So I fired up the 3-D printer and heard some not so nice noises coming form the print head. After opening it I located a cooling fan for the printhead driver circuit had bearings going out (this seems to be a common theme lately). I was able to find a replacement at a local store and installed it. Then I got to printing the motor mounts and the arm mounts. The weight for each was reduced as much as possible by using shells with thin wall sections.
In the picture above is one of the two blocks together that will form a clamp that will be held in place with 4 machine screws to hold one of the 6 arms to the main support frame.
This is the small "cup" that will hold the motor on the end of each arm. I shaped it like a cup because I wanted to cover the small gap between the shell and lower plate of the motor to give some degree of dust shielding. The photo makes the shell look a bit thick but its fairly thin.
Here the parts saved in .STL format are placed on the 3D printer platten for printing, I placed the sides I expect to machine for fit and alignment down so the supports created during printing are not an issue.
And the parts were left to print overnight. The next step it to clean them up and get them ready for applying a ceramic shell to take the heat of the molten aluminum. I printed only two now to make sure my casting wall thickness is sufficient to fill when I do the first pour. Meanwhile I will go to work on the top plate for the hex that will contain all the antennas. It will be .090 thick aluminum with the entire center section thinned to about .030 thick to save weight. I wrote the G-code for the CNC Mill last night. More to come....
Comments
This is really cool. I cant wait to see how the casts turn out!