Oh what a relief it is!

[Brady Watson]

I got permission to cut one of the reliefs that I laser digitized for one of my customers. The original size was about 12 X 20" & I scaled it up to 48X80" & cut it out of 50mm (about 2") Trupan. I would normally toolpath this in ArtCAM Pro, but I wanted a chance to try Vectric's Cut3D & how it would handle a project of this scale. It took me about 3hrs to do the Z-level rough out with a 1/2" end mill & then another 17hrs to do the finishing pass using a 3/8" ball end mill @ 10% stepover. All in all it came out really nicely! (Special thanks to my customer for allowing me to use this beautiful relief!) It's pretty cool being able to scan something and then see the results on something other than my computer screen!...and really funny to hear brakes squealing from people slowing down on my street to catch a glimpse of this thing when I had it outside to take a pic!


-B


872

873

(Dewalt screwgun shown for scale)

[harryball]

Magnificent. 20 hours of cutting time. Did you pause it overnight or let it run?

Robert

[Brady Watson]

I stopped it @ 2AM...I thought I would run it all night but intuition reminded me of how much I like my shop & how much I hate fire...


-B

[harryball]

Twenty hours, I just wonder if anyone would buy it for enough to make it worth while. I just don't think like someone who "has money". It is a beautiful panel and I'd love to see if painted and installed somewhere.

I hear you on the fire hazard... I keep a close eye on things. Coming from the internet industry I installed many automatic discharge ceiling mount fire extinguishers. I've pondered placing a few of those at strategic locations. You can even get FM200 cans... but those get costly. I've met people that have never used a fire extinguisher... I'm not one of those people so I can't see pressing my luck any further. :-)

Robert

[Brady Watson]

Robert,
This carving was done mainly to proof the data coming off of the laser machine and as a conversational piece for the shop. I usually give away my best work leaving only the scraps to show off when people visit. This piece isn't for sale, but I have done a lot of work like this before & it's worth while if you have the clientele that understands what it takes to do the job. I've shipped similar 3D items all over the country because the customer couldn't find anyone else to do the job. You aren't going to make a profit selling 3D at a flea market...but I bet you already knew that!


-B

[hines]

Looks sweet Brady! Did you sand it at all? Figured with all the hours of cutting not much was needed.

[myxpykalix]

WOW! No wonder you're the "Master". Is that something you would use as a door? or door accent? Non shopbotters have no idea how much time goes into cutting something like that. The surface looks like it is textured? good job! I'd buy that for a dollar!

[Brady Watson]

Jack good observation. It is textured. Here's the laser scan. Note the background texture & woodgrain on the 'rails':


874

Dave,
No sanding, although it could use a good once over to clean up some of the stepover marks where the tool encountered a curved wall. I could have tightened up the stepover to reduce this at the expense of longer machining time. I just changed bearings in the spindle & figured this was a good break-in project for it. The pic you see in the 1st post was 10 min off the machine with only a bit of vacuuming to clean off the dust.

[hespj]

Brady, I like it very much. This is the direction I would like to aim for. Tell us about laser scanner please.

I've taken to missing out the roughing stage on items like this (large in X & Y direction, but relatively shallow Z). After all, the finishing pass is only making a light cut at 5 or 10% stepover. It does need a long enough tool though. What do you think about this aproach?

[paco]

Yes Brady, do tell us about your laser scanner... are you offering laser scanning services at a very affordable fee? Should we throw away our touch probe?!




Sound good!

[Brady Watson]

John,
On a project this size, Z-level roughing is a necessity. There's just too much force on the long cutter to forego the roughing pass. At 1st glance a roughing pass seems like a waste of time...when in reality, if the bit could take the force without serious deflection or breakage, you would have to run it at a very slow rate...and the cutting would actually take longer & the finish quality would suffer. You can get away without roughing on smaller & shallow reliefs. Most of the time roughing only takes minutes & saves a lot of time.

Scanning...yes...This is a essentially a digitizing service that I offer to those who cannot afford a professional laser setup. This is a unit that I designed around industrial laser sensors and it is the result of over a year of R&D. The hardware is not for sale or available. The service however is. I've scanned everything from a giant ice cream cone to musical instruments and customers send me things from all around the world. Many of my customers have Picza, NextEngine and even Scantech units, but need a higher resolution relief, something that their equipment cannot do. I really don't want to get into the CMM equipment business, but I do offer high resolution scanning at a very affordable rate. If you need scanning you can forward me pictures of your model for a quote. At the moment I am putting together a dedicated laser rotary scanner, which will scan 5-sides of a part in one go. This will be ideal for those who need models for the indexer, or multi-sided parts.

Don't throw away your touch probe! You can still scan 2D patterns and shapes with it!
I used the SB probe for years & it is an excellent way to get into digitizing on a shoestring. I started getting more digitizing work than the SB could handle (time/speed) so that's when I began researching lasers.

-B
PS- Here's a pic of the ice cream cone. It was about 6" in Z.


875
876

[jseiler]

Can you give us an estimate on how much you would charge for digitizing the snow cone so we have an idea of whether or not we could afford this? I do very little for pay, but occasionally people ask me for things like this (and a guesstimate of cost). I've not any reference points to even make an estimated guess. I'm sure there are others who would like ballpark figures.

[Brady Watson]

Please contact me off list for pricing on laser scanning.

-B

[rookie432]

Brady,

Fantastic work. Impressed with your scanner.
I have the nextengine laser but havn't delved all the way in yet. The Resolution issue seems to have been a result of some software but that seems to keep improving.
Again I love your shield relief. Awesome.

Bill

[kaaboom_99]

Brady,

Thanks for sharing. Once again, you truly are an inspiration to those of us "coming up".
Your work and abilities are a benchmark for me to test my own mettle to.

Now, if I could only figure out how to price my work so I keep busy.
There has to be a book somewhere! :^)

[Brady Watson]

Thanks for the positive comments guys. It was a lot of fun to do & a neat conversation piece to have on one of the shop walls.

-B

[myxpykalix]

I assume the texturing was a seperate toolpath? How much extra time did that add to the project and do you think it was worth doing or would a non textured surface look ok? Are you going to paint or finish this in any way?

[Brady Watson]

Jack,
The texture was part of the 3D scan & resulting toolpath. There are other ways to add texture via 2D (XZ or YZ) strategies, but I just cut the file as it come off of the laser...which was limited to the detail that a 3/8" ball could cut. A 1/4" would pick up much more detail at the expense of time...but I could have also just isolated higer detailed areas only to do those parts with a smaller bit as well.

-B

[jhicks]

Very Nice Brady! The possibilities are endless.

[foamcarver]

Very nice-what kind of digitizer do you use? I like the icecream cone. You do some AWESOME work

Nikki

[Brady Watson]

Hey, thanks guys!

Nikki,
The digitizer is of my own design & based on industrial laser displacement sensors. I have no plans to market the machine or sell plans ~ but I do offer affordable hi-def laser digitizing services for those who can't get the detail they need from thier SB probe, Picza or NextEngine laser digitizers.

I'll be putting up an updated digitizing page on my site as soon as I get the time to knock it out. I'll have several examples of the data that I get off of the machine & the types of parts that I have done. It's really a lot of fun being able to put a part on the machine and duplicate just about ANYTHING with the ShopBot! I'm currently developing a dedicated rotary scanner that will be able to scan in a whole host of parts geared towards the SB Indexer. I've already got a pile of legs, statues & machettes just waiting to be done...Getting this machine online will motivate me to actually use my indexer...instead of feeling guilty about it still sitting in the box!

Thanks!
-B

[myxpykalix]

Brady, let me pick your brain in regard to your scanning. Lets say you mount a cabriole leg (or anything) in your indexer, scan it, and make a 3d file. You now have a copy but doesn't it still need to be toolpathed? And how would you know what bits to use for the different types of designs within a file?

[rcnewcomb]

What is the largest size (LxHxW) that you can digitize?

[Brady Watson]

Jack,
You still have to toolpath it. Picking the right bit sizes is a function of how much detail you want to capture and how long you can tolerate running the file. Some programs that handle 4th axis toolpathing have a decent previewer in it that will let you see what each size bit/stepover will give you.

Randall,
At the moment, 48 X 48 X 7" in one scan. Parts can also be 'panelled' to accomodate larger models, when necessary.

-B

[dray]

Beautiful!!