Make Loc-line fitting to repair coolant screen

Yep, but of a mouthful but I'm not sure how else to describe it. It's one of these:

Some time ago I bought an adjustable polycarbonate screen for The Shiz from Cutwel, although I'm pretty certain I didn't pay £96 for it, so presumably it was on offer at the time. This is designed to be positioned on the milling table to contain swarf and coolant that is thrown off by the cutter.

It's not actually a Loc-Line product but presumably a reasonably decent copy. Having said that, it broke recently when I tried to adjust it. To be fair, the plastic looks as if it doesn't do sunbathing well, judging by the loss of surface colouring. 

The orange becomes bleached, whereas the blue doesn't seem to suffer as badly. It's possible you might expect that, given that dark materials absorb light, UV etc at the surface, whereas clear and lighter materials allow penetration - hence black cable ties are approved for automotive use, whereas white ones aren't due to their tendency to become brittle under extended exposure to UV.

From the description, it uses 3/4" LocLine, although the segments are actually labelled "JETON". Well either way, let's see about designing and replacing the broken shield mount.

Before getting trapped in a Makerspace / Thingyverse black hole, be aware these are available from McMaster-Carr, along with the 3D models in STP, IGES etc format, so you can download many parts directly from McMaster-Carr from within Fusion, ie no need to bugger about saving and importing them manually:

Looks almost right (or does it?):

So let's export it and flash one up in PLA+ with 100% fill:

It's surrounded by support structures.

They come off easily enough:

There. Looks fairly convincing.

...until you look a bit closer. Can you see the problems (there are more than one)?

Yes, it's the wrong sex - and the thread is too big. Apart from that it looks fine.

Let's start again. This time, for greater strength, use an M6 machine screw instead of a threaded body. And avoid thin sections - apart from the section around the spherical socket. I may regret not taking that thicker but equally, if it's too thick, will I be able to mate it with a male segment?

Let's make up a set and find out. Once I removed the dross, this is what I found:

And finally, with the polycarbonate screen fitted. 

Good. Job done - actually fits to the existing Loc-Line segments with enough friction to avoid sagging.

Soft jaws for Paramo and Record vises

Those new jaws I got for the Paramo vise are pretty vicious and the Record vise jaws aren't much friendlier. Clamping soft stuff such as wood or plastic in either vise leaves witness marks.

Looked for some ready to go designs on Makerspace etc but I could only find jaws that were intended for different sized vises. I have No3 vises, which have 4" wide jaws, whereas the nearest I could find are for No4 vises which have 4.5" jaws.

Simple enough to flash something up in Fusion and print a couple of sets to see how they fit the vises. 

That worked OK but I can't help myself but have another go at making it a bit better still. Some of the edges are a bit vicious and the "brim" that was printed around the build plate was a PITA to remove using a deburring tool.

And why not make it a parametric design while I'm at it?

And put some edge breaks on the various edges. Then export it as STL and get it printed....

Oof. Seems the first layers are curling. That usually menas the bed needs to be heated.

Yes, 75-90C would be good - but the default parameters for the eSUN PETG in the Orca slicer don't include bed heating.

That's better. With 90C bed temp, there's no warping:

Nice finish, no distortion, no need to deburr. Got there in the end.....