September summary
We did not find a moment to write new blog entries, but yesterday John Ferguson from the UK sent us some .STL files with improvements on the TwinTeeth plastic parts and we decided to sit down, write these lines, publish here the files and thank John for his excellent work and for his contribution to the project.
During September we have been really busy with the shop and making kits. After the summer vacation we had a lot of pending orders and we served them during September.
We changed a little the kit configuration we are selling. We are using now a blue-light colour for the plastic instead the navy-blue which we were using before the summer. This colour has a big demand on the 3D printing market and frequently occurs that it is difficult to find because it’s sold-out. We changed to light-blue which is easy to find. We also included by default the aluminum platform kit in the Framework Hardware Kit because our provider had time during the summer to make some kits and now we have stock. We hope to control the demand. We also found time to improve the linear motion system and the kits include now the new lead-screws and supports (see blog entry).
On the other hand we abandoned the project of making a SLA Toolhead. We successfully tested the PHR-803T pickup and the driver to cure UV resin, but we did not see any advantage using an inverted delta robot. Probably a traditional cartesian robot will do a better job but beginning a new design would divert us from our goal, so we changed the focus of our researching activities to another side: improving the way of soldering vias. We would like to do some testing with TwinTeeth and use it for soldering and testing vias because they are always a nightmare when making PCBs at home. We have got some absurd ideas. Once again they seem the best. If the idea is not absurd enough then somebody has probably done it already. At this stage of technological development we only have two opportunities: research on complex and difficult areas investing a lot of time and money or find a backdoor: something that nobody thought of because it was absurd. As you can imagine the second way is our specialty and here we are: thinking about new methods to soldering vias using a robot. We are still waiting some equipment we bought and will keep you informed as soon as possible about results.
We are also studying optics because we want to do some researching about how to sensitize dry-film using galvos, polygonal mirrors, lenses, LCoS and LCD devices and in general any other optical method rather than mechanical. When we discovered the PHR-803T we fall in love with it and with its optomechatronic system. Optics is an important area of mechatronic and we don't know too much about it, so we will try everyday to learn a little about “the dark world of the light"…I mean: "the dark side of the force” :-)
We also would like to test TwinTeeth for printing circuits using graphene. We found some experiences on the internet where people are transforming graphite oxide in graphene using a laser beam. Maher El-Kad from UCLA University did it for the first time using LightScribe. This is an old technology which uses a DVD laser to burn a cover image into the top layer of the DVD. The method he used to make graphene seems simple: he covered a plastic substrate with a graphite oxide aqueous solution, let it dry and finally he used the laser beam to transform the graphite oxide into graphene.
You can find more information here and some videos on youtube like this one.
The first problem we found in this project was the graphite oxide’s price. We though it was cheaper than graphene which actually is really expensive. But graphite oxide is not cheaper: approx. 180$ per gram. In fact it is more expensive than inkjet printer ink: the most expensive liquid in the world.
We also had time for collaborating with Mecaduino. We met Mecaduino guys last May at the Maker Faire. They gently offered to teach us how to use more metal parts in our designs and now we are talking about how to make a project together.
That's all!
We will keep you informed.