About me

Hi all,

Most here know me only by my posts. My writing, typing, and spelling skills are so poor I hate to think of the picture you have of me. Tonight I thought I'd tell you a few things so that picture is clearer if not better. First, I like small boats! I have a job that pays wages as an aircraft mechanic/machinist. I also have a small business building boats. The last five years have been spent building a new house and now my new shop. (pictures on link at bottom) The shop should be done by September I hope. I'm also around half way to completion on a 4'X 8', CNC, 3 axis, gantry router. All of this and yard work too. My goal is to have enough boat work to supplement my retirement in about ten years. Did I mention that I like small boats? My armature forays into design is what keeps me up at night. If I post something way out there feel free to let me know you won't hurt my feelings.
Jeff, thanks again for a great forum.

Gary

Link to shop pictures:
http://www.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=67b0de21b3016f634562

 

Hey Gary
Read your post and thought of you when I downloaded this pic I took Sunday in Seward AK She is A Devlin 22' Surf Scooter with a Honda 90 in the well. Not a bad day boat! The owners want $39,000.00 for her and claim she surveys at 49......... alot o bread for 22' foot of boat. 8Kts

 

Great picture 8Kts, and it's good to hear from you again. For those that are not familiar with Sam Devlin’s designs, this is a very good example of a boat that can be built in your back yard with plywood. At that price it sure puts O-1 into perspective. For more of his designs check this out.

http://www.devlinboat.com/

Gary

 

Nice shop Gary. Lots of trees make better working company than city streets and the neighbor's vinyl siding any day

Are you building your CNC router using a kit? Do you know what your total cost will be yet for your CNC setup?

 

And it's good to see you on the forums 8knots! I think the 22' version looks better proportioned than its 25' larger brother, although I'd typically prefer a little more length. Nice looking boat.

 

Jeff, I started with a set of plans from Machine Tool Camp. ( http://www.machinetoolcamp.com/ ) I hope to finish it for under 6K. I choose this design because the operating system uses G-code, and construction is simple and sturdy. We will see if I made the right choice this fall. Using this tool for my boat building is a natural, CNC is the one area that I would consider myself a professional
Gary.

 

I'll be interested to hear and see more as you put this together - a friend has a CNC router for around a thousand less primarily for signs; it does the job but it seems a little light weight (though I really have no hands on experience with CNC so I know next to nothing - only what I've seen on the web). I haven't had a chance yet to play with it, but hopefully when I get some free time and find some better software to drive it I'll have a chance (currently it's command line and somewhat inflexible, though I've only spent 5 minutes with it so maybe I just don't know what it's capable of yet.)

I'm curious about the 5" of up-down travel. Could you use this to produce a nice half hull model if you had plenty of time? Or no? What limits the z-axis travel and would it cost a fortune to increase it by a few inches? In the next few years if it comes down by a couple thousand this is something I would love to have too, but unfortunately since I'm not even building a boat right now, I won't be able to justify this large of a tool for a while

 

CNC stuff

Hey Guys:
I have had the chance to work on a Gerber Sabre router at a sign
shop I used to work at. I love the Vacuum hold down table it had
I strongly advise you to get ahold of some plans Gary. You will not be sorry for the expence. The Z axis is 6" on the 404 I worked on. Unfortunatly the software That Gerber provides is not 3-D capable So I was not able to do exactly what Jeff wishes
Real 3-d software costs BIG! I did cut the station molds for the plug of the 19' sea kayak I want to market. 3/4" MDO with a 1/4"
upspiral will cut fast and crisp. Just a note Hartlaur (spelling)????
is where we got all our bits. Great Service!!!! Anyway have fun all
I am sure you will be making chips from everything you can get your hands on soon! 8Kts

 

By the way sign shops get between $60-100 an hour + art time
@ $65 an hour to do custom stuff up here. This may help those of you who have plans. and do not like jig saws! those shops that have a mist cooling system can all-so cut aluminum, brass and bronze. Take out that 2nd on the house though it will be slow =costly 8

 

The limit on the Z-axis is the height of the gantry and the length of the Z drive screw. Adding 5 more inches would be less than $100. The controller package I have is capable 4-axis movement. It is very rare that you would have more than 2 axis moving at one time. For half models you could run XZ paths, than YZ paths. You would use a ball end cutter and would have to sand off the high spots after the cutting is done. Most of the better CAM software will import 3D CAD files. You decide how you want the file cut and what cutters to use and the software will write the code for you. For 2D there are a few good CAM packages for under $500. The funny thing is that I know zip about electronics and I’m building this in my garage. I will share all my mistakes with everyone here. I also would be happy to answer any questions.
Gary

 

Gary:
You may be able to find a market selling your Router service to
alum boat builders and cabinet makers. And i say service meaning when times are slow. 8

 

I’ll be happy just to make wood chips to start. For aluminum I would need a power head with slower RPM. That will have to wait for the GTi version.
Gary

 

Just for info we had a Porter cable 3 1/2 hp router that had 5 speeds but we ALLWAYS ran it wide open @22,000 rpm we just changed the the IPM feed to compensate for different materials!
Have you ever played with high density eurethane? Blue foam is fun cheap practice Too 8