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Reply to "Continuing Saga …"

Thanks Pat… big progress is being made every day. As for the printer… let me discuss that first since it really is "earth shaking". I loaded my lathe file, but inadvertently loaded the teeny tiny one. Let me put it this way. It printed in a couple of minutes and was so small… "How small was it?" It was so small that it was smaller than an ant or piece of rice. It was a lathe which you could barely make out with an unaided eye. There was no way to successfully scrape it off the platen, it simply fell apart. It was so small that it was a for a machine shop in Hooville, and only a Hoo machinist could use it.

Then I loaded the correctly sized one which I seemed to have solved by changing the units the model was exported in from inches to millimeters. I even used the auto support system that puts all the legs on it that usually you have add singling in the software.

But it didn't print. The file loaded in the machine and the image showed up in the display window. The platen went down to zero level, sat there for a few moments and then rose saying, "Print complete." I had forgotten that the printer came with its own thumb drive that has a sample file on it. I loaded that tonight and it's now printing as it should. It shows elapsed time, time to completion and what layer it's on out of the total number. This print will take about 3 hours and I'll show you it. It's magic to watch. Each layer is taking about 10 seconds, then the Z axis rises a bit to break the connection with the build zone and goes back down to establish the new layer. Each layer is exposed entirely in one go.

My last part of the 3D printing "lab" arrived: the UV curing light. I'm going to make a box line with aluminum foil to get the UV distributed all over. I honestly never believed that a completely affordable desk-top Hi-res printer was in my stars, and now it's in the basement.

3D Print Cure Light

Today was a painting day on the engine house. First up was painting the trusses. I used a Tamiya Rattle Can Gray Primer followed by Coral Blue. It's a nice structural steel color. I did all the painting outside which was 90° and humidity wasn't so bad. Paint dried quickly.

EH Truss Painting

I then masked all the gluing surfaces on the various wall sections. I don't want to glue painted surfaces since Titebond needs porosity to really develop strength. I then took all of this outside and used Rust-O-Leum Gray Primer followed by their Gloss White. I was just painting up the bottom 2 inches for a two-tone paint job. 

Tomorrow, when fully dry, I'll use a surface gauge to mark off 6 scale feet, and then mask the whole deal so I can paint the light gray wall remainder.

EH Lower Int Wall Paint

I glued together the machine shop since I wanted to paint its interior at the same time. I used my picture frame clamp and corner clamps to hold it square and used Titebond.

EH Machine Shop Wall Glue

When this was set I glue in the floor since it wasn't very stable with just the walls. I also added 1/4" square bass wood as corner reinforcement. The floor was just a tad oversized about 1/64" which I removed with some hand sanding on my sandpaper-glued-to-a-surface-plate sanding device.

EH Machine Shop Floor Install

I then laid out the roof to accept the trusses. I used the sides to pinpoint where the trusses will go, and then draw lines, square to the edges across the entire roof. I used narrow Tamiya tape to mask these line areas so the trusses would glue to native surface.

EH Truss Layout

I took the roof outside and painted it entirely Tamiya Light Gray Primer which is going to be the final color. When dry (quickly) I pulled the tape and glued the trusses. I used two angle blocks to hold the truss vertical, then a heavy weight to press it down until the glue set a bit, then moved on to the next one. I used some thin CA to tie done each end so I could take the weights off without anything shifting.

EH Gluing Trusses

Here is the entire roof with all the trusses. I'm going to run some longitudinal members wide enough so the LED light patches can stick to them. The lights already have mounting tape on their backs. The roof is still not stiff over its length and it needs to be boxed in a bit.

EH Trusses Placed

To make the roof easy to lift off, I'm going to have to make the attachments strong enough so they can double as lifting devices.

Oh… and one more boneheaded thing. I had Stephen cut the strips for the between-the-rails space. There was only two things I could get wrong with this: width and quantity. I blew it in both directions. I forgot to add relief for the flange way so the strips are about 1/16" too wide. And I have three tracks, so I'm four short. Each piece is 24" and the length is 40". I'm not getting more cut, I'll do something by hand. DOH!

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Images (8)
  • EH Truss Painting
  • EH Lower Int Wall Paint
  • EH Machine Shop Wall Glue
  • EH Machine Shop Floor Install
  • EH Truss Layout
  • EH Gluing Trusses
  • EH Trusses Placed
  • 3D Print Cure Light

OGR Publishing, Inc., 1310 Eastside Centre Ct, Suite 6, Mountain Home, AR 72653
800-980-OGRR (6477)
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