"Larry Jaques" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 9 Feb 2010 11:45:46 +0800, the infamous "Royston Vasey"
scrawled the following:


"Larry Jaques" wrote in message
. ..
On Mon, 8 Feb 2010 21:07:21 +0800, the infamous "Royston Vasey"
scrawled the following:


I'm forming some wire mesh cloth - that part is going ok.

The finished part needs to be compressed to fit into a pvc part -
working
it
in by hand results in scratching and marking of the pvc. I'm looking for
some ideas on how to compress the mesh part so it slips cleanly into the
pvc
part. There's a few pics in the dropbox:

http://www.metalworking.com/dropbox/wire_screen.pdf

Think "tampons", Royston. vbg How about a teflon sleeve with an OD
the size of the ID of the PVC to help guide the screen in?

Or a pair of spr

ing steel guides on sticks, curved tongs if you will.

Questions: Do you later "inflate" the cup back to full inside
diameter? What do you use to secure it to the PVC? And, last but not
least, whatever are these used for?

Another thought: If you were to compress the cup closer to final
diameter, it might be easier to work with. It appears to have lots of
gaps between the folds and OD.

Everytime I think tampons I'm reminded of UK's Prince Charles bugged phone
call where he told I think it was Camilla Gorilla his bit on the side at
the
time that he "wished he was her tampon" - a nasty thought! :|

Heh heh heh.


The tongs is a good idea - I just made something similar using some
crimpers:


http://www.metalworking.com/dropbox/...creen_tool.pdf

Ah, good!


Once in place the screen springs back quite a bit, I still need some
urethane - maybe sika 191, 293 ?? The black marine stuff anyway, that
works
really well on most things. The screen is a shield over a humidity
sensor -
to stop fingers and look nice more than anything else. I don't think there
is a way to eliminate the folds and extra mesh / cloth. The cloth doesn't
want to stretch enough so a degree of folding results.

Have you tried a press in the shape of those tongs? Place screen cup
over mandrel and compress vigorously with tons of force to 'set' the
folds tighter.



I don't have much in the way of machinery so I've made do with what I have.
The wire is 316 stainless and is quite "springy". An arbor press is on my
wish list (along with a mill, guillotine, panbrake..........)


Alternatively, have you thought of just using a disc of screen and a
slightly longer piece of PVC, dadoing in the flat screen piece? You
could even use a heftier screen gauge to keep fingers from damaging
it.


I can't quite visualise what you mean. I've tried a few different
arrangements, the one I have come up with seems to be the best in terms of
being simple to manufacture with the tools I have to hand.


--
We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves
after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.
-- Marcel Proust