"John R. Carroll" wrote:

Pete C. wrote:
"John R. Carroll" wrote:

Bob La Londe wrote:
On 4/21/2011 4:45 PM, Pete C. wrote:

"John R. Carroll" wrote:

Pete C. wrote:
Bob La Londe wrote:

On 4/21/2011 10:40 AM, Pete C. wrote:

Does anyone who has 3D capable CAD/CAM have the ambition to
generate some G-code for me? What I need is two sets of code
for a half egg shape, a positive and a negative to use in a
press. The egg would be approximately 3.5" diameter by a
suitable length perhaps ~4.5" or so. The pos/neg die clearance
should be .020". Post processor for Mach3.

Thanks,

Pete C.

I would help, but it sounds like you already have better
qualified helpers than me. Laminated hardwood stamp and die
huh? Interesting. I take it that it will be a modestly small
production run then?

I'm hoping oak will be sufficient (backed by 3/4" steel press
plates) to form relatively soft AL flashing at the 1.75" depth
needed. If it works well, I wouldn't expect to press more than a
couple dozen pieces or so.

Get some industrial thickness aluminum foil and press four or five
layers into the mold one layer at a time.
That's something your friend could do on his or her own, uding the
core ( not drawm yet) as a pestle.


At about .015" the AL flashing material is relatively thin and soft
yet should be solid enough to be reasonably durable, hopefully it
will behave ok.


My other thought/comment/question.

I know they make aluminum cooking pans, but is there a particular
grade/alloy/type for food products like baking pans?

I think there is.
He's got the code for both halves of his tool now, probably quicker
than he thought, so Pete is probably scrounging material to make the
thing out of. LOL


Yep, I've got pieces ready for glue up and I'm going to go out to the
shop in a few minutes to do the glue up. I will probably stack up a
bit of foam board if I have enough on hand to do a test while the
glue is drying on the wood.

OK but I ran a full simulation here before sending it.
Still, not a bad idea.

--
John R. Carroll

The blocks are glued and clamped, they should be ready tomorrow
afternoon. I need to eventually find some affordable 3D CAM software as
well as a good simulator. The problem of course is that all I do is
really hobby stuff, so I can't justify really expensive stuff.