Aussie Lapidary Forum

LAPIDARY => Tips and Gadgets => Topic started by: Ghost on December 03, 2018, 03:39:31 PM

Title: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: Ghost on December 03, 2018, 03:39:31 PM



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O8xArDRyas


Regards,    Ghost

Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: MALACHI on December 03, 2018, 05:44:21 PM
Wow that so cool.   :o Just love to watching automatic machines in operation.   :)  Hey MakkyBrown, here's a challenge for you. I'm sure you'd be able to put one of these together.  ::) ;)
Cheers  beers
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: Rusted on December 03, 2018, 08:47:52 PM
For more, towards the end of the first video there's a link to a longer one, it's worth a look too.
From comments the machine can only do round stones, and not even the girdle on them.
Polishing is done by hand on quite a strange machine too.
The second one shows the machine preforming stones, and some strange burner machine doing something to a whole heap of stones simultaneously.
Awesome machine, but I have seen videos of better machines that can do all shapes but only cut one stone at a time.
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: MakkyBrown on December 03, 2018, 09:18:53 PM
I'm starting to build a machine atm, but it's still going to be manually used. I'm just going to take away the time consuming bits with stepper motors. Height and index control will be motor driven. Horizontal slide on linear rails. Steppers arrived today.
 
I wonder how they transfer all those stones.
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: Rusted on December 04, 2018, 07:04:08 AM
I thought the burner machine in the second video had something to do with transfer at first, but no.
I wonder how they turn all those dops at once when they are so close together. You can see the drive shaft turning while they are preforming in the second video. It looks like they all turn the same direction at once so it's not a chain of tiny gears driving them, too much backlash in that sort of setup anyway. A tiny worm/wheel on each dop might do it?
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: Rusted on December 05, 2018, 06:15:10 PM
This looks more like something that Makky could build

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnKcl2rw-qg

I have just spent an hour or so having a look at what the Indian and Sri Lankan manufactureres are making, very interesting, Imahashi type machines, concave facetors, Ultra tec type machines, even a VJ type. Sterling in Sri Lanka look to be quite good machines.
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: MakkyBrown on December 06, 2018, 09:26:09 PM
I could, I think I'll go the one gem at a time option first and still leave it so I feel I'm doing the cutting. Not having to physically change the index, horizontal slide and mast height will speed things up a lot.

I can easily cut anything in 2 dimensions on the mill with high precision.  I just need to design around what I can do easily with the mill and lathe.
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: FlashGP on December 16, 2018, 09:39:22 AM
Makky,

you done need to make a machine to automatically cut stones if you have a mill with a turret that tilts, just mount the la where the cutter goe and the dop on a tool holder mounted on an indexing head and cut away. beers
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: MakkyBrown on December 16, 2018, 11:25:50 AM

Flash
My mill is not that fancy, just 3 axis. Even still I just can't see a cheaply built automated machine having the accuracy where  I'd be happy with the finished stones. Maybe one day.
Title: Re: One At A Time - Please!
Post by: FlashGP on December 17, 2018, 08:43:37 AM
Hi Makky,  I agree with your last comment regarding accuracy.  My mates' mill is calibrated to 0.001mm, but it weighs several tonne, ex TAFE equipment.

However some home engineers will be good enough to make a CNC cutter accurate enough for the job.  The bigger issue would be presssure sensors so the stone isnt squashed on the lap.

I just threw my earlier comment half in jest.  Whenyou think about it, faceting machines are really just prescision grinders. 

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