Author: josh

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42 Drill and alan key Bits Storage shelf with added removal function

The problem

been buying quick release bits from wish and other suppliers just storing them in bags is not cutting it any more to time a made a storage tray for them all. was doing a tidy up in the cave last night came across more bits. put them in a draw. was lying in bed about to sleep when I had this design in my head last night waited till morning to put it into a design. the joys of dyslexia.

I had made a shelf for my retro pi NES box last night teaching my self new skills with tabs so i thought of what i had done and thought how to incorporate it with the design i was thinking of to make it a wall-mounted shelf.

  • Back showing tabs.
  • Quick and dirty retro pi shelf
  • Done works well

So the principle for this is that all screwdriver hex bits are 1/4″ or for us, brits 6.35mm hex so on that principle i am going to do a test cut to make sure if i use the laser to cut that size it will fit if not will adjust its size.

first up lets design the tray going to be made up of 3 layers.

The first layer will be the baseboard and slider, Slider I hear you say what that for, all will be explained in the design. layer 2 and 3 will hold the bits.

Time to fire up my trusty Lightburn software to design and then cut it using a laser cutter.

Have made H counter leaver design for the wall if this does not hold the weight might go from tabs to another idea but cross that bridge when we come to it.

The first draft of the tool shelf with quick slide made the design up on the fly. for 4mm MDF

I will release the design once i have perfected it as with any project it might or might not be 100 per cent right the first time but let’s give it a go.

Time to test the hex size and then cut the full pattern, the joys of using light burn select the test part and then turn on cut selected graphics will only cut the one hexagon so i can make sure it fits.

Don’t forget to turn the option off after test cut.

Tested and yes i was right it was a little off and my thoughts of it being wrong were right so a little tweek. So now to test cut the design and make sure it all fits together before i glue it.

Wait I just thought of something to make it better!

Ok, i have decided to make 1 design change before the first cut to make the shelf more stable by adding second stabilization bar to stop any movement when taking the shelf in and out. the joys of having a dyslexic mind can figure out issues without even putting thigs down on paper.

Spot the 4 extra tabs in the design.
almost done.

So to assemble going to use 4 m3 screws and nuts to hold the 3 layers together will then mount to the wall using 2 X 4mm self tappers. going to glue using quick contact spray and glue.

Screws ready to put it together.
Screwfix special nice and cheap but great.
all glued right few issues but let mount it on the wall.

All glued let’s mount it and test it.

Not as tight as i want it. on the hex time to modify.

I am going to revamp the design slightly as a little too much play in the hexagons. and 2 back screws are binding so removed works fine so might just change base plate slightly to get it to work as well.

So back to the power of lightburn. Changed the dimensions by .300 in x and y to get a tighter fit. will test it tonight. I removed 2 back screws to stop it hitting the cross braces. I then took a few mm out of the back to stop it binding. will do cut of modified bits tonight and post findings later.

The fix changed the dimensions of the hex.

Will update this later once i have had time to cut modified bits. will then post the design.

did some more finessing of the design to make it much more usable have adjusted holes to make a tight fit and removed all bolts apart from m3 which are used for aligning the 2 hex panels during alignment and then glued boards in place.

the updated file works fine.
updated not bolts version just glued in place
all working fine.

Lightburn File download. please find a link to the file i have added information to the file that should be removed LINK

please enjoy and don’t sell my work.

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Using Lightburn to make quick key rings for fun gifts on a 50w laser cutter.

Thought i would out a quick video for your entertainment as ran lots of these before Christmas as gifts for son’s nursery they are quick and easy to do.

Enjoy the video.

Heres how i did it in non-video format.

Step 1.

Open up Lightburn create and name in whatever font you like in my case have used army chalk font and my son’s name.

Step 2.

Using the offset toolset 3mm or bigger offset outwards with rounded selected.

Step 3.

Then i add the Ring for the keyring. this is done by adding a 4mm circle then adding 4mm offset as shown below.

Step 4.

Time to join them together place the rights and the outer edge together as shown below. select the outer edge of the keyring and outer circle then select the weld all shapes tool just below the offset tool.

Selected edges before the weld.
Selected edges now joined after weld.

Step 5.

To change the inner test to engrave path. in my case, I have the blue layer set for engraving. so, first of all, I select the text. then click on the blue layer to change it to fill layer.

Inner text selected before i then clicks on my blue layer to change it to a filled layer or engraved.
All ready to engrave and cut.

Step 6.

Settings in my case as i currently using 4mm Laserply that is a little unstable with glue blobs i currently cutting at 40% power 4mm/s and Engraving at 65% power and 350mm/s. now it’s ready to engrave and cut. This usually is around 2mins per keyring. can be done with an array of fonts i tend to do sheets at a time to make it cost-effective.

Step 7.

Wood prep work i tend to go over my laser ply boards with 400grit sandpaper on my orbital sander both sides before applying paper finishing tape. can see me smoothing it down int he video. now ready to cut.

Step 7.

Clean up and ringing of the key rings. i tend to peal all finishing tape and then light sand if needed i then grab my keyrings that have a solid ring with a split in it using snub nose pliers i insert it inside the ring and force apart i then place the ring through the wood and close using the pliers. bit hard to photo there is some over headshots of this in the video.

Finished items. from the video.

can use whatever font you like. to do this.

hope you enjoyed this project as much as i did. great gifts and work out under 50p each to make. did 100s of them over the Christmas and new year for friends and family.

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I will be adding more videos

New projects got some fun idea coming up on the site already filmed the next video which i will post this evening. if time allows it as have been busy working on getting on of my rental property ready for new Tennent.

Have already filmed another video that one is more of an experiment to improve a project i saw over on a friends youtube channel.

So the next video is a how-to make quickly customizable keyrings for gifts using a laser cutter and lightburn software.

Followed by Resin pour using ink and glow in the dark powder if this works will lead on to a bigger project as thinking of doing some night lights for my boy using led fairy lights and some resin cast stars will be also making my own silicone mould to cast the stars.

Hoping to get my CNC machine working as well as want to do some cool stuff with that shortly.

got any ideas for a project and need some help drop me a line as always looking for ideas and would love to help some other bloggers or youtube channels.

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Inlay Project part 2 clean up and polish prep work for filming.

have used 2 120grit sanding discs so far to get it down to a nearly flat state as my workbench is not a level as i thought it was. So the E has not filled in as i would like.

I will use a 600, 800 and 1500 grit discs before the video starts as till i get a vice cannot show this on my workbench.

time to sand some more.
orbital sanding done now for a quick clean

ready for 2500 and some micro-abrasive to take the scratches out and then a final polish after.

micro abrasive and polish 2500grit
ready to film the cleanup then polish

will be filming it tomorrow. as have an ill little boy tonight so think its going to be a long night.

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More video content incoming with sound and multiple cameras if all works well.

Have had some technical difficulties with cameras and mic but think i have solved some of these issues hopefully by end of tonight i can film part two of the resin infill project so if all works will do this tomorrow.

very happy with the first attempt i have whizzed down the excess resin with my orbital sander and some 120grit sandpaper. Really need a sanding booth dust out brake think next time will do it outside.

some pitting from my bench not being level. now to make it shine.

Good News seems to all be working now just got to do some re-running of USB cables to get rid of the issues with running more than 2 HD cams on one USB port. Will test out the gaming headset for mic audio.

touch wood will all be good so i can film the final finishing of the coaster.

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Laser engraved Costers with Resin infill Part 1

Right, this has been a long time coming but i have finally got around to doing a video its not perfect as i need to 1 work on my video editing skills its a new bit of software i am using. 2 work on my narration skills as i think i can do better. i know i am probably being a little hard on my self but such is me.

Anyhow, I hope you enjoy the video part 2 should be out in the not so near future maybe even later see how time goes as off playing airsoft in the morning so got to charge up my hpa tanks so might not get time to film me sanding down the resin.

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Video incoming and new year new projects.

New video series i will be producing a video to go with all my future projects.

As going live has been not happening due to life and work commitments i will be producing videos of all my projects and putting them on youtube as and when i do them this will be the not so live from the mancave series.

I will be starting the ball rolling with a video about laser engraving bamboo coasters and then infiling them with resin.

Part 1 should be released tonight. as in the cold weather the resin hasn’t set as quickly as it should hoping tonight it’s less sticky so i can fill me sanding and polishing it. then can put together part 2 and get that out as well.

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I am back in the cave time for some fun with UV resin.

Well 2 weeks off meant to feel rested but now more tired than ever the joys of life. Never mind time to play with my Christmas gifts as requested crafting supplies.

UV resin and some Epoxy Resin, as i travelled back alone i ventured down to the man cave last night for some testing.

so for my first test, i decided to try UV resin. on a silicon mould and infill on a bamboo coster that i had laser engraved. So i fired up lightburn imported a welsh dragon logo as the brother in law wants a set of costers. i set the parameters to 350mms and 70%-65% power with 6 passes. I will modify this in the future as i want it to engrave deeper in fewer passes. i then pored around 10ml of resin into a cup and added 6 drops of resin colour red to give a nice red resin using the stir stick i coated the engraving. then hardened using UV light. Now i had not removed the masking tape which was a mistake as when i peeled it took all the resin out of the engraving with the tape so started again with no tape didn’t now have enough to fill to level but get the overall effect was still stickie to the touch.

if it been the first attempt probably would have been perfect. just squeezed all i could out of the mix pot.

will sand it later and see what happens. then will repeat with Epoxy resin on the opposite side of the coster.

UV Resin test infill on bamboo after sanding. gives a nice infill even though i didn’t have enough resin.

The viscosity of the UV resin is quite thick and does not flow very well was going to use a syringe to apply resin but wouldn’t suck well. see how epoxy does. next up i half-filled a silicon mould with resin applied some dry flowers and then filled the mould with resin i then cured using UV light apparently need 30 mins only did a few mins so will need to try this again as very sticky after cure.

so time permitting will do some experimenting tonight as can see this being cool for some upcoming projects i want to do.

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Fun with different designs of wall-mounted spoolers

have since moving my Prusa mk3s to its new home on some racking been having issues finding a good wall mount spooler for it. so have been testing some from Thingiverse and www.prusaprinters.org that will fit into my set up. There might be more if none perform right.

Wall-mounted Spool holders tested.

Wall-mounted drybox by Ondřej Stříteský

This is a good 36hr print a really nice design

16hr print start
16hrs later.
rods and screws all installed as well as plastic membrane

The buidl:

Now as i have some 8mm tubing and all the bits have arrived from aliexpress time to build the box and see how she performs.

the print time is 36 hrs per box one failure as my new filament sensor was not turned on doh. hence the 2 tone box. still dialling in the printer.

funny looking humidity gauge thanks aliexpress.

Oh, Just opened up my humidity monitors from aliexpress turned out to be temp gauges so have ordered 5 more from bangood hope these ones are right but for time being they are going to be temp ones till bangood deliver.

the build come in 2 x 16 hr prints for each side of the shell. you are going to need 4 bearings and 2 x 100mm aluminium 8mm tubes 1 x M3 x 5mm. 2 x M3 x 10mm. and 2 x M3 x 30mm. and a panel mounts humidity meter bag plastic from a ziplock bag and some silica crystals to dry out the box.

the 8mm tube is a nice tight fit so i got some sandpaper and smoothed each end to allow bearings to fit better. then pushed them into pockets in the base of the dry box I then fitted the lid and added the 2 x M3 x 30mm bolts to the hinges and screwed them in. the M3 x 5mm holds on the lid catch i had to ream the channel that the plastic nub fits into slightly to get a nice tight fit. i also added another m3 x 5 mm to the lid to help it lockdown this was not mentioned in the guide but works well you then use a ziplock bag to cut out a rectangle window for the filament to go through this is then bolted down using 2 x M3 x 10mm bolts. as i have bags of silica gel i have added 2 to the box.

I then positioned the box to were I wanted to mount it I then use 4 self-tapping wood screws to fit it to my wall behind my printer.

Time to test.

very stiff on pulling out filament going to do some more testing later it’s not working right might be the cheap bearings from china. will play some more with this but taking up wall space. so going to remove it and test next design.

Conclusion:

my issues might be the cheap bearings i used. so will revisit this design shortly as like the idea of having my filament stored during our winters.

Next, i tried this nice looking spooler

Simple Wall Mounted Spool Holder by 3dprintaddict

This was a 9hr 30 min print and works great on standard spools but not on Prusa spools are a little wider than smaller 1kg rolls.

The build.

take it off the print bed take 2 self-tapping screws and screw to the wall ready to go.

Conclusion:

standard 1 kg roll of filament.

Just to small for my Prusa filament spools. will use it on another printer in the future.

Prusa 1kg roll of filament doesn’t fit.

Filament Spool Wall Mount by dermatin

As this one has been designed for Prusa printers i am hoping this will work for my set up its a clever system going to take 3 print runs to build have finished printing the base around 6hrs to print and am currently running the legs that a further 9+hrs then i will do the spoolers 9+hrs. you are going to need some parts for this build luckily i have all the parts from the days of printing fidget spinners. 8mm threaded rod from previous projects.

Legs are currently on the printer did the base earlier.

Parts list.

  • 160mm M8 Threaded rod.
  • 4 x 608 bearings.
  • 2 x M8 nuts

The Build.

all built up ready to mount.

In my case, i had to cut down a 1m bar threaded with my junior hacksaw. then ran the first nut to end of the bar. insert the 2 legs into the base ad 608 barings to each end of the spoolers. thread the bar through the bearings the legs and add the second nut tighten till not to much play one the spoolers.

attached mine to the wall with 3 self tappers and then covered with the hex caps.

fits the space perfectly

Conclusion.

This is the one for me as holds 2 full-size Prusa filament spools and easy to swap in and out. will be testing this over the next few weeks. as I am installing a heater in the next few days i will not need to have a covered spool.

Right finally go this out after a few months of issues and printer problems i can see the light.