New grinder plans for download

Atlas Knife Company

Atlas Knife Company

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Feb 16, 2010
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Well, a few weeks ago I took the plans for the EERF grinder from BlindHogg to my local shop. They priced it out at around $60 per part. Apparently it's the setup cost of each part and laying out a new piece of steel for each part. So, I put them all in one DXF and laid them out to fit on a single piece of 12" x 48" x 1/2" plate. I couldn't fit the platen in the plans under 36" so I extended to 48" and added a toolrest.

If ANYONE has any problems with this, let me know. I'm not trying to take credit for anything, other than laying them out in a single DXF. Well, I laid out the platen and toolrest from scratch.

Thanks to Jamie & BlindHogg. If you guys want to post this with your available files, feel free to.
 

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I took a look, if anyone needs dimension let me know, I am adding them right now. Nice work zaph:thumbup:
 
Any chance of getting a download of a jpeg for those of us who don't have a CAD program to open dxf at home? I'm definitely interested, just want to be able to see what you've come up with.

Either way, thanks for posting this!
 
Nice job, I will put them up on my website if you like and give you full credit of course for nesting the files and with coming up with the cool smiley platen and toolrest.
CW
 

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amcardon said:
Any chance of getting a download of a jpeg for those of us who don't have a CAD program to open dxf at home? I'm definitely interested, just want to be able to see what you've come up with.

Either way, thanks for posting this!
Click to expand...
Give me 30 seconds and your email and I will have it without dimensions for you, the red lines will form a 1" grid


Beaten to it, I forgot to save my work and had to re do the grid
 
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Looks good. :thumbup:

It will vary from shop to shop, but I wouldn't personally run that layout. The pieces are a little to close together for my liking. I space them out further when I do my layouts.

Jamie
 
polarbearforge said:
Looks good. :thumbup:

It will vary from shop to shop, but I wouldn't personally run that layout. The pieces are a little to close together for my liking. I space them out further when I do my layouts.

Jamie
Click to expand...
A good waterjet shop only needs about .050" gap for their kerf.
The guy I just used only used up .040".

That being said, I would seriously think hard about a shop that wanted to charge you $60 a part Zaph, they really should be able to nest those parts themselves...

Pretty lame to want to set up individual parts.

I personally wouldn't let them cut my parts unless their price was real inexpensive, and my butt would still be clenched the whole time.
 
Brian Fellhoelter Knives said:
A good waterjet shop only needs about .050" gap for their kerf.
The guy I just used only used up .040".

That being said, I would seriously think hard about a shop that wanted to charge you $60 a part Zaph, they really should be able to nest those parts themselves...

Pretty lame to want to set up individual parts.

I personally wouldn't let them cut my parts unless their price was real inexpensive, and my butt would still be clenched the whole time.
Click to expand...

The spacing I'm referring to is for the skeleton, not kerf. My kerf is about 0.010" for half inch steel. My machine is also a laser, not a waterjet. With some of those pieces so close together, the heat buildup would cause issues. A little extra skeleton material is a small price to pay for the speed I can cut it at.

It is lame to charge that much per part for nesting. We don't do that. I have a feeling it could be a "well, if he really wants it and we don't really want to do it, then we'll charge a lot for it" type of things.

Jamie
 
I didn't realize he was using laser...
Sure seems like he's getting the f*** off price doesn't it?
"We'll do it, but it'll cost you..."

I didn't know that lasers has only a .010" kerf, that's nice and thin.

I always use waterjet, so am always trying to minimize my skeleton to reduce wasted material.
 
Brian Fellhoelter Knives said:
I didn't realize he was using laser...
Sure seems like he's getting the f*** off price doesn't it?
"We'll do it, but it'll cost you..."
Click to expand...

It sure does seem that way. I don't know if he originally went to laser or waterjet, I was just offering a laser perspective.

I always use waterjet, so am always trying to minimize my skeleton to reduce wasted material.
Click to expand...

As do I, when it makes sense. There are times where it's not worthwhile.

Jamie
 
I can spread them out a little. Still room to do that. Nothing is closer than 1/8" from anything else. I wasn't sure how much skeleton there needed to be. Also, I might redo it with all the hole in a separate layer so they can be cut first. I might also redo a second one that is nut-free. Back side designed to be tapped instead through bolted. Just to make it look a little neater.

Ackelson just got a CNC plasma and they want small projects to test with, so I'm looking at $80 for steel and $75 for the cutting. At that price, I can't pass it up.

Here's the latest version. I removed the attachment from this post and changed to the latest version on the OP.

Blindhogg: You can put this version, One Piece V3.dxf on your site.
 
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New version uploaded. The bottom pieces were below the bottom line so I moved everything up 1/8". Also, I moved all the interior cuts to LAYER 1 and Thanks to LAYER 2. Nothing is closer than 1/8" to the next piece.

Both the smiley platen and work rest use angle irons and they aren't included in this.

Jamie: How thick of a skeleton would you recommend?

Attached is a PDF of the latest layout for Amcardon.
 

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zaph1 said:
Jamie: How thick of a skeleton would you recommend?
Click to expand...

When I layout 1/2 steel, I usually leave about .350 between parts. If I'm tabbing the parts in so that they are still connected by a small amount of material, I may go closer. Other operators with other machines may have different spacing guildelines. This is what I have found the best for me. The machine I run moves really quickly from position to position (11,000 inches per minute, not a typo). Sometimes if parts tip, there isn't enough time for gravity to let them fall.

Jamie
 
Yeehaaa...

11,000 IPM is like 10mph

That's moving right along.

I've never had to figure machine speed in MPH before...
 
Usually about the same distance from the edge depending on the condition of the edge. Many sheets a radius on the sides. I'll add a bit for these types of sheets. The look like ) from the side instead of ].

There's a calibration cycle on my machine that I run when I'm showing it to people. I have them stand right in front of the door and make the gantry move straight at them at full speed. Even though it's completely contained in an enclosure, people always step backwards away from it.

Jamie
 
I can fit everything on a 12"x48" piece with at least .375" between everything. Is that more viable? The other option is use a wider sheet than 12" but my supplier buddies say that flat bar stock only goes upto 12" then jump to 4', 5', etc.

Jamie: A question about your CNC software. My brother was concerned that everything had to be drawn in the order that it would cut. Is this true or does the CNC optimize the cut path when it imports the DXF? Also, do the holes need to be on a separate layer so they can be cut first?
 
zaph1 said:
I can fit everything on a 12"x48" piece with at least .375" between everything. Is that more viable? The other option is use a wider sheet than 12" but my supplier buddies say that flat bar stock only goes upto 12" then jump to 4', 5', etc.

Jamie: A question about your CNC software. My brother was concerned that everything had to be drawn in the order that it would cut. Is this true or does the CNC optimize the cut path when it imports the DXF? Also, do the holes need to be on a separate layer so they can be cut first?
Click to expand...

.375 is good. I would run it.

I can speak for the software that I use. It could care less about the order it was drawn. It has it's own optimizer for sequence, and I can modify it to pretty much run anyway that I want it to. Separate layers sometimes cause problems depending on the file. I prefer everythnig in one, and I can split off what I don'tneed.

Jamie
 
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