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Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Thu May 28, 2020 11:34 pm
by Casey Burns
If anyone interested I am selling an old Atlas 6" lathe. Would be best if someone came and got it but I can ship it anywhere in a number of separate packages if interested. This is the type of lathe that I used for the first decade plus of my flute and bagpipe making career. Currently it is listed on Craigslist for $1200. Shipping would be extra, including a crating charge. It includes 3 and 4 jaw chucks, and Jacobs chucks for the tailstock and the head stock. The heast stock one is threaded internally. I wish there was one for the Myford lathe!

The Craigslist listing is here: https://seattle.craigslist.org/kit/tls/ ... 74375.html

For years I have used my friends Alden and Cali's laser engraver to label my flutes. then came the Pandemic in February and by early March, I joined everyone else in sheltering and home and isolation. For years I have been wanting in-house capacity to do this and finally have something that is working great. For a while I was hoping I could get one of these Silhouette Curio machines to work on a rounded surface and I am still pursuing modifications to that machine for engraving rings. Then the great Highland Bagpiper and friend of mine Murray Huggins informed me he was in a similar predicament. He invested in an inexpensive Chinese-made XY table and it engraves his chanters just fine. His mark is a little more linear than mine and I was always under the assumption that I needed something with a rotary axis like onthe machine I have been using. I considered one of these - simply converting the Y axis to a rotary axis.

About 4 months ago I saw a promotion for a rather poorly named but interesting concept of a tripod mounted laser engraver with a long focus of 200mm called the Laserpecker (see http://www.laserpecker.net). I saved the ad for the Kickstarter campaign as an image, more out of the humor about the brand name but then remembered it. Early in May Amazon started shipping these so I went ahead and ordered one ($321) and it arrived Saturday. There are 2 versions and the newer one isn't out yet. Unfortunately I found that the one I had produced laser dots that were .3mm across, equivalent to 86 dots per inch. The new one will be twice the resolution. However I was able to coax an acceptable result out of it. Then Sunday night someone commented on my image and mentioned a hack that he tried - simply attaching a magnifier lens over the laser window to focus the point into a tighter dot. I jyst happened to have a 50mm diameter lens with 100mm focal length in fused quartz that a local glass grinder gave me. This reduced the focal length of the laser unit to 78 mm and the resulting DPI is around 216 - better than the Pro version (the same hack will be useable on the Pro). Once I adjusted the focus on the test pieces I built a simple device consisting ofr an inexpensive XY table to hold the laser and a spindle that holds a flute head joint for the correct label position and alignment. Both are mounted onto a piece of 3/4" plywood. The XY table is useful for focusing and for centering. I located this in the workshop right next to one of the exhaust fans right next to the door to blow out the resulting wood smoke.

The results are good and sharp - and in some ways better than what I was getting with the expensive unit. Someone should be around when the unit is operating due to fire hazard thus while its operating, i am in there doing something else like tuning and voicing. I only have laser glasses for now and sitting at my tuning and voicing bench the lathe I use for boring blocks all light from reaching my eyes. A beep tells me when it is done. Its wonderful to have this in-house capability finally! Pictures below! I plan to upgrade to the Pro with even higher resolution.These are very well thought out tools and are excellent for this purpose.

Casey

Here is the Engraver setup. The LP is controlled by an app on an iPhone, iPad or Android via Bluetooth. It doesn't work off a Mac or a PC. Artwork can certainly be designed on these platforms and transferred to the tablet.
Image

Here is a closeup of the added lens - here inelegantly mounted with some duct tape. Some day I'll make a lens holder that will allow lenses of the same diameter but different focal lengths. Lens can be easily purchased at Edmunds Optics.
Image

Here is a nice sharp result in Boxwood. I've removed the "Washington" under the "Kingston" and stylized the icon in the middle (this is based on a columnal of a fossil sea lily that I have been studying for years in my paleontological life).
Image

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 1:42 am
by Andro
That is absolutely totally amazing Casey. I am deeply impressed.

I liked the Washington. People like me who live in Australia and are ignorant of US state geography will assume you are a maker in Jamaica. I'd vote for it back!

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:06 am
by PB+J
Wow marvelous work! I would not have thought you could simply focus a laser--I guess I assumed a laser was already as focused as it was going to get.

I'm always looking on craigslist at lathes. I have a very small wood lathe that barely works, but I've turned a few things on it--small bowls, Bodhran sticks, knobs for guitars. A neighbor has a big old south bend metal lathe that i could use but I'm hesitant to use it for the possibility of messing up someone else's tools.

I don't know why I look--I don't even have a way to transport a metal lathe and finding a place to put it would be challenging


What part of that crinoid are we seeing?

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 7:19 am
by Casey Burns
Kingston Jamaica, Kingston Ontario, Kingston Washington - it will be a puzzle for music historians in the next century.

Casey

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 8:27 am
by Geoffrey Ellis
That is incredibly cool! A really professional result.

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 10:08 am
by bigsciota
As soon as I heard the name I knew that no native English speaker was involved in the making of the "Laserpecker." Makes you wonder about all those Chinese character tattoos people get without actually knowing any Chinese...

But it looks wonderful!

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:03 pm
by an seanduine
bigsciota wrote:As soon as I heard the name I knew that no native English speaker was involved in the making of the "Laserpecker." Makes you wonder about all those Chinese character tattoos people get without actually knowing any Chinese...

But it looks wonderful!

激光 啄木鳥〔--鸟〕

PY zhuómùniǎo ☕PY jīguāng ☕
I would make that to be ¨Laser Woodpecker¨ which might be where the unfortunate translation comes from.

激光刀

PY jīguāngdāo ☕ Would be more apt, and translate as Laser Scalpel.

Bob

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:26 pm
by Nanohedron
Laserpecker ... :lol:

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:27 pm
by Peter Duggan
bigsciota wrote:As soon as I heard the name I knew that no native English speaker was involved in the making of the "Laserpecker."
No native US English speaker perhaps. We don't have the same problem with 'pecker' (which means something quite different) here. Hence my brother's American flatmate apparently in fits of laughter 40-odd years ago at a cinema advert stating 'a Double Decker [chocolate/cereal/nougat bar] keeps up your pecker'!

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:28 pm
by Nanohedron
Peter Duggan wrote:
bigsciota wrote:As soon as I heard the name I knew that no native English speaker was involved in the making of the "Laserpecker."
No native US English speaker perhaps. We don't have the same problem with 'pecker' (which means something quite different) here. Hence my brother's American flatmate apparently in fits of laughter 40-odd years ago at a cinema advert stating something like 'a Double Decker [chocolate/cereal/nougat bar] keeps up your pecker'!
On your side of the Pond do they still say "Keep your pecker up!"?

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 4:33 pm
by Peter Duggan
Nanohedron wrote:On your side of the Pond do they still say "Keep your pecker up!"?
Probably, but I don't know; it's not a phrase I've ever used, but of course I've known not to for 40-odd years!

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Fri May 29, 2020 9:08 pm
by Lozq
I just happened to have a 50mm diameter lens with 100mm focal length in fused quartz that a local glass grinder gave me.
This easily the best 'By coincidence, I actually happened to have....' statement I've heard in some time!

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Sat May 30, 2020 2:30 am
by Terry McGee
Casey Burns wrote:Kingston Jamaica, Kingston Ontario, Kingston Washington - it will be a puzzle for music historians in the next century.

Casey
Also a suburb (and shopping centre) in Canberra. Named after Charles Cameron Kingston, the former Premier of South Australia and minister in the first Australian Commonwealth Government.

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Sat May 30, 2020 4:23 am
by Maihcol
Nice work, Casey and I like the process you went through with it. I was looking at another brand of that same tripod mounted minilaser a few weeks back on Amazon but concluded that its 1.6W power rating either wouldn't be enough to make a visible engraving on black delrin - or might need a long time to do it.

I get my engraving done to look like a traditional stamp, which you need to look for on the barrel, rather than having it jump out at you. That means that a laser needs to be able to give some depth to the engraving on black delrin, or african blackwood for visibility. So, if I want to do it myself, I think I'd need one of the more powerful lasers, maybe one of the 20 - 40 watts CO2 models to be sure of getting the job done.

I was thinking I could put my name and model in a straight line in small lettering along the barrel to avoid the problem with laser focus due to surface curvature and thus not even need the rotational axis you added.

It came out clear on the light coloured boxwood you used but have you tried it on african blackwood yet? Do you think it has enough power to engrave deeply enough to be properly visible on a hard black surface?

Garry

Re: Lathe for sale and a few other things to mention

Posted: Sat May 30, 2020 4:36 am
by kkrell
Garry,

Maybe some gold Rub n' Buff
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07SPWC3Z1

Here's an example on an etched guitar pickguard (post #274)

https://www.acousticguitarforum.com/for ... 80&page=19