bit and stylus are ganged together on one face of the parallelogram

and essentially tracking each other at a set distance from each other.

However, because the swing box is rhombus (rhomboid?) the  router and stylus

will travel in an ARC to the limits of their travel defined by the size of the

parallelogram and that would be the 4 th axis, I guess.

Comment by carverman on April 4, 2011 at 2:10am

referring to your previous comment, Jay, I only see 3 axis.    X is the vertical  ( 2 dimensional graph) or lateral in a 3 dimensional object.

Y is the horizontal (graph) or longitudinal in a 3 dimensional object , and Z is the angular axis between two points.

 

So I only see 3 so far, not 5.  The carriage moving back and forth is longitudinal

or  Y axis, the swing box moves the router bit/stylus from side to side in a

parallelogram fashion but it is still considered an X axis and the router/stylus

moving up and down would be the Z axis, I would think..or the last two are

reveresed, but still only 3 axis.

Comment by Jay D. Wyant on April 3, 2011 at 4:22am

I was referring to one of the swing boxes you guys had posted a video on (BNC).Obviously the rolling carriage is one, the swing side to side is two, up and down would be three, the indexer would be considered a fourth axis, and like on the BNC the extra hinge on the front allowing the router to swing toward you would be the fifth. I haven't seen your machine or your plans, so I don't know if you have the fifth or not.

As far as direction of cut, you are talking about climb cutting versus conventional cutting. There really is no right answer to that question, as each piece of wood will act differently, and some times a climb cut is necessary to prevent tear out, but that strategy will be a lot harder to control, so you would want to take very light cuts.

I like your approach to creating the stylus.

Comment by carverman on April 3, 2011 at 3:39am

Bob; assuming you have got your model and blank mounted and indexed at 90 degres. How do you go about routering it. I mean, if you bear down too much with

the bit, will it not burn into the wood and plug up?  Is there a right way and a wrong

way to start off when you have an excess of wood?  I have a Deltae router-shaper table that I use a lot for making bases etc. You can freehand the base

around a pin, but you have to be careful which way you lead into the bit with the

wood blank, otherwise it will tear out chunks.  I'm sure it's the same way with

these copy carvers.  Would you start..say left to right from the back and move

slowly to the front of the carving or go from front to back in a straight line (like

a swath cutter) and then come back and start the next swath?

Comment by carverman on April 2, 2011 at 4:41pm

You mentioned 5 axis, that would seem to be X,Y,Z...what are the other 2?

The mounts which I'm working on provide the four 90 degree quadrants,

rotated and indexed on both the model and the blank.  This would seem to be the

creitical part to me.  The parallelogram swing box just allows lateral movement

and the carriage the longitudinal movement of the bit/stylus.

I've notice that the counterweight (movable barbells in my case) do allow for

weigh scale type of balance, but having the light touch on the stylus (without

dampening) can lead to some funny "oscillations" when moving the stylus,

so I'm installing 6 *"x 4" x 2" thick cement paving bricks inside the carriage

to give me some ballast and dampening effect for both the stylus and

keep the carriage wheels on the steel tubing track...it's not rocket science

but everything needs to be set up with some diligence..before having a

go at 'er.

 

The other thing that I like about this Bosch mini router is that it is speed

adjustable from 15,000 rpm all the way up to 35,000 rpm and that also

gives some leeway for trial and error for the best results with the cutter

heads depending on what wood is being used.   I love tupelo, but it's very

expensive up here in Canada and shipping is very expensive now anywhere

because of the rising cost of oil.  Lots of basswood here, but it kinda sucks

because you can't always get good consistency in the density from one

tree to another.  

Comment by carverman on April 2, 2011 at 4:28pm

Jay; Well Ed Walicki (a well known fish carver..see his website) advised me in

the plans he supplied that "SOME" router bits seem to have a different profile when

cutting vs the physical size and dimensions of the cutter head.  He didn't go into

any details on what those where, but it would seem to me be the more complex

router shapes with the multiple flutes such as roman ogee and specialty shapes.

Now for just" roughing it", a ballnose would seem the right choice, especially

the Kutzall which I have and like.   The one I got was a large ball nose and corresponding stainless steel machine stylus head that matches the profile

of the cutter.   I'm going to experiment with what I have, as he mentioned he

made his own by drilling a hole with the router bit in a piece of wood with a drill

press, removing the router bit and inserting a steel rod in the chuck, then pouring

lead (from discarded lead weights in the tire shop) into the wood cavity around the steel rod clamped in the drill chuck vise.

I am going that same route, but using an epoxy two part stuff that I use

called Magic Sculpt that hardens and can be used as a limited production

stylus. I'm not going to be making my carving duplicates by the hundreds,

so I don't have to worry about wear on the stylus head.   All I have to do

is knurl the steel rod first so that the epoxy can stick to the steel shaft,

mix up the compound and pack it in. It sets in about 2-3 hrs, so there is

a llot of time to work it.

 

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