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March 9

Renting a lathe

Does anyone happen to know of any place around the San Jose area (other than TechShop) where I can time-share a metal lathe? Because I've been doing this at the TechShop for my project, but the problem is, half the time their lathe is not working right! Right now 2 of their lathes have an inop Z-axis sensor (which they said will take at least until April to fix), and the other one (in Redwood City) has an inop coolant system (which they're not planning on fixing at all)-- and since my project requires very high precision, this makes all of them unusable as far as I'm concerned. Thanks in advance! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:54E6:7BBC:ADED:E845 (talk) 02:31, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Does this help? I want to avoid sending business to anyone in particular, but there are likely some businesses there that can help you. --Jayron 32 02:41, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! One question, though: Can I use the equipment at that location, or will I have to take it home with me and install it? Because I don't have much space in my garage, y'know! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:1C73:84FD:3547:DED8 (talk) 04:56, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You will need to contact the companies and ask them. MarnetteD|Talk 05:19, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Will do! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:4014:3962:946C:2AF1 (talk) 07:48, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If it's high precision work, employ someone to do it, on the same lathe they're used to working on day-in-day-out. You won't achieve good results on a rented lathe (they're rarely in good condition), or on a lathe you're unfamiliar with. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:38, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
True, in that case you'll want to look for a machine shop or job shop. --Jayron 32 14:46, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, so far I have achieved extremely high accuracy even with that worn-out lathe they had at the TechShop -- in fact, on turning the short end I had achieved accuracy in the Z-axis beyond what the manual said was possible on that machine! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:9031:2E93:E491:EE2 (talk) 08:13, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I presume this is a follow-on from WP:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2016 September 10#Machining Andy Dingley (talk) 17:41, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes it is indeed! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:9031:2E93:E491:EE2 (talk) 08:13, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

3D Printer

Wishing to buy a 3-in-1 (metal, wood and plastic) cutter and curver (and so on).

Important: Capable of creating straw style holes...

Q:

1) Do 3D printers come with tools, like things you get with the sewing machine…?

2) How long will it take to learn its software? I'm planning to use it at home and self-publish my artifacts.

116.58.204.231 (talk) 17:18, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

No such animal (as a useful machine). Any "combination" machines are a bit like Dr Johnson's comment about a dog walking on its hind legs: it's not that it does it well, but that it can do it at all.

It sounds like you're looking for a machine that can:

Cut like a laser cutter
Machine large soft materials like a CNC wood router
Machine metals like a CNC mill
3D print, probably filament plastics
Bend plastics like a hot wire bender (which admittedly I do on the laser).

My suggestion would be to find your nearest Hackspace and to try and get some hands-on experience with the machines there. My own buying advice (for lasers at least) is:

Don't buy one, use someone else's.
Don't buy one until you've used one.
Don't buy a brand you haven't used.
Don't buy from anyone further away than you can go and shout at.

For things like subtractive CNC machining, there's a big difference between a CNC router (large sheets of plywood) and a CNC mill (smaller pieces of metal)[1]. There are very few hobbyist CNC mills around - most metal-cutting "mills" are more like small routers here, using high-speed spindles and router cutter geometry. Even the standard hobbyist model engineer import milling machine is slow-spindle speed, high-load cutting, thus almost never used with a CNC conversion. There is a lot of non-obvious subtlety here, so get hands-on practice before buying anything.

For 3D printing (Wikipedia has no useful coverage on the topic), then a machine like a RepRap Ormerod is about the best hobbyist machine, and also very cheap (£500). But this is way behind a commercial machine, either a £10k plastic powder or a £¼M metal powder machine. Yet you can use machines like that (and for much less trouble) by bureau printing through Shapeways or iMaterialise.

Andy Dingley (talk) 17:33, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

A month ago the Computing ref. desk had a 3D Printer question with the same spelling of "wood curving" (carving?) from an IP user. Wikipedia has articles 3D printing and a book about 3D printing. Blooteuth (talk) 18:41, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

and same kind of confusion of 3D printing with machining. Asmrulz (talk) 06:04, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Glowforge can sell a laser cutter as a "3D printer". Andy Dingley (talk) 22:06, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]