I thought about a mirror, but I couldn’t come up with a way to reliably cut a 45 degree “slot” into the dowel. I thought, as an option, i could drill a 1/4 inch hole, and split a 1/4 inch dowel in half (minus the thickness of the mirror reflective surface) and attach the mirror to it. It seemed complex so I thought I’d try to just get a half round and polish it. I have one and I was able to polish it some (center shined up, but eges still are rough). needs more work.
Whether or not I can get an acceptable mirror surface is unknown. Also unknown is if I can get everything aligned well enough to make it useful. Will see. Fun experiment nevertheless.
I think the alignment is pretty critical considering what I’m trying to do. I don’t know how well I can create this. a 3d printed part might be better, but I don’t know.
I wonder if it would not be better to cut a dowel in half and smooth it out and then put the aluminum foil tape on it for the reflective part. I am not sure if it would be reflective enough, I will find my tape and see just how well it might work.
Maybe the block holding the mirror and camera could be bigger, with a piece of 1/2" dowel to put into the chuck? That way the mirror could fit into a 45-degree saw cut intersecting the dowel hole, which could extend all the way through the block, and the portion of block holding the camera could extend farther along the camera body.
Is something like this what you are suggesting? I see merit to it. You just need to make sure the mirror is at 45 degrees and the dowel going into the drill, the hole for the camera dowel and the mirror are attached in line. You can move the camera dowel up and down and CW/CCW to align the camera to the correct spot.
New to forum and skimmed thread. The problem is machine relation to actual. The encoders just tell you where the motor is. I’ve done work on production CNCs. A lot of them run encoders on the motors. The problem is uneven ways, backlash, and ballscrew stretch. The machine thinks it is in one place when it actually is located somewhere else. You can compensate with a comp table.
Ok…note to self replying applies to whole thread and not single post? Anyways the comp tables I have seen are usually based on a singe axis. Best way to say it is say your table has adjustments every .5 and the first adjustment is at .5. If you moved to say .025 the adjustment would not be applied. Move to .075 the adjustment would be applied. Moving back it would be removed.
Now I’m not privy to the actual code so I can’t tell you how it works. If you apply to one axis any moves you make will make the adjustments in terms of volume and not linear. I.E. an xy movement will apply both x comp and y comp. basically making the matrix for you. Also calibration would be simpler as all you would need is to make a linear move, then make a cut in perpendicular axis. The only problem with this set up and the Maslow that I can see is we would need a home position.
My two cents.
Welcome @happyk9! Thanks for your insight, I like the idea. The challenge with Maslow is that the X and Y planes do not have a direct one-to-one mapping to a motor as most CNCs do. Instead, to move the bit in a single X or Y plane, coordinated movements of both X and Y motors is required. This is due to the triangulated nature of the machine with the sled hanging off the chains.
Having said that, it may be possible to take the same idea and apply it to polar coordinates, which would allow direct translation onto our setup. That would be a cool idea.
I stumbled across the website that picture might have come from (http://www.optics-online.com/rms.asp) and what they show would work since it will also work as an external reflector. But the website sells in bulk quantities so will have to find a source elsewhere.
Reasonably accurate - layers can be .05 mm but an output nozzle of .4 makes .05 less reasonable. Really to keep a good flow planing on .5 layers with a .4 mm nozzle is a real world expectation. This is usually stated at 50 / 100 /150 microns - 50 - 350 microns is selectable in 50 micron increments in the software. You want it to mount in the 1/2 collet correct?
I understand that you are trying to get it in line with the bit, but if you were to have an off set and calculate on that offset you could have the camera directly mounted and permanent. Calculating the offset seems much less work and easier to accomplish. In some way I think there would be a way to monitor / record and use it to evaluate what happens when there is an error as well. " The Maslow Dashcam"
FYI, The SurplusShed.com has all kinds of military optics and prisms.
I have not personally bought anything from them, but they are a great source for ATMs ( Amateur Telescope Makers) , a second hobby of mine.
