Author Topic: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture  (Read 2034 times)

Offline sshire

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Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« on: April 28, 2017, 08:03:01 PM »
Suck it up
Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture

In my never-ending quest to actually get the Simpson and Shipton further along (there has been some progress, not yet posted) I’d been thinking about holding some thin parts for milling. This seems to take much more time than the actual milling. Double stick tape holds the part but coolant loosens it immediately. Crystal Bond is good but for a number of parts it gets tedious. Super glue, hot glue, etc.

A vacuum fixture plate seemed to be a workable solution. No special fixtures for each part, quick to set-up, quick to switch parts,etc.

The commercial plates are quite expensive. A search on eBay found some in the $100 range (without a vacuum system) but when I looked closely, they didn’t seem to be more complex than a grid of grooves to hold round gasketing and some connection to a vacuum source.

Might as well further amortize the CNC mini-mill. Enough ½” 6061 plate in stock so, off to Inventor for the CAD and the CAM.

The most difficult part was figuring out the connection from the pump to the plate. It seems that each industry has its own secret handshake, passwords and connectors. The HVAC and auto air-conditioning folks, who use vacuum pumps regularly, have a hither to unknown (to me) set of connectors. ½” ACME is not the acme thread that we know. It seems to be an HVAC connection.
A trip to the auto parts supplier netted a few adapters that got me from ½” ACME to ¼” NPT. The issue then was that my ½” thick plate was too thin to take anything larger than a 1/16” NPT. By some miracle, I actually had a 1/16 NPT tap, tapered reamer and die. Made up an adapter and all was well.

Rather than a group of photos, I thought I’d try a video as a change of pace.

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usIPnig_bhs" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usIPnig_bhs</a>
Best,
Stan

Offline Tennessee Whiskey

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #1 on: April 28, 2017, 08:14:19 PM »
After replaying it three times and two martinis 🍸 Vern, that's machining a man can drink to  :cheers:  As always, nice presentation.

Cletus

Offline gerritv

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #2 on: April 28, 2017, 10:11:58 PM »

good stuff, and none irritating music.

Gerrit
Don't confuse activity with progress

Offline b.lindsey

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #3 on: April 28, 2017, 10:46:59 PM »
Well done Vern. Seems to work well too!!! Nice addition to the tool box.

Bill

Offline 90LX_Notch

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #4 on: April 29, 2017, 01:07:44 AM »
Very nicely done Stan.  It's definitely going into the vault for future reference.  Where did you get the gasket material?

I made a simple vacuum plate a few years back with moderate results.  Yours is much better. 

-Bob
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My Engine Videos on YouTube-
http://www.youtube.com/user/Notch90usa/videos

Offline Dave Otto

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #5 on: April 29, 2017, 01:09:23 AM »
Nicely done Stan!

Dave

Offline sshire

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #6 on: April 29, 2017, 01:22:47 AM »
Best,
Stan

Offline sshire

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #7 on: April 29, 2017, 01:30:37 AM »
I've been using g-wizard for feeds and speed calculation. Works very well.
I discovered the Vacuum table calculator inside of g-wizard. Very slick.
This is a pretty good explanation
http://blog.cnccookbook.com/2016/06/13/quit-scrapping-parts-pop-off-vacuum-table/
Best,
Stan

Offline Walsheng

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Re: Suck it up: Making a Small Parts Vacuum Fixture
« Reply #8 on: April 29, 2017, 02:33:10 AM »
Nicely done and nice job on the video.  Another item on the list of things to make!

John

 

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