Making small parts

[mziegler]

There lots talk all time on the forum about using vacuum hold-down but little talk about other techniques that can be used to make parts. I myself find out it is hard to use vacuum for making small parts. Often most people end up building a purpose-build jigs with gasketing. Do anyone have new ideas that do not use vacuum? Mark

[mikejohn]

Mark
In my case, jigs, clamps, screws and tabs.
...............Mike

[mrdovey]

Mark...

There are a lot of hold-down techniques for small parts - double-stick tape, various types of clamps and vises, hot-melt glue, and special pallets incorporating cam, screw, and toggle clamps.

Vacuum clamping doesn't work sell without some minimum vacuum area (about 15 square inches with my setup) which may not be achievable with small parts.

[ron brown]

Mark,

Depending on a lot of things.... I sometimes will glue pieces to plywood with a piece of paper between using thinned glue. Normally, the part will split on the paper.

One can secure very small parts with good accuracy. I learned the techinique in doing "split turnings".

Ron

[mziegler]

Thanks guys. Ron, split turnings sound like very worthwhile technique to try. I think a plain paper grocery bags should be idea for the paper joint. This might work better than the resawing I been doing for small parts. Will do a test run this weekend. Mark

[mziegler]

This just remind me that MDF will split very easy too. Just cut the piece part way into the MDF and then used a sharp chisel to split apart the piece at the bottom of the cut. This work best on very small letters and numbers. Mark

[gerald_d]

On splitting....and tabs.....put tabs across the grain so that they can split with the grain. SheetCam is working great for us in placing tabs.

[mziegler]

Gerald, I mean splitting the pieces horizontally, not vertically. Trying to think outside the box here. Mark

[slendon]

If you can't(or don't want to)produce tabs on parts then a piece of scrap the same size as the bit diameter can be placed in the kerf behind the bit (or there would be no kerf), as the file is running creating a tempory packing bridge, which stops the piece skating around when freed at the end of the cut. For the sensible out there you can pause the file while doing this......

Steve

[mziegler]

I tested the split turnings method that Ron mention above this week. The parts were easy split apart with a chisel. The paper itself split and this leaving paper on both the part and the plywood. If need too, the paper can be removed by sanding. This method has one extra step than resawing has and I would prefer to used it on larger parts. I like to resaw parts no larger then about 1 ½ by 1 ½. Mark