Too busy to report right now!

I've built the 1:1 pantograph, and got pictures of most of the build-
I've put the 1:2 pantograph to work-
and I'm too busy getting ready for a huge craft show to post any of it!

I've come up with some products for the small pantograph that look to be
more popular than I suspected, but haven't put the bit one to work yet. I'm in the
middle of finishing up tons of banks and other items, for a show in the middle of Novemer.
After that is over, I will take the time to post about all that is going on in my shop.

Well, here I am working on building up a craft business, and I've decided that I need more products than just my banks.

Now, don't get me wrong- I feel strongly that I build the best post office box banks around, and I'm not about to stop making them.

I've observed, though, that I need to have smaller, less expensive items to offer in order to keep the cash flowing.

To that end, I've been working on ideas for various items that I can produce quickly, and sell at a reasonable price. This is going to require that I be able to reproduce these items quickly and easily.

I've looked at different ways to accomplish this. While, ultimately, it's my intention to build a CNC router, at the moment that is beyond my means.

I thought about using templates with a router, but this still seemed too slow. Then, one evening I was looking through some old magazines in my shop and happened upon an article on building a pantograph for a router (Popular Science, Oct. 1970).
The author of the article, James Joyner, had not only come up with a practical and simple pantograph, he had also come up with a good system of making and using templates. His focus had been cutting lettering- while I may well do some of that, I have other intentions for designs. The beauty of this system is it's versatility.

So, once I decided to build this system, the first thing I had to do was round up the materials. Just for fun, I decided to build it using whatever junk I had in my car (plus bits from the shop). Of course, since I knew what I had collected in my car at the time, this was an easy decision...

So, what do I have to work with here-

1- A pile of various scraps of solid surface material- didn't come into this project, but I'll use them to make plenty of other items.

2- Some shallow drawers, made of 1/2" birch ply (sides), and 1/4" ply (bottoms). There were two of the small ones- I've already used one to make a small downdraft table for sanding. The wierd looking item in the top one is a cell phone display- I got a bunch of them from a cell phone store. Still not sure what use it will be.

3. A pile of wood- a nice big piece of 3/4" birch ply (no idea why the target was drawn on it- it had no random holes in it), a small pile of oak lumber, a bit of 1/2 birch ply, and a nice pine board. Here is where my pantograph materials will come from.

4. Not really sure what I'll be able to use this last bit for- it is a piece of 1" thick marble, about four feet long. I don't have tools to cut it- maybe I can trade it to someone for something else. Or, possibly, just break it into lengths with a hammer and chisel and use it for weights.

In amongst all of this is a little plastic bag containing the hardware I bought just for this project. More on that later.

To keep things simple and light, I'm planning to use a trim router with this rig. I don't really care for the trim router I have, but it's the one I've got- and I got it by trading some of my labor, so the price was right. Ideally, I'd like to use a plunge router, but apparently there isn't a small one on the market anymore. The bit of 1/2" birch ply that I had in the car is ideal for the router base- here I've begun laying it out.

No plan- just figuring it out as I go


And here's the completed layout. Some people would make this an exercise in complexity- me, I used handy roll of masking tape to lay out the curves at the corners.


Here's the base, cut to rough shape. I'm planning to make clamps to hold the router in place, in case I find one that I like better. To that end, I've counterbored the bottom, and epoxied in some threaded inserts (found them in a coffee can in the shop). This is all going to get covered with
some laminate (that I had in the shop for another project that remains unfinished), and then cut to final shape on the scroll saw.


The original article called for oak arms, 1/2" thick by 1" wide. I thought about using plywood, but decided that oak actually was the better material for this project. I am changing the dimensions a bit though- the author used brass wood screws for his pivots. My plan is to use 1/4 hex bolts, passing through nylon bushings. The bushings are 1/2 in diameter- if I went with 1" wide arms, this wouldn't leave me very much stock around them, so I decided to go with 1/2" by 1 1/4" for the arms.

Here, I've ripped the arms to 1 1/4", and I've flipped them up on edge to resaw them to 1/2" thick. This could be done with the bandsaw and planer, but a good ripping blade makes it much easier and faster to do this on the table saw. If I were concerned about appearance, I'd cut them just a little proud of 1/2" and run them through the planer, but that's not needed here. The piece in the foreground has already been cut to size.


The arm which carries the router consists of the router base, with two shorter arms attached to it, with the router riding in the middle. The next two pictures show the glue-up of this assembly. I've lined up the short arms to get the proper spacing, clamped them to a scrap piece to keep them straight, then glued them to the base. Wax paper keeps the alignment scrap from being glued. After the glue was dry, I drilled and countersunk from the bottom, and installed three screws on each side.




Here the arms are cut to size, and screwed together in order to be sure that all of the holes are drilled at precisely the same distances.

Note the layout lines.


And here they are with the holes drilled- note the layout for the end on the second one down. No measuring or complex layout here- I just freehand a curve with a pencil, then used the bandsaw and belt sander to get it to the shape I liked. The first one was used to lay out all the others. If I were making a bunch of these, I'd make a template complete with positioning blocks, but it's not worth the trouble here.

The paper above is one page of the two page article- the magazine was literally falling apart.



Here's the hardware I purchased especially for this project- a few hex head bolts, a bunch of fender washers, nylon lock screws, and some nylon spacers. I saved a bit of money by buying the spacers longer than I needed and cutting them to length. The bolts are longer than actually needed as I didn't want threads inside the bushings- I can cut off any excess length if I decide to later. The one longer bolt will go through the base. Total cost for all of this? $3.98 (including sales tax)! And that was my entire cost for this project!


And here we have it assembled for the first time- it's starting to look like something, finally!


A pantograph needs a base to work on, and here I'm putting it's base/table together. It's simply some red oak runners screwed to the edges. The ply board is wider than my workbench, so the runners will hang over the sides. In use, I'll clamp one of them in my workbench vise, keeping everything nice and steady. The "target" is visually distracting, so I put it on the bottom. I used the board as it was, no cutting at all.


The pivoting base for the pantograph is hinged to allow moving the router without cutting into the workpiece. The base itself is simply a bit of red oak counterbored for a hex bolt. The stylish hinges came out of a box of old cabinet hardware I picked up at an auction years ago.


As you can imagine, at this point I was eager to try this thing out. Even though I haven't made the clamps yet, I went ahead and screwed the router to it's base, and installed a 3/16" flat bit. I grabbed a couple of pieces of scrap ply, and used a magic marker to lay out my initials on one of them.


After cutting out the letters on the scroll saw, I screwed the template and a piece of 1/2" birch ply to the board, and cut my initials. It worked perfectly! This pantograph is designed to be a 1:2 ratio, so it cuts about half the size of the template. This ratio will actually make it easier to make good templates.

The follower is simply a hex bolt with the head cut off and the end smoothed a bit. I'll attach a handle here later.





All in all, I'm going to have to proclaim this a very successful project! It didn't cost much, was easy to build, and should end up helping me make lots of money! The only drawback I can see to this machine is the 1:2 ratio- I can see that I might want a 1:1 ratio for some items. I've got a plan for this, though- back in the mid '90's Wood magazine published a plan for such a pantograph. I'm thinking that I want to build one after their design (with appropriate modifications- they made using the thing entirely too much work!).

So, keep an eye on this space to see my next pantograph!

Patience is a big part of saving money!

My wife is attending college online, and has been expressing a desire for a better chair. Since she's spending even more time at a computer than I am, I couldn't blame her for her desire! I saw some nice office chairs at a garage sale for ten bucks each, but had no way to transport them... later I checked at a used office furniture store- and they wanted FIFTY BUCKS for a junky old used chair! Ye Gods! I don't have to tell you that I left that place in a hurry!

So, a week or so ago, I was driving home from work, when, all of a sudden, something caught my eye- lo and behold, it was a nice old office chair! I pulled over to check it out- it was in great shape, and obviously a very well made chair- must have cost a fortune new! The support for the back is a massive aluminum casting- nothing at all like the stamped sheet metal they use now. The base is also a massive one-piece aluminum casting, and everything else about it is sturdy and well made. It shows very little wear- in fact, it only appears to be a few years old, but it's obviously an older style.

I brought it home and put it in her spot- she was terribly excited when she got home and discovered it- and now the wife can do her homework in comfort, and it didn't cost me a penny! So, thus, keeping the wife happy, and saving money are both served by a bit of patience!

Usage report on the Bucket Cyclone

Well, I am happy to report that my shopmade cyclone works spectacularly well. I've emptied the bucket several times, but I've only had to clean the filter on my vacuum once. Interestingly, the sawdust in the bucket always has a pattern on top that indicates that it was still spinning when it hit bottom!

I have to say that for all the extra work I ended up putting into this, it has been more than worth it. This is definitely one of my favorite shop projects ever. Now, if Ican come up with the extra bucks to buy one of those stretchable hose that Rockler has come out with, it'll be even easier to use around the shop.

The only inconvenience in the use of the cyclone is that I have to walk over to the shopvac to turn it on. My plan is to get around this buy obtaining one of those little remotes used to turn on Christmas lights- in use, a box plugs into the socket, and you plug the lights (or vacuum) into the box. The remote turns the power on at the box. I'll attach the remote near the end of the hose with a retractable line, and save all those steps.

Making a Bucket Mounted Cyclone, part one

Here lately, I've been doing a lot work on the belt sander, which produces a lot of fine dust, which is collected by my shop vac, which in turn ends up with a clogged filter. Then I have to shut down what I'm doing, and clean the filter, which, of course, makes a bit more of a mess in the shop, as that fine dust just billows everywhere. The solution to this problem is something that takes the dust out of the airstream before the air passes through the filter. The best way to do this is with a cyclonic separator. There are at least three on the market that can be mounted on a five gallon bucket and used with a shop vac (one that is made by a well-known company, the other two I found by searching around on the web). The cheapest of these costs about sixty dollars, plus shipping. As a self-respecting tightwad, I just couldn't bring myself to pay this cost. I got to pondering my dillema, and the fact that I have all of this scrap material laying around taking up space, and decided that maybe I could make my own separator. Here's the story of what I did, and how it came out...

I've decided to keep it simple, and just make the body from layers of plywood rings. The board on the left is my initial layout- the conical body will be a little over ten inches high, with a 7 1/2" i.d. at the top, 3 1/2" i.d. at the bottom. (that was the intention, anyhow- it came out a bit different). The piece on the right is the layout for the first ring- note the entrance holes drilled for the scrollsaw blade. I had the scrollsaw table and drill press table set at the same angle to keep things simple.

I used each ring to lay out the next ring...


Here's the first three rings, with a bit of scrap to the right. They are assembled with the glue
and 18 guage brad nailer shown in the pic. I never thought I would enjoy having a brad nailer- doesn't seem like "proper woodworking". I have to admit, though, that for making shop projects like this, it has turned out to be unbelievably useful. Care must be taken to see that brads don't blow out into the interior of the body (of course, some did- I simply clipped them, then ground them flush with a dremel tool).

About the fifth level down, I decided to install this square ring. Despite how odd it looks, this turned out to be the smartest single thing I did in this project. A plain cone would make for very difficult work-holding, but having this one square piece made it quite easy. In later stages, I was able to simply clamp it to my bench with a c-clamp and perform heavy work on it. In use, if need be, I'll be able to secure bracing struts to this part.

Here's the completed cone. It looks good in this pic, but fact, it's all out of wack, and I spent a week trying to get it right with 36 grit sanding paper on a 1" dowel. I clamped it to the edge of my bench, and worked it with a motion like churning butter. It was way, WAY too much work- if I ever do this again, I'll work up some kind of angled router jig and use a flush cutting bit to make sure the rings are perfectly consistent with each other.

I need to drill a large hole at a tangent in the cone for the intake pipe. Here the square section is showing it's usefulness again- I just clamped a bit of scrap to the top, making sure that everying was sitting right.

I pondered a bit, and finally decided to use my biggest forstner bit to drill this hole (2 3/8", which turned out to be the perfect size, anyhow). I was a bit worried about it with the brads (something I should have thought of beforehand), but it turned out that they didn't cause a problem for this big bit. While forstner bits don't tend to catch, I wasn't taking any chances with this odd assembly, and clamped it all to the drill press table to do the work.

This is something you just can't do with any other kind of bit- the bit is cutting on only one edge, and tracking just fine.

More progress, and cutting through, now.

And here we have the hole drilled all the way in to the interior. I had placed it by eye, but it turned out to be in pretty much a perfect location.

Front view. The end of the pipe will fill most of that little flat spot, so it's not a big deal.

Just as I was about to go and buy some pvc pipe, I found a bit of it in a rollaway dumpster. One of the hotels on my route is remodeling, and I think this came off an old jacuzzi. It's just over 2 3/8" in diameter, which is why that drill bit was the perfect one to use.

Test fitting the pipe- note the fitting on the end- I cut that off later.

Here's the cut line, traced with a sharpie. Over to the bandsaw and big belt sander...

And here's the pipe cut and sanded to final shape. To install it, I drilled the pipe into the body, put in one screw, then used putty epoxy to fill in around it (yes, it was Mighty Putty- that's what I had handy). Later, I backfilled from the outside with low-viscosity epoxy, and then silicon sealer. It's strong, and doesn't leak.

I like to make hose connections for my shop tools with mdf- I didn't have to get into my stash for this project, as I found a bunch of the stuff sitting by a dumpster. I have no idea what shape was cut out of the one piece- matters not a bit to me.

With the body completed (and after LOTS of sanding of the inside to try to get it straight), I"m ready to move on. With all of the gaps in the interior of this plywood, and the porous nature of the wood itself, it's become obvious to me that I'll need to line this with a smooth, non-porous material. I happen to have the perfect material on hand- some aluminum flashing that I picked up cheap at an estate auction some year ago. I used a bunch of it when rebuilding my shop, but still have quite a bit left.

Above, I'm making a template- this was quite simple. I just cut some posterboard to rough size (and note that even this is recycled- some old medical advertising posters), then put it in the body, and traced it with a superfine sharpie.



After cutting to the lines, it's almost a perfect fit. This was easy to fix on the actual lining. (sorry about the double pic :()

And here we have the lining- my old camera had trouble getting a good focus on it. I cut the straight parts with a straightedge and utility knife, the curved parts with snips, then gently cleaned up the burrs on my 1" belt sander.

Here the lining is being epoxied in. The one clamp is enough to hold it- the spring in the metal did most of the work here. The hole for the intake was easy to cut- while making the paper template, I stuck a scrap of the same material in and sprayed black paint through the hole to get the shape. When I test fit the lining, I traced it with a sharpie, then used the painted template to get it perfect, then cut the whole thing out on the scroll saw. After that, it was just a matter of lining it up on installation.

I tried trimming the excess with an old wood chisel, but that didn't work to my satisfaction. Then I tried using a hacksaw with a steel-cutting blade in it, and that turned out to be the ideal tool for the job- you just have to be careful to take short strokes against the body so that you don't pull it loose- the excess will just curl away. Kind of fun, actually :)

As you can see, even with a lot of sanding and work, I still didn't get the interior perfectly straight- there was still a signifigant gap between the lining and body at the bottom. I filled this with silicon sealer, and it seems to be working fine. I built the body in a hurry, and it caused me a lot of problems and extra work. If I ever build another one of these, I'll take a lot more care in this process.

Completing the bucket cyclone.

At this point, I've built and lined the body, constructed the top (also lined with aluminum sheet), and installed both pipes in the body. I've also fabricated the adaptors to fit my vacuum hoses. I have a Ridgid shop vac, purchased at Home Depot. HD carries plenty of accessories for this line of vacs, and I picked up a spare hose some time back. It's going to come in handy now! Certainly looks proffessionally made, doesn't it? :)




Here's a good view showing the lining, and how the top is constructed. While the body lining is epoxied in, I simply used contact glue to apply the lining to the top. I used my scroll saw to cut a hole in the aluminum large enough to allow the mdf ring (this is to reinforce the pipe) to be glued directly to the 3/4" ply top (I also shot some brads through the ring). A bead of silicon sealer around the top and bottom of the ring completed this. I cleaned up the edge on belt and disc sander to make sure everything was even.

The pipe is cut to extend down past the bottom of the intake pipe.


I was so happy to connect the hoses at this point! Everything fit just right. I decided to test it out by simply putting it on top of a bucket and holding it to make a seal of sorts- then I vacuumed up some debris from the shop floor...

And here's the result- it works!!!! Yeah!!! It's nice to know that I haven't wasted all of this work- now I'll go on and finish it :)


I picked up a cheap circle cutter at Harbor Freight the other day, and I'm using it to establish the hole in the base, which will be just over 3 inchs. I didn't cut all the way through (it's just too much trouble with this cheap tool), but just used it to cut in about a quarter inch, then cut the rest out with the scrollsaw, and cleaned it up on the router table using a flush trim bit.

Here I've got the first two layers of the base glued and bradded together- I'll use the scroll saw to cut out most of the waste...

Then make it perfect on the router table. Note the vacuum held close to the work- this helps a lot in keeping the mess down.

I'm making the base from four layers of plywood- three 3/4" inch layers, and one 1/2" layer. I'll be securing it to the base with some 3 1/2 screws that I picked up at a flea market awhile back. Here, I'm getting it all set up- I drilled pilot holes, then used 2 1/2" self-drilling screws to get it all set up on the base- note that the holes are set fairly far out on the base- this is to avoid the possibility of putting a screw through the lining (and I didnt'- phew!). I also used these holes and screws in cutting out the holes in the next two layers, so that it all came out consistent.

Here's the completed base, ready for it's lining. I've applied contact glue to the lining and the inside of the base- then I went inside to have a drink and let it dry. Not the bucket lid in the top of the pic- I've cut the hole, and set up for the inner mounting ring. This is a simple ring of 3/4" ply that goes on the bottom of the bucket lid- then 1 1/4" self-drilling screws are run through it into the very bottom layer of the base. A good layer of silicon between the base and top of the lid insures a good seal.
And here it is with it's brand new base!

And here it is, mounted to it's bucket as described above. I emptied all of the fine dust out of vac filter into another bucket (and it was really an amazing amount), then used the cyclone to vacuum it up- and all of it ended up in the bottom of the bucket!!! WOO-HOO!!! IT WORKS GREAT!!!!!! The only thing I found wrong here was a slight air leak around the top, so I simply removed it (I no longer needed to access the inside, anyhow), ran a heavy bead of silicon around the top, then screwed it back on. No more leak!

Here is my happy painting assistant :) I picked up some spray paint for a quarter a can a week or so ago, and this seems like a perfect use for it.

And here is the finished product, painted (many mistakes disguised, in other words), and ready to go! About all this needs is a stable base for the bucket, as this is a bit top heavy and easy to tip over. All in all, this is one of my favorite and most worthwhile shop projects ever!