Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Built a scanner? Started to build a scanner? Record your progress here. Doesn't need to be a whole scanner - triggers and other parts are fine. Commercial scanners are fine too.

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pav
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by pav »

I wonder if, for the benefit of those living in the higher-UPS-charges areas, you could consider, in addition, another mode of propagating the design.

Would it be possible to create a pdf of parts outlines in 1:1 scale? An Alaskan, or a foreigner, could glue them on top of a panel that (s)he can get locally and ask for a local advice re: cutting them out, drilling, etc.

I guess the best would be to use A4 (US letter?) page size with some margins (to allow for A4/US letter adjusting). After printing out one would need to cut out the margins and either cut out the parts outlines (combine from different pages for bigger parts) or may be combine the whole pages in the right 'mosaic' for certain typical panel sizes.

What do you think?
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daniel_reetz
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by daniel_reetz »

It's a great idea, and like so many great ideas it has come up before - somewhere on this forum. :) First things first, this will be an open source design with total CAD documentation, so if people want to convert it into such a format that will be possible, and I will seriously consider doing it myself. There are some design ideas I have that would likely be too complicated for a scroll saw or jig saw to handle, so although this is possible, it's unlikely to be the best way to distribute things.

Believe me, though, I am thinking about people in remote places and with little cash. Maybe we can use wider adoption to subsidize their purchases.
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rob
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by rob »

OK, Advantech OSB: OSB is, as pointed out above, oriented strand board. Basically wood is run through a chipper-shredder, liquid resin is mixed in, and the whole thing gets compressed into a sheet. The wood is not as fine as MDF (Medium Density Fiberboard, which is essentially sawdust and glue), and also not made out of plies like plywood (thin sheets of wood glued together).

Advantech is a brand, which is supposedly better than the other brands of OSB, due to the resin they use.

The main characteristics of OSB:

* It is as strong as plywood. Plywood is strong because alternating plies are laid down with the wood fibers running at right angles to each other. The plies also are composed of long fibers. OSB has the wood fibers oriented in random directions because it is made of chips, not plies, and the fibers are shorter. However, the whole thing has a three-dimensional structure.

* It is water resistant. The resin used in OSB is stronger than the glue used in plywood, so the OSB doesn't come apart if exposed to water. Of course, it will eventually come apart if drenched in water, but much later than plywood.

* It is structural. OSB is typically used (in the U.S., anyway) as floorboards, on top of which you put carpet or tiles or whatever. It is also used as exterior walls, over which you put siding.

* It doesn't have voids. Plywood can get voids because there can be natural holes in the ply. This reduces the strength of the plywood, especially if you saw through a void. OSB doesn't have voids.

* OSB is supposedly more uniform in thickness (FALSE). I have measured OSB and plywood (well, Baltic Birch), and I have found that they are just as uniform: +/- 0.02 inches. I just measured a 2'x2' piece of OSB, and it varies by 0.01 inches. My Baltic Birch sample varied even less: 0.005 inches.

* OSB looks horrible if not painted. It's structural engineered wood, not a cabinet-grade wood.

* OSB tends to chip easily. If you route OSB on a CNC, some of the chips may pull out. You can alleviate this somewhat by using a downcutter (a routing bit which doesn't pull the routed material up, but rather pushes it down). But it will still chip. I've had 1/2" x 1" pieces just come right off.

Hope that helps!
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by Ryan_phx »

rob wrote:* OSB looks horrible if not painted. It's structural engineered wood, not a cabinet-grade wood.
OSB looks horrible even when it IS painted. OSB should never, IMHO, be used where it will be seen. It is a structural material meant to be covered up. Sure, it's cheaper than BB plywood, but it's so gawd-awful ugly that it'll make the end product look, well, cheap.
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daniel_reetz
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by daniel_reetz »

LOL. you guys just go on arguing about the merits of OSB and I'll just keep building scanners. :) (no seriously, thanks, it's all informative and interesting)

I cut my first batch of test parts on the ShopBot today, it worked out to be an interesting material, but only right for certain parts of the machine I'm planning. I didn't have any of the problems Rob described, but maybe I just didn't cut enough stuff.

My main observation today is not so much about the material but about the software toolchains - holy shit, is CAD/CAM software awful. And I have access to some of the best stuff out there - Solidworks, Autodesk Inventor, and the Vectrix cam suite. What a mess!
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Misty
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by Misty »

daniel_reetz wrote:My main observation today is not so much about the material but about the software toolchains - holy shit, is CAD/CAM software awful. And I have access to some of the best stuff out there - Solidworks, Autodesk Inventor, and the Vectrix cam suite. What a mess!
Seems to be the case in almost every non-general use professional field. ;) The more specialized you get the kludgier the software gets.
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le.gentleman

Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by le.gentleman »

Sounds like a great plan Daniel!
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rob
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by rob »

daniel_reetz wrote:My main observation today is not so much about the material but about the software toolchains - holy shit, is CAD/CAM software awful. And I have access to some of the best stuff out there - Solidworks, Autodesk Inventor, and the Vectrix cam suite. What a mess!
It is shit. Here's what I recommend as a ShopBot toolchain: use Adobe Illustrator to draw your parts, and then import into PartWorks. PartWorks can then be used to generate your toolpaths, along with adding fillets. Sadly, the fillets all have to be added manually, but you can get away with shortcuts -- like you don't have to add fillets to interior corners. Also, just as sadly, if you then go back to Illustrator to make a change, all your work in PartWorks up until then is wasted.

There's a useful plugin for Illustrator if you deal with a lot of curvy bits, which is PathToolkit. It helped me immensely in designing a weird Geneva mechanism for cutting on a ShopBot.

Solidworks is extremely powerful, if you can get past the learning curve, get used to doing parametric design the "right" way, and have a Solidworks pro in your area who can be as completely in the dark as you are when posed a question, although said pro will push more buttons and come up with more complex screens in an effort to arrive at no idea at all.

Have you been able to evaluate Alibre?
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by will1384 »

I find that Mach3 from ArtSoft works well to control my small CNC and its easy to use,
and Cut2D from Vectric works well to convert to G-Code, and for drawing / designing things
I have been using a mix of things, DeltaCad, and CorelDRAW, that being said I stick to 2D


Mach3
http://www.machsupport.com/

Cut2D
http://www.vectric.com/

DeltaCad
http://www.deltacad.com/

CorelDRAW
http://www.corel.com/
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daniel_reetz
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Re: Mass Production DIY Book Scanner.

Post by daniel_reetz »

Thanks, Will1384 and Rob... very helpful. Can't wait to get going on this project - it's going to be off and running very shortly. :)
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