Warhog

DM.....I had no idea there was a decent for the yaw trim knob. Excellent. I shall add that feature. I mean it makes perfect sense to have neutral trim snap into place. Thanks Ky.:thumbup:

It looks like you have it set up spot on. Just the line work needs some attention. When I create lines, I start by drawing the line and then I offset it 0.015" to each side and finally close the ends. That gives me a closed poly line 0.03" wide. I use the pocket function to cut it which ensures there is nothing left inside it. As DM mentioned, you can pocket out the area under the knobs for backlighting. Use the same technique except switch to a 1/8" endmill. Mods and things to think about. 1. Use a small shop vac with a small diameter hose and attach it to the spindle bracket. A small pencil type attachment or a shoe/brush attachment will remove swarf as its produced keeping you table and machine clean. There are lots of examples on the net to look at. 2. When cutting acrylic...If you have a compressor, attach a fitting to blow a steady stream of air onto the cutting tool. Don't need a lot of pressure. This helps keep everything cool and the acrylic won't melt as fast. 3. Setting zero on your Z axis... Keep your jog rate set to 0.001". Use alt -pg dn to get your cutting tool close to the work piece surface. Then turn spindle on, jog down at 0.001" increments until you either hear contact with work piece or see it. Back off 0.001" and then set zero on you DRO and do a recalc. Your z axis starting point will always be perfect. 4. Keep a fine hair brush 1" wide to move swarf from cutting tip/workpiece when cutting to maintain visual. 5. Even though CNC is an automated process, NEVER leave your machine. If you do it will get mad and run itself into something just because your not there to hit the E Stop button. Happens every time. For the time being, hold off cutting anything harder than the engraving plastic. Use it to get comfortable with Mach3 and the machine in general. It's easy to make mistakes at this point in the learning curve and it's always better to have soft material in place when you :doh: Now you may be tempted cut some aluminum. Just a little piece he says...don't. Stick with less damaging materials for now. That's about it for now Clay. Keep posting like this and I'll add comments as you move forward. Beginners can use this thread to get them started.:) John

I was at the x-plane forum today watching your video on replicating roll and pitch using small stepper motors and a Mega. That was an excellent demonstration. Could you post your code for that in this thread. I'm interested in seeing how you handled the data from the flight sim and create the movement with the stepper motors to be exactly the same as the sim. I'm sorry I can't help you with your request as I'm still very much a novice at programming. But seeing how others write code helps me in understanding the process. BTW, that sticky on DCS-BIOS has a lot of good info in it except it is a rather long read. But it may help you find what your looking for. It helped me understand more about how you can use real world components and Arduino to make things work out side of DCS. And welcome to the forum.

And they look really nice as well. I have been trying to steer people away from these machines only because of the limitations they have related to cockpit building. Most of us would use CNC to make virtually all the parts one would need in a cockpit. That said, if all you need to do is engrave plastic you should be OK once everything has been tweaked to its max. As soon as you start to cut into anything heavier your going to get flex and there goes the accuracy. To help maximize it's potential you should chuck your cutters so very little is showing out of the collet (z axis - Spindle flex). Based on the v-bits I suggested I would make the cut depth for engraving plastic no more that 0.003". Set your spindle speed close to max. If you see any melting... tune it down. I don't know what your spindle speeds are . If they are variable, you need to experiment with that. For engraving, faster spindle speed is generally better. Feedrate for plastic is 30in/min. If you get any distortions in the letters, set it lower. Use the double sided tape I suggested. Cover the entire back side. Clamps should not be necessary if you do that. Besides, clamps tend to cause distortion and create an uneven surface... very bad. Make sure that there is tape on both sides of what would be to outline cut for a panel. That edge is especially prone to being lifted when using an endmill to cut it. All edges are prone to this. Its just the nature of the endmill to lift material as it cuts it. If you don't ensure good coverage of the tape you will have your edges looking pretty bad. Also clean you table with isopropyl alcohol or acetone (assuming no plastic parts on the machine or they melt). That will ensure the tape has a good surface to adhere too. For all other cutting I would use HSS or solid carbide 2 flute, 0.0625" (1/16") dia. end mills. If you need to pocket large areas go to 1/8" or if really large... can you machine handle 3/8" dia? As you are new to CNC, I would strongly recommend you look into buying CamBam. It is so easy to setup your g-code. All you do is import your dxf file and set your type of cut, type of cutters and a few other variables and then hit the "make G-Code" button. It calculates all of your offsets for you, toolpaths etc. It is the most idiot proof package I have seen to date...why do you think I use it?:music_whistling: And it only costs $150.00. I think HSM might be a bit overkill as all you are cutting is 2 1/2 D parts, not 3D. CamBam can also be use in 2 different scenario's...basic and advanced and that can be set on the fly so if you need something special for one cut you can switch to advanced and then switch back for the basic. And one more point, you can draw your panels in it as well if you wanted to do that. It has good control over text and that will be a priority. Thats all I can think of for now. I'll add to it as I think of anything else that may be important.

Your kidding??? WTF? There are lots of rotary engravers in operation. Laser may be the leader but it hasn't eliminated Rotary engravers yet.:( Where abouts are you located? Right in downtown Vancouver? What did you order Clay and how much? Did you go through Synergy for the order? While your waiting... 1. Have you run the setup routine to correct for x and y axis "measured vs actual distance" discrepancies yet? 2. Have you tried cutting a circle (hole) and measuring the diameter both horz and vert to ensure its a circle and not an ellipse? 3. One more thing, have you determined and corrected for backlash? As far as limit switches go, I would only use them to ensure you don't crash into the sides of the machine. Home switch won't be needed as all you need to do is establish zero before you cut your work piece. I assume you are using Mach3? Do you know how to set zero before you cut? What are you using for g-code? I'll try and give some max cutting depths relative to material, feed and speed rates and anything else I can think of once I know what you setup is... as in PC, PC to controller connection type, controller type, motors and maybe post some pics of you setup as well. :thumbup:

I would just Google them and see where their suppliers are located. I buy my material locally, which is outside of Toronto. They have it delivered in 2 days to me. I expect there will be a supplier close to you. Google is you best friend for these kind of things.:)

Thanks Clay. Acrylic face plates and styrene plastic for the housings.

Need I say more:smilewink: This is the technique I use to achieve, what I consider to be, excellent back lighting. Here is a basic gauge face. This could just as well be a panel since it's all the same material and thickness. As you know, I use 0.0625" (1/16") thick engraving plastic for everything in the cockpit. But .0625" is too thick for LEDs to transmit sufficient light to illuminate the lettering. The solution...make it thinner... SO how do you do that? Its really easy. You flip it around and pocket out anywhere there is lettering that needs to be back lit. When I'm doing the g-code in CamBam, the last thing I do is mirror the panel or gauge and then I draw boxes around all the lettering. I then pick those boxes to be pocketed to a depth of 0.035". That is the perfect depth to get excellent light transmission through the plastic. And because the plastic is white on the back layer it helps to diffuse the LEDs so there are little to no hot spots. Some might say that this is a pain in the ass to do but when you use CNC for everything, this is just a minor operation that takes just a few minutes to code and the actual cutting doesn't require exact registration when you flip the work piece. The cutting time is just a couple of minutes. The end result though is very nice and exactly what I wanted to have when the panel or gauge was sitting in place with the back light turned on. I believe Anton also uses this method. To achieve even better light diffusion I build into my panels a diffusion box and I mount common LED strips to the backside. They are intensely bright. Here is an example of one such panel. These strip LEDs are intensely bright as I mentioned so I need to dim them a bit. And thats what this panel is for... The console dial as well as all the other dimmers on this panel are actually 12v dimmers I bought on ebay for $2.00 each. http://www.ebay.com/itm/12V-8A-PIR-Sensor-LED-Light-Strip-Switch-Dimmer-Brightness-Adjustable-Controller/141714284675?_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIC.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D33098%26meid%3D8f8472b800a8444393784ff3c392d680%26pid%3D100005%26rk%3D3%26rkt%3D6%26sd%3D331601522755 For that money (and free shipping):music_whistling: how can you go wrong :thumbup:. I gutted them and used them for all the dimmers on the is panel. You can see three of them in this picture. The pots are mounted inside and the three wires from them go to the respective circuit boards on the outside. From there I will have lighting rails to each are being controlled by this panel. It works really well. I am just ecstatic as to the control I know have over my cockpit lighting. Sorry for rambling on like this but I wanted to give you a complete answer to your question.:smilewink: John

This thing about a flat surface is only half the battle. Using the t-slots will hold the edges down but when you start removing material away from the edges the end mill will lift the material and cause all sorts of grief. The best tape to use is http://www.dickblick.com/products/scotch-removable-poster-tape/ I have tried so many tapes and this tape has been the very best... easy to apply, easy to remove and holding power for engraving is perfect. It works for .06" engraving plastic and .125 acrylic. No other clamps are necessary. Maybe some edge clamps to ensure it doesn't slide if its a small piece. I buy huge amounts of it and that's all I ever use now. Don't try and reinvent the wheel. Try this stuff and you will not go back. You need to cover the entire backside with it. Both surfaces must be clean. Sometimes your cutting tool will pick up some of it so you may need to use a small wood dowel and gently push against side of cutter to remove tape. More to come when I get some time to post. John

I sure wouldn't mind having that Bridgeport with CNC. My wife would never see me.:music_whistling: Unfortunately all my machines are in the basement with a set of stairs to traverse. That kind of restricts me to the smaller stuff. It took five really BIG guys to get may 10x18 lathe down the stairs. Same with my mill.

Not sure if that's legal here. It may fall into the category of "replica" which is a big no-no in Canada. I will have to look into this in more detail. Thanks for the heads up.

Clay, the max dia is around .485" That allows removal. I use epoxy for mine. I have a neat technique for assembling the extensions that I'll post next week on a separate thread. Deezle, that looks really great. You do nice work. What machines do you have in your shop? John

Speaking of model railroads, I have an N scale layout and you just reminded me that the turnouts I use are "two direction" solenoids. A capacitor discharge moves the rails back and forth with quite a slap. That may be what is needed as it can operate in either direction and if you move the turnout by had it will still move as the solenoid doesn't prevent it from moving. It just slaps the rail one way or the other. PECO turnout motors are what you search for. http://www.peco-uk.com/imageselector/Files/Instruction%20sheets/PL-10%20Series%20Instructions.pdf http://www.martinandrose.com/page12.htm

Yah, No Shit... I have been learning electronics and programming from basically no knowledge to start with. I have had to developed all sorts of new and interesting ways to solve problems. I've learned how to hide money from my wife:music_whistling:. I learned how to do engraving. I taught myself CNC quite a few years ago in anticipation of some future project that would require it. Yes indeed its been an excellent journey and learning experience.:thumbup: Tekkx, do you have anything down on paper yet as to how you think it might work? If so could you send me a copy to look at? I just started to research this as well, so I haven't formed any concepts yet.

Clay, I use the same v bit cutter for everything that is engraved. The large fonts are "Arial outline". I use the pocket function in "CamBam" and it creates the G-code to remove all of the material from inside the outline of each letter. Any thick lines are done that way as well as you can see with the 100 foot tick marks below. This is an example of the Altimeter faceplate in CamBam. You can see what the letters look like. Sometimes I adjust the depth of cut to increase or decrease how much is cut as its a 60 degrees v-bit. The deeper the cut the wider it cuts. https://farm1.staticflickr.com/687/20276323533_3e40c80f05_b.jpg' alt='20276323533_3e40c80f05_b.jpg'>CamBam Altimeter by John Wall, on Flickr[/img] Engraving plastic is readily available in North America. I use Rowmark 222-412 1/16" thick 2 ply matt black/bright white. I would welcome a "sticky" CNC thread and also a separate "Laser cutter" thread where people could post what they use, how they do it and the results they get. It would let others be able to evaluate the different techniques and equipment available so they can be better informed to choose whatever will suit there budget and skill set.

Clay, if you use engraving plastic, it is a 2 ply laminate. It has a very thin black surface and the rest is white. I use a 60 degree v-bit engraving tool with a .010" tip. Depth of cut is 0.004". Use a super fast spindle speed as I don't know what speeds you have but faster is best. I also use 30 degree profile cutters but you do need to take care as that 30 degree tip is rather prone to breakage if your not careful. These are the people I buy engraving cutters from. Excellent quality and service. Their product has proved to me that its worth buying from them. https://www.2linc.com/engraving_tools.htm They have lots of specialty cutters but this is the one I use for virtually everything: C-125-2.0-60-.010-S Try not to buy Chinese for these. The quality is really important if you want to get good clean cuts. Believe me, it is money well spent and if treated properly they last a long time. I have cut over 30 panels out of engraving plastic and may 25 PCBs with the same cutter and only now am I thinking of replacing it. I use a 2 flute 1/16"diameter end mill (1/8" dia. shank) for the acrylic. Slow spindle speed and fast feed rate is what you need so it doesn't melt on you. This is an example of what you should be getting as a final product assuming you set your feeds and speeds properly as well as cutting depth. This is also cut on engraving plastic. Another consideration is that when you use engraving plastic you don't need to fill in letters. It just happens naturally.:smilewink:

I would say that is one big AFFIRMATIVE :thumbup: Other than a select few on this forum, I suspect a lot of us here have never really considered magnetic switches in any detail. With the advent of Ians DCS-BIOS and the mods that Gadroc is proposing, Magnetic switches can become a reality in our cockpits. Tekkx has already indicated his intention to try and solve this problem,:smilewink: so lets give him a hand. Lets use this thread as a brain storming session and see if we can't collectively figure out an easy way to make these for ourselves. We have the code, we need the switch...Post your ideas or solutions, pictures, sketches (read:drawings :smilewink:) or whatever. Lets see what we can come up with.:)

Why don't you setup a new thread for the mag switches so we can all comment and contribute to coming up with an easier solution than spending mega bucks to buy them. Anything related to the code should stay here. Does that sound like a reasonable approach?

Looks like he has contracted the disease people. There is no known cure my friend.:( But your panel is excellent. Looks really nice. And the phrase "built like a brick shit house"...I think that applies as well.:P Looking forward to more pics Deezle.

That is really quite an excellent build. Well done. :thumbup: I was looking at your Flickr site...those bearings you have should make it feel just fabulous. What are you using to control the friction? Is it that black plastic component on the side? Are you planning to back light the control panel? I've been keeping an eye out for collectives as I intend to build a UH-1 cockpit when my A10 is complete.

Mike, this is indeed an excellent step forward. Way to go!:thumbup: I expect there are quite a few others, including myself, that are in the same boat as Gadroc. I too have an HSI just sitting on a shelf waiting... I'm hoping to drive it with synchros as the alternative is going to be me ripping it apart and trying to drive it with stepper motors.:( I would rather not tear it down as it is a beautiful instrument and it would be extremely satisfying to see it function on its own volition without any extreme modification.

Thanks guys. I found out through one of our esteemed colleagues. The throw is only .07" Nowhere near what I expected. My thanks to everyone.:)

I'm starting to design the fuel panel and I need some help with the push-pull knobs that disable the fill action for the two sets of tanks. What I need is the total pull distance for these knobs. I imagine they are around .375" but I would rather not guess. So if anyone knows what this distance is I would very much appreciate you forwarding that on to me.:) Thanks in advance. John

Hi Tom These are the people I use for engraving plastic. It will be a good place to begin looking for a suitable replacement material in you neck of the woods. http://www.rowmark.com/distributor/northamerica/canada.asp You had asked about nixie tubes and stepper motors... I believe Ian was going to look at creating a stepper class for DCS BIOS which we may see in the next release. There are many examples to be found on the Internet that will let you include stepper motors if you are in a hurry and don't want to wait. I don't know when the next release will be as Ian is extremely busy with exams and school at the moment. The nixie tubes, I don't think so. After discussing this at some length it was decided that because there are so many types of displays, only the most popular one would be included. That was the 1602 LCD type and there has been a tutorial already produced. Any other displays would need to be coded by the user. I think you will find that with a bit of research, you will find that somebody, somewhere has already written code for that particular device. Hope that helps Tom.:) John

Well that was a rather interesting video... COMBINED ARMS! eh! It opened my eyes to even more possibilities.:pilotfly: OMG "the door gunner simulator" :gun_smilie: I definitely have to have one of those. " you just don't lead'm as far" :megalol: And to boot, I finally found a use for this little puppy. I built it a few years ago and, after turning some heads at the range, it just sits in my play room collecting dust ("yes there's a gun lock on it")... so maybe I could use this beauty instead of building an M-60.:thumbup: Yah, I know its a little dated (1917 to be exact) but, what the hell...it still a machine gun. :megalol: OK...stop with the comments... I'll build an M-60. I just need to get some detailed drawings and I'll be "good to go". Give me couple of weeks or by the time Oculs Rift has a consumers version of their product :smilewink: and I'll have one of these (see link below :yes: ) in the basement for my simulator and I can save my 1917 machine gun for ARMA... (WWI):lol: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/US_Navy_030309-N-4142G-005_Aviation_Warfare_Systems_Operator_Jon_Leney_checks_a_M-60_machine_gun_during_a_pre-flight_inspection_on_an_SH-60_Seahawk_helicopter.jpg/1280px-thumbnail.jpg I also have to show this video to my wife. She wasn't very happy to learn I was, in fact, building three cockpits... but they'll be just like the ones in the video... Easily converted from one style of aircraft to another and another. And they said it couldn't be done. hmmm! I may need to increase my cockpit budget after this.:music_whistling: