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The Custard Pit :)


Devon Custard

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Zip containing fritzing file and copper layouts, normal and mirrored. Have fun toner transferring, took me a couple times.

 

Layout uses these tactile switches, and is designed for exporting the switches out to my brydling 256 board, hence the breakout to blocks of 8/16. Plan was to use another smaller daughterboard with 40 way headers and a 12V connector for the backlight LEDs

 

Tactile-Switches-Used-in-Digital-and-Commniucation-Feild.jpg

cdu2.zip


Edited by Devon Custard
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Looks good DC. Make sure you have good ventilation though, that place looks like a bunker

 

PMSL.

 

 

I actually got an agreement with the builder we bought the house from that he would cut a vent hole in the wall for me. Right now the lasers by the door and i just run the hose outside. But yeah it does doesnt it :)

 

Half tempted to drywall it and slap paint on it. maybe when the pit gets close to finishing, will need to dismantle some of the workbenches anyway.

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Yup. i have to, theres not really enough space with WAXIs plans to use the "shoulder" method, well not without a lot of precise shaping of the shoulders and i really dont want to sand and shape that many buttons when i can simply glue onto the transparency.

 

Im loving these LED strips. Cant remember who suggested them (Warhog?) but they are really superb, so easy and prepackaged with resistors. When i think of my first efforts at building this and the pain in soldering that many connections *shudder*.

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Yup. i have to, theres not really enough space with WAXIs plans to use the "shoulder" method, well not without a lot of precise shaping of the shoulders and i really dont want to sand and shape that many buttons when i can simply glue onto the transparency.

 

Im loving these LED strips. Cant remember who suggested them (Warhog?) but they are really superb, so easy and prepackaged with resistors. When i think of my first efforts at building this and the pain in soldering that many connections *shudder*.

 

Yup, that was me. I love them as well for panel back lighting. It makes it so easy. This is my UFC with the same strips although I am going to paint the sides of the buttons to reduce the light leakage.

 

 

IMG_0131_1.jpg

 

And BTW, if I haven't mentioned it, your panels are looking rather excellent.:thumbup:

 

Have you decided on a display for the CDU?

 

One other question, after looking at you PCB, I can't figure out how all the grounds are wired together. Is it a double sided board?

Regards

John W

aka WarHog.

 

My Cockpit Build Pictures...



John Wall

 

My Arduino Sketches ... https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-Dc0Wd9C5l3uY-cPj1iQD3iAEHY6EuHg?usp=sharing

 

 

WIN 10 Pro, i8-8700k @ 5.0ghz, ASUS Maximus x Code, 16GB Corsair Dominator Platinum Ram,



AIO Water Cooler, M.2 512GB NVMe,

500gb SSD, EVGA GTX 1080 ti (11gb), Sony 65” 4K Display

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Thanks hog, always nice to have good feedback.

 

I found a 3.5 inch display at lcdstore.de VGA connector so will hook direct to PC.

 

As for the grounds I group them into banks of 16 and just link the one half of the tactile. Pins 1 and 2, and pins 3 and 4 are linked so I can easily ground them. Tempted to ditch the brydling in favour of a custom arduino now.....

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Could I ask a few questions, I have a home made CNC which runs a Dremel but I cannot get any decent engraving of letters.

 

As soon as I put a font in the design the G Code sends the engraver around so many times the letter gets wider and wider despite which font I use. Are you engraving deep or is it basically taking just the black paint off and scratching the plastic?

 

How many coates of black did you put over the white?

 

How did you make the buttons and the cutouts so precise? After I engraved the buttons at what should have been .5mm smaller than the holes I had to sand them to fit and the gaps are so huge and irregular I couldnt backlight.

 

The buttons are probably the piss poor tolerances of a home made CNC!

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Could I ask a few questions, I have a home made CNC which runs a Dremel but I cannot get any decent engraving of letters.

 

As soon as I put a font in the design the G Code sends the engraver around so many times the letter gets wider and wider despite which font I use. Are you engraving deep or is it basically taking just the black paint off and scratching the plastic?

 

How many coates of black did you put over the white?

 

How did you make the buttons and the cutouts so precise? After I engraved the buttons at what should have been .5mm smaller than the holes I had to sand them to fit and the gaps are so huge and irregular I couldnt backlight.

 

The buttons are probably the piss poor tolerances of a home made CNC!

 

I know your pain, took me ages to sort it out, and in the end the biggest issue was the type of paint.

 

At present my process is this.

 

3mm thick Acrylic sheet - semi opaque white. Cant see through it but if you use the LED strips (the 5050 type i.e the ones on that come on the reel) it shows through fine.

 

I then airbrush acrylic paint over the top. I apply as many coats as it takes for the backlight strip not to show through the paint . This is always going to differ depending on how you paint, the type of paint etc. I use an air gun thats more suitable for laying down paint over larger areas - for the speed.

 

I then use my laser to engrave through paint and about 1mm into the acrylic. Then i cut.

 

The problem with other paints is that my laser scorches the paint around the area im cutting. I tried using masks but still had problems with scorched paint.

 

I found for my particular laser that reducing the scan gap to .025 mm, uni directional engraving (it only cuts moving top to bottom - doubles the time but smoother more accurate cut) and turning the blower off - i think this stops the superheated air at the engraving point being forced over a wider area. I also reduce the speed that the laser moves at.

 

It took me a good few months of trial and error and various different types of materials. My only concern with using a dremel is that i know the spindle/collet doesnt hold bits very securely. The vibrations loosen the collet and so the bit wobbles and hence your accuracy decreases as the cutting head wobbles. I have the same issue with the laser, too fast and the chassis starts to shake and the beam is striking with ever decreasing accuracy. Again this is all about the equipment and materials you work with. I started another thread about engraving and there were some seriously detailed discussions in there about CNC engraving., have a scan over it, might give you what you are looking for.

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Also, the reason i redid the CDU and used WAXIs plans is that i needed to make the buttons bigger. The font size i was working with just impractical to engrave with. I worked out the minimum space i could cut acrylic with (about 2mm between cuts gives me 1mm of actually acrylic). I just couldnt cut letters that were readable so i had to make them bigger. Sounds like you have the same issue., maybe go a touch larger?

 

Stick fonts might be a better solution for CNC as well. I was looking at going the stick font route until i finally got things to work


Edited by Devon Custard
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Could I ask a few questions, I have a home made CNC which runs a Dremel but I cannot get any decent engraving of letters.

 

As soon as I put a font in the design the G Code sends the engraver around so many times the letter gets wider and wider despite which font I use. Are you engraving deep or is it basically taking just the black paint off and scratching the plastic?

 

How many coates of black did you put over the white?

 

How did you make the buttons and the cutouts so precise? After I engraved the buttons at what should have been .5mm smaller than the holes I had to sand them to fit and the gaps are so huge and irregular I couldnt backlight.

 

The buttons are probably the piss poor tolerances of a home made CNC!

 

Alright off topic a bit but please explain how you made a home CNC with a Dremel? I have wanted to do this FOREVER and just don't know how to put it all together..

"Pride is a poor substitute for intelligence."

RAMBO

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Alright off topic a bit but please explain how you made a home CNC with a Dremel? I have wanted to do this FOREVER and just don't know how to put it all together..

 

There are several CNC kits out there that are Dremel based. I don't have link handy but they are out there.

 

Just an example:

 

http://www.quality-handtool-review.com/dremel-cnc.html#sthash.zv6lHaeN.dpbs


Edited by cichlidfan
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I used the cheap black aerosol cans from WM to paint white acryl. Turned out pretty good. My process was first cut the shape, paint (so the sides are covered too) , engrave. Quality of engraving improved a lot after I got air assist attachment, no more random flames with it

 

Outlawal, many ways to skin a cat. Plenty of tutorials available. You can scratch build, but Maybe a kit like" shapeoko" will suit you better.

 

But frankly I think laser is much better tool for panel making.

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Anton.

 

My pit build thread .

Simple and cheap UFC project

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I used the cheap black aerosol cans from WM to paint white acryl. Turned out pretty good. My process was first cut the shape, paint (so the sides are covered too) , engrave. Quality of engraving improved a lot after I got air assist attachment, no more random flames with it

 

Outlawal, many ways to skin a cat. Plenty of tutorials available. You can scratch build, but Maybe a kit like" shapeoko" will suit you better.

 

But frankly I think laser is much better tool for panel making.

 

Woooop wooop time to start the laser vs cnc debate!!!! Women and children to the lifeboats please

 

 

:helpsmilie::music_whistling::doh:

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Alright off topic a bit but please explain how you made a home CNC with a Dremel? I have wanted to do this FOREVER and just don't know how to put it all together..

 

I'm nearly done building a "Momus CNC" which uses a laminate trimmer for the spindle. It's a bit larger than a Dremel though not much. I bought the plans for $20 from this site: http://momuscnc.com/ I chose it because it's a very well thought out design capable of cutting light metal as well as plastic, and because it was something I could build without having an outrageous assortment of tools. (I do have a $100 bench top drill press though.)

 

Even if this is not something you're interested in, I recommend considering buying the plans. They are extremely well done and the introductory material covers a number of points to be considered if you're planning on designing your own or evaluating the designs of others.

 

There are a number of detail pix taken as I made the parts for the CNC here:

 

http://mikesflightdeck.com/oldnews/oldnews_2013.html

 

and here:

 

http://mikesflightdeck.com/oldnews/oldnews_2012.html

 

(WOW! I did not realize I had let this project drag on for so long! I really gotta finish this puppy...)

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Could I ask a few questions, I have a home made CNC which runs a Dremel but I cannot get any decent engraving of letters.

 

As soon as I put a font in the design the G Code sends the engraver around so many times the letter gets wider and wider despite which font I use. Are you engraving deep or is it basically taking just the black paint off and scratching the plastic?

 

How many coates of black did you put over the white?

 

How did you make the buttons and the cutouts so precise? After I engraved the buttons at what should have been .5mm smaller than the holes I had to sand them to fit and the gaps are so huge and irregular I couldnt backlight.

 

The buttons are probably the piss poor tolerances of a home made CNC!

 

A homemade cnc should have good tolerances for doing engraving.

 

It is possible that you have coded the wrong size cutter. E.g. said you have a .2mm tip when you actually have a .5mm, or whatever. This would cause the letters to be larger than anticipated, not hugely so in this example but really depends on the size of the cutter and how far out you are. Examples would be useful, I could probably guess by seeing what is happening.

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Ive got some rustoleum and that was absolute crap.

 

@Mr Burns - ive got some spare white acrylic scraps , probably will run a spare set of of buttons this weekend. Want em?

 

Very, very kind of you to offer but I would imagine there will be much more deserving recipients than me and someone will bite your hand off!

 

I have done a UFC with the Dremel, perfect it isnt but I have dismantled the CNC and started to bulk it up and I may buy a proper router motor rather than the dremel.

 

ufc-back_zpsb6b513d0.jpg

 

ufc-front_zps8186abb7.jpg

 

 

The letters are really quite blurry (hence my questions as yours are nice and crisp) and In the end because I was having so much trouble with just the buttons I resorted to gluing printed letters on the actual panel when I wanted to engrave them.

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Alright off topic a bit but please explain how you made a home CNC with a Dremel? I have wanted to do this FOREVER and just don't know how to put it all together..

 

This was the beast. Metalandwood helped heaps with the final setuup and some gcode help (proof of the great guys on this forum):

 

 

 

9e12dabb-7f95-4bd2-86de-c2deb7a971ca_zps31cb7bdd.jpg

 

Actually I think this was the phtot I sent him and he showed me it was the wrong way around.


Edited by Mr_Burns
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The letters are really quite blurry (hence my questions as yours are nice and crisp) and In the end because I was having so much trouble with just the buttons I resorted to gluing printed letters on the actual panel when I wanted to engrave them.

 

The letters are blurry because your spindle motor (dremel tool) probably has excessive "runout". In other words you spindle shaft is not running perfectly true in that axis. That causes all sorts of bad things to happen when it comes to getting nice accurate cuts. No one should use a dremel tool for a spindle motor or even a drill press for that matter. First they do not have adequate lateral support so the shaft , not to mention the whole dremel tool gets all these pressures applied to it in directions that it was never designed to handle. Second, they just don't use quality parts or parts with the tolerances required to perform consistently or accurately. There accuracy is really at the level of "hand held". That's what they were designed for so I wouldn't expect to get much better than if you did it by hand.

 

Then there's the whole issue of backlash which also causes many more bad things to happen.

 

What it gets down to is if you want good, consistent quality you have to use good equipment. Unfortunately that means spending a fair chunk of money. There really is no other way around it.:( If funds are at a premium I would get it done commercially. It would be less money but then you would miss out on the adventure of learning to do engraving/cnc.:music_whistling:

 

You know, for a piddley little flight simulator which is basically free and maybe fifty bucks for my A10 you sure can spend a huge (did I say huge?):doh:,

I meant HUGE amount of money. :cry: :megalol:

Regards

John W

aka WarHog.

 

My Cockpit Build Pictures...



John Wall

 

My Arduino Sketches ... https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-Dc0Wd9C5l3uY-cPj1iQD3iAEHY6EuHg?usp=sharing

 

 

WIN 10 Pro, i8-8700k @ 5.0ghz, ASUS Maximus x Code, 16GB Corsair Dominator Platinum Ram,



AIO Water Cooler, M.2 512GB NVMe,

500gb SSD, EVGA GTX 1080 ti (11gb), Sony 65” 4K Display

VPC MongoosT-50, TM Warthog Throttle, TRK IR 5.0, Slaw Viper Pedals

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