A Lionclaw build (kit)

[BMG]

After attempting to do a Joe 2 without sufficent tools and even less time, I cratered and bought Lionclaws Kit. Joe spoke very highly of the kit and since my budget is tight, it definitely fit.

My kit arrived this past Monday (1/29) after a looong ship via UPS. The driver must have used every truck stop between CA and PA.

I pulled the box into the kitchen right at the end of dinner (my wife thinks I am nuts) and cracked it open. I was caught off guard by the peanuts, but they attracted my sons (1 and 3) like moths to lamps over the highschool football stadium. 2 hours, 2 garbage bags and a vaccum full peanuts later, I still had not recovered the remaining stryofoan pieces from the kitchen. The kids definitely had fun, but I will certainly NOT do that again.

The kit itself is now in my basement with most of the torsion boxes dry fitted. I really like the look and weight of the Birch plywood. The MDF I was cutting really put out the dust and certainly added up the weight.

I will be begin the build in earnest this weekend and will keep a log posted here.

Many thanks to Lionclaw for his hard work and an excellent design.

Brian G.

[bd007]

Hey Brian,

Good luck with your build. I just finished a Lionclaw, I cut the parts out on my JGRO. I agree, Lionclaw did an excellent job designing the machine, my hats off to him.


Dave

[sc351cobra]

Looking forward to following you build. I'am thinking of building one myself.
Lonnie

[tangocc35]

Hi:

I have the Prototype of Lionclaw's Router. Unfortunately, I haven't done any building yet as SWMBO (She who must be obeyed) had other plans (orders) for my time.

I'm now finished most of these and will start building next week--I willbe following your progress with bated breath!

John

[BMG]

I have been waiting all week and I finally got a chance to work on the kit. Got a good 6 hours in (including the father/son trip to Lowes). Due to the normal Dear interruptions, I was surprised at my progress.

Had a few snafus. I started with the Y axis torsion box. I was a bit slow on the assembly and everything was tight. As a result, the skins did not seat as well as I wanted because the glue was setting up quickly. This might need a rework in the future. Time will tell.

The lower gantry torsion box has 3 long rail - of course, I did not put the one with the bolt patterns in the middle. I guess I will be figuring out how to drill holes inside of the box.

The rest went together surprisingly easy. I had a finish nailer that I used to secure things as I went. This really helped with the X Axis Torsion box. Tacking the ribs at the end made a huge difference is keeping everything together. Wish I brought the nailer out for the Y axis.

Lionclaw adds caution when assembling the gantry panels. I had slippage on the first one and had to pull the nails out. When I got to the second one, I used some of my 1/4 inch bolts to hold the pieces together and true. worked like a charm. Used the same technique on the machine supports.

I always get some purchase wrong and today was not exception, I looked at the 1/2 inch gas pipe at Lowes and doubled checked the lengths. when I was sure of the length, I grabbed one out of the rack and checked it for true on the floor. When I got home, I tried to lay it into my finished Y axis, only to find I grabbed a 3/4 inch pipe. Bah.

One item I was surprised, the kit calls for several 4" pan head screws. Checked 2 stores already and the longest they carry is 3". What a drag. Off to HD tomorrow to check thier racks and back to lowes to switch the pipe. I think I will also pick up a sheet of Birch to make the X deck out of. I was going to use MDF, but the wood looks too good.

I really like the wood Lionclaw used. I am temped to simply coat the thing in Polyurethane. After doing a crappy job on the Y axis I had second thoughts. Probably will do it anyway since painting has its own hassles. Can't be afraid to show a wart or two (so long as it works).

All in all - I am happy. Time to order the electronics now.

Brian G.

[BMG]

I am skinning my X torsion box. Lionclaw notes in his directions that when cutting this out of a 4X8 sheet, the top can use a single sheet and the bottom (unseen piece) can be pieced.

I am curious whether this will deafeat the torsion design if I simply butt the boards. Its my understanding that the lower skin will be in tension and therefore any seams would be a break in the skin. Since the top would be in compression this could easily be a pieced together skin. Acstetically (sp), this would not look as nice but it would be stronger.

Am I reading this right or does it matter?

Thanks.

Brian G.

[ger21]

I haven't looked closely at the design, but for a torsion box to work properly you need 1 piece skins on both sides.

[Madclicker]

Or join the pieces properly.

[BMG]

I haven't looked closely at the design, but for a torsion box to work properly you need 1 piece skins on both sides.

Andy actually specifies a full sheet on both sides in his design. There was a comment in his instructions about conserving material when cutting a full sheet in his manual.

I was thinking that you could actually do this so long as the pieced sheet was on top (and less pleasing to look at). I believe that in most circumstances, the top skin is in compression and therefore the pieces would squeeze together and not comprise the concept. After thinking about it more, since there is alot of motion and mass being thrown around, this probably is not entirely true. Good thing is I have a full sheet of MDF in the shop I can make a full skin out of for the bottom. Its just been too cold out there this week to do anything.

Thanks for the reply Ger

Brian G.

[BMG]

Or join the pieces properly.

I thought about pulling out my bisquit joiner but figured I would botch the job. I also thought about lap joining the boards, but then since this thing is out of view, MDF will take less time and not be readily noticeable.

Brian G.

[BMG]

A headcold slowed me down the past week. I did finish the base and test assembled the gantry.

I skinned the bottom side of the table with 1/2" MDF. I was really amazed at how stiff this thing is now. I will definitely use more torsion boxes in the future. For the pipe rails, dumpster diving a nearby business on a sunday night netted 60' or so of schedule 120 galvanized 1" pipe. This stuff is dead on straight and very smooth. I haven't epoxied it in yet but the ribs hold these in tight without it.

The 1/2" rails for the Y axis when dry fitted are very tight as well. I am tempted to just leave these be and not epoxy them.

I plan on building the bearing rails this week on my lunch hour. One of my nearby operations has a grinder and drill press I can use.

I received all my other parts and electronics (still waiting for the AB nuts). The electronics are worrying me. I never really assembled anything electronic so this is my achilles heel. The Hobbycnc board seems easy. I took an old sound board and was playing with it removing some parts to get a feel for the heat from a 25 watt iron. For the life of me, I could not get the solder to melt consistently and as a result heated up the components. Perhaps a 35 watt iron would be better.

I will probably daisy chain to ATX power supplies as noted elswhere. I have one 200 watt unit (another dumpster find) and am on the hunt for a matching unit. For a computer, I plan to use an old pentium with the Ebuntu / EMC2 software. I always wanted to try Linux and figured this is a good time.

Time to rest up and hopefully see something turning within 2 weeks.


Brian G.

[Lionclaw]

It looks like you're making good progress Brian.

As you've probably noticed, the pipes for the Y rails don't necessarily have to be epoxied into place. I didn't epoxy them on my current machine, but they do shift ever so slightly in the grooves if enough pressure is applied to the Z carriage.

I just finished the new Y torsion box on my new machine last night, and I did epoxy the rails in after painting the box. If you go this route, I would highly recommend you epoxy the rails one at a time. Use an epoxy with a 5-minute or longer hardening time. I used a tooth pick to apply a very light and even coat to the half circles. I placed both rails in place(even the one without glue) and put bar clamps at every rib. I let the first dry and then glued the second the same way. Don't use too much glue, because most of it is going to squish out anyway. After I finished mine I measured it with my calipers and found the distance between the outer edges of the pipe varies by no more than 0.006" at any point along the 36" span.

Having lots of bar clamps really helped with my assembly. I've got a bunch of the 12" ones from harbor freight. They usually have them on sale for ~$4 each. I would only recommend their metal ones though, as I've already broken 2 of the plastic ones.