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Posted

Hey, today in class I was thinking (it was a boring lesson), what about making a tube roller, this is what I was thinking:

 

Attach a dowel (exchangeble size) to a motor and make like flaps on both ends of the dowel so the paper dosen't telescope, then fix the paper on to the dowel, now this is where it gets hard because I can't find a way to fix the paper to it... Well and then I think you know the rest: switch it on and let it roll

 

PS: I forgot to put the part of putting glue on to the paper...

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Posted

This thread may be of interest to you.

 

http://www.pyrosociety.org.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=3175

 

An idea about the tubes. If you don't want them too long, you could used 2 or 3" wide gummed tape. After you have rolled them dry, wet the end and seal it shut. After that place a bucket of the tubes in a steamer basket, and the tubes will come out hard as a rock once they dry.

 

You may also be able to figure out some sort of roller or sponge system using a thin wheat paste. The slightly thicker viscosity may make keep the glue from running. Another idea I was having was a sort of hopper with a V trough with the bottom cut off. The paper could be scraped between this opening and a block of wood and get a consistent thin coat of glue.

 

I'd also suggest hand cranked machine at first. It will be easier to tune. Unless you are rolling very thick tubes, I don't think a motor is really neccesary. You'd have to gear it way down anyway.

Posted
Attach a dowel (exchangeble size) to a motor and make like flaps on both ends of the dowel so the paper dosen't telescope, then fix the paper on to the dowel, now this is where it gets hard because I can't find a way to fix the paper to it... Well and then I think you know the rest: switch it on and let it roll

 

PS: I forgot to put the part of putting glue on to the paper...

For winding straight it is more a matter of feeding the paper straight onto the roll. Generally end stops do not really solve that problem, as you may just end up with creases or a fold on the end.

Posted
Ah, thanks Mumbles for the thread, if I get some time I will maybe draw, and make it...
Posted

How the Chinese do it:

 

Posted

Just made a spiking horse... finally... very similar to Pudi's design. Read some pages of Fulcanelli for inspiration yesterday to actually get out and make it. Mines just slapped together... but should work well enough... just C-clamped it a bit out of the way underneath my workbench...

 

Now I have 2 wooden mallets that I use occasionally for pyro... I'm thinking that I'm going to coat them in some resin of some kind to seal them from moisture. Don't know what kind yet. Actually... Might make another small mallet from all this scrap wood I have around from recent projects.

Posted
I think a drying box is a very nice tool to have:

post-4-1200060124_thumb.jpg

Posted
I think a drying box is a very nice tool to have:

Most designs I've seen include a dehumidifier inside the box (moisture has to go somewhere) or intake/exhaust sytem to carry moisture away. The one I built uses intake and exhaust and light bulbs as a heat source. My only problem is that my basement is so cold right now I can't get the temp hot enough ATM.

Posted

OOOHHHH--

 

Now ya tell me! LOL - guess I'll have to get another little fan and break out my hole saw.

Posted
Or they have a vent that lets the air blow through and out.
Posted

As I mentioned in another thread, I just ordered .75" and 1" thick pieces of UHMW and some .375" and .5" diameter T6061 Aluminum rod...I hope to say goodbye to my shitty, broke-ass Chinese starplates soon. Since I'm too cheap to shell out $250+ for a Wolter plate (again, no slight on his product - just too spendy for me), I'm attempting to make my own. I was planning to use brass, but Aluminum rod was about $60 less for the materials.

 

I took some ideas from a Passfire tutorial, but am making them differently. The .375" will be a 44 gang plate (11 staggered rows of 4) and the .5" plate will have 32 gangs. I'll post a tutorial on the making of them, including material costs...if they work :ph34r:

 

3/8" Design:

http://www.apcforum.net/files/3_8instarplate.gif

 

1/2" Design:

http://www.apcforum.net/files/1_2instarplate.gif

Posted
The drawings look really good. One tip for you is when drilling the UHMW you may have to drill oversize as it tends to contract and your pins won't fit. Also watch the drill bit doesn't grab and rip itself through the plate leaving a deformed hole, you may want to use a dull drill bit for this. Hope it works out well.
Posted

Ok everyone, here is a video of my grinder doing it's thing. (sorry my hand sorta got in the way, oh well ;) )

grinder

As you can see it has plenty of power (the motor is 1/3 HP 1725 RPM geared down to what you see) also the charcoal i used in the vid was homemade and was much softer then what i usually run through it, towards the end of the video i put in a large knot and it went through fine.

qwezxc, the coupling was made by heating up the end of the grinder screw and melting it into the plastic, it is also held in by a set screw and a bolt that goes through the middle of the coupling into the grinder, in retrospect there were other ways to do it, but this was the first thing that came to mind. let me know if you have any other questions.

post-4-1200195775_thumb.jpg

Posted

jacob,

 

That kicks major ass! Awesome homebuilding. Thanks for the pics of the coupler. I'll be wanting to do something like that when I run through all the hand ground charcoal I processed this summer.

 

One request: Do us (and yourself) a favor...get a rammer to poke the charcoal down into the grinder ASAP. When I saw you stick your fingers into the hopper, I could only cross mine for you...there's a reason food processors have rammers to jam the carrots into the blades! Get you fingers into that screw and you won't have time to pull them out intact...and 1/3hp will grind your fingers up really nice, too...I'm sure all of us here don't want to you get hurt!

 

Bonny,

 

Thanks for the tips. I'll be drilling the pin holes 1/64 under and pressing the pins in. I planned to drill the star holes 1/32 over to prevent potential binding of the plates. I had good luck drilling a core into my 3" comet pump rammer (which is a solid rod of UHMW) in my drill press, so I didn't anticipate any problems drilling.

Posted
Great point qwezxc, i will definitely do that before i use it again, they look closer in the vid then they actually are, but still it was a dumb thing to do, that's certainly not something i would want to get any body parts caught in. also i think i'll build a hopper on it so i can pretty much just pour it in out of the bag, and see if i can fix that infernal squeak, it gives me a headache. But on the lighter side methinks this will also work well for powdering wax for KNO3/sucrose/wax smokes, two birds with one stone. yay ^_^ .
Posted

I made a star plate from aluminum and brass, i glued both plates to eachother during drilling so the holes lined up. The holes where slightly too small for the brass rod so i put them in a very cold cryo firge they had at work and used an arbor press to insert the brass.

I forht what brand of charcoal but i smashed it with a hammer and used a coffe grinder to get it to a point where the ball mill could take it.

Where do you guys get the willow charcoal? I used to get mine from http://www.unitednuclear.com/ nut they are kinda expensive but it is good willow so they say

Posted
I recently got some from http://www.customcharcoal.com/ It seems to be pretty potent stuff. The Alder wood will also be pretty good for black powder, and I've heard is actually a bit hotter than the willow. There was another site, but it seems to be down.
Posted

Draco,

 

I got a 20lb. box of Alder from Custom Charcoal...cheaper than the Willow and it works great...I'm actually cutting back on the lift that I used for my 4in and 6in shells now.

Posted

i placed an order with them for some willow i will try alder at a later time(they had free shipping on the willow). one can also get BP AND MEAL D from http://www.powderinc.com/ if you like Goex brand BP

i allmost shit myself when i found they had meal d, Now i have a gold standard to test my own BP agenst

Posted
You must be licensed to order "A" grades and Meal D from Powder Inc.
Posted

only if you order them in bags, go to their black powder ording page, meal D in 1 pound cans is listed, i dont have a licences my self and they shiped it out, you just have to dig a bit on their page

http://www.powderinc.com/catalog/order.htm

Posted
only if you order them in bags, go to their black powder ording page, meal D in 1 pound cans is listed, i dont have a licences my self and they shiped it out, you just have to dig a bit on their page

http://www.powderinc.com/catalog/order.htm

Interesting. They are mixing Meal D with 4Fg to make an "under the radar" blend. Still *way* too expensive for my blood.

Posted

Well my UHMW bar stock and 4041 Al pins arrived today:

http://www.apcforum.net/files/StarplateUHMWandPins.jpg

 

I'll try to drill and assemble the star plates this weekend. They look like they'll be damn near indestructable when put together. Investment so far is just under $70 (including shipping) in material for both. So far, that's a far site better than the $49 and $52 each + shipping a certain site charges for the crappy Chinese plates :)


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