Building a Shaper experiences-

[ErichKeane]

Thanks for the reviews on the Acto plans. I was considering getting them, mostly for perusal but partly with an eye toward making a hand-shaper one day, but it sounds like they do not make very insightful reading.

One of these days, I'll tackle the martin model hand shaper. Have a small Ammco but hey, the power goes out a lot 'round these parts

The seller is a pretty darn good machine designer, he fits some fantastic features into this shaper. However, the plans themselves look like he marked up some MS-Paint drawings. The plans themselves lean VERY heavily on on a text document where describes things.

So far, I've learned more about how a shaper works by watching Makercise(making the Gingery) and Tubalcain's videos on shapers.

 

[Lo-Fi]

Thanks for the reviews on the Acto plans. I was considering getting them, mostly for perusal but partly with an eye toward making a hand-shaper one day, but it sounds like they do not make very insightful reading.

One of these days, I'll tackle the martin model hand shaper. Have a small Ammco but hey, the power goes out a lot 'round these parts

Don't get me wrong, the design is excellent and worth the beer tokens. It's really well thought out and has excellent features. The plans do, sadly, leave a lot to be desired, so you won't learn a lot just from leafing through them.

I've built a few small Hemmingway projects, all of which came with beautiful plans in "standard" format with nice general arrangement, shaded isometrics and detailed build instructions. They did not require endless to and fro between the drawings and notes - all the pertinent info was on the drawings, so once you'd read through the suggested sequence of ops, all you needed was the annotated drawing to hand.

 

[Lo-Fi]

The seller is a pretty darn good machine designer, he fits some fantastic features into this shaper. However, the plans themselves look like he marked up some MS-Paint drawings. The plans themselves lean VERY heavily on on a text document where describes things.

First catastrophe! Luckily in CAD

Lack of General Arrangement is particularly crippling. So much so that I managed to draw the crank arm and associated parts upside down, backwards and a mirror image. At fault here is drawing 17 which is drawn from two sides of each of the stiffener brackets and the counter-sinks shown on the wrong side along with horrendous hole dimensioning. I'd have been really peeved if I'd been making this in metal!

 

[ErichKeane]

First catastrophe! Luckily in CAD

Lack of General Arrangement is particularly crippling. So much so that I managed to draw the crank arm and associated parts upside down, backwards and a mirror image. At fault here is drawing 17 which is drawn from two sides of each of the stiffener brackets and the counter-sinks shown on the wrong side along with horrendous hole dimensioning. I'd have been really peeved if I'd been making this in metal!

Holy wow... that drawing is special.

I hate how inconsistent he is with the use of the letters. I could get over them if they were consistently used, but sometimes they mean different parts, sometimes they mean different views, and sometimes he mixes two in the same drawing.

I can definitely see how easy that would be to mess up.

 

[Lo-Fi]

Your comment about MS paint hits the nail right on the head!

Few more bits not making sense... The pin adjuster location, for example. It doesn't fit in the slot and won't allow proper range of adjustment as drawn unless I've missed something pretty fundamental. I'll update as I slog through it

 

[ErichKeane]

Feel free to share the drawing/what you mean and perhaps I can put another set of eyes on it.

That said... I'm positive after looking more into the drawings that I wouldn't want to do this project on my own. I'm REALLY glad you're willing to take the plunge with me! I fear how many issues we're going to find with the plans as we go along based on how poorly they are laid out.

Additionally, I noticed an couple of times he refers to things in not the way I'd think. For example, DR#6: He mentions a 20 x 15 mm cutout section as clearance for the drive chain. However, if you look at his drawing:
from the front view it is 20x10.
From the LH view, it is 10x15.
From the bottom it is 15x20.

I don't know why the heck you'd refer to it based on the 'bottom'. If there was any other cutout on the part I'm sure I would make a serious mistake on this one.

 

[Lo-Fi]

It'll be fun doing a joint project even if we're not working on the same actual parts or even on the same continent! It's quite fun, I got to work with lots of cool people in a similar way when I made my Kerbal Space Program mod. Different discipline, but the same thing really.

I've got a few more bits to model before I produce any drawings - the ram ways, spindle and a few other major pieces really make sense of all the worky bits and most importantly make sure they'll work - then I'll start sending stuff your way to sanity check and discuss.

Did you say you had some email contact with the guys who made/sell the plans? If so, mind pinging them an email asking if we can post certain drawings here to discuss? I'm sure we could claim its educational use, but better to have an OK in writing from them, then we're clear. Hopefully they won't object!

 

[ErichKeane]

It'll be fun doing a joint project even if we're not working on the same actual parts or even on the same continent! It's quite fun, I got to work with lots of cool people in a similar way when I made my Kerbal Space Program mod. Different discipline, but the same thing really.

I've got a few more bits to model before I produce any drawings - the ram ways, spindle and a few other major pieces really make sense of all the worky bits and most importantly make sure they'll work - then I'll start sending stuff your way to sanity check and discuss.

Did you say you had some email contact with the guys who made/sell the plans? If so, mind pinging them an email asking if we can post certain drawings here to discuss? I'm sure we could claim its educational use, but better to have an OK in writing from them, then we're clear. Hopefully they won't object!

I only emailed via ebay, but I can ask.

 

[Manual Mac]

Hi Erich. I located the book (big magazine?) Lindsey reprint. Shaper Operations. Great stuff.
Just dropped it off @ post office.
This oughta set the hook for your build.
Enjoy. Steve

 

[ErichKeane]

Hi Erich. I located the book (big magazine?) Lindsey reprint. Shaper Operations. Great stuff.
Just dropped it off @ post office.
This oughta set the hook for your build.
Enjoy. Steve

Thats wonderful, thank you!