I started making a solenoid graver, I 3d printed the handpiece and wanted more power than Alistaire's so I used a larger solenoid, but it gets quite hot, it's still a work-in-progress.
In my case it was a combination of the challenge, lack of funds for the professional tools ( I made 4 air gravers for under $100) and occupying myself during lockdown, Some people watched Netflix, I got in the shed and did stuff.
If you have a lathe and a 3d printer you can make this ported piston power graver. The metal version works better, but the plastic one will be ok for getting into power graving until you can afford a professional set-up.
There's more stuff on my youtube channel that may be of use to the beginner.
I have one that looks the same, but it doesn't contain a needle valve so you only get full off and full on with a slight variable air flow if you can move your foot slightly between the two, but its not meant to be variable it's just an on/off switch.
Yes mine was in a box, but I had air vents in it and an extra fan for cooling the compressor, so was probably noisier than yours.
I would like to know which foot pedal you used, because I could not find one off the shelf that delivered a variable air supply, they were all either press for on and...
This flexi-drive way works quite well. If you press the pedal past about halfway you get the thing that all handpieces containing a spring suffer from where the piston in the handpiece moves faster than the spring can react, but it is perfectly useable having to limit the pedal to halfway...
This produces pulsed air - the piston has it's reed valve removed and the hole blocked up, so on the up stroke it forces air and the down stroke sucks air. You can see it in action if you follow the YouTube link in the original post.
Yeah, I saw some advert on Instagram with the motor attached straight to the compressor and instantly thought it makes more sense to connect it with the handpiece then you can still use it as a drill.
Most flex shafts can take a beating as long as you don't put too much of a bend in them as not...
This is a modification of Shaun Hughes Homemade Engraving Machine to use a flexi-drive drill as a power source. This way you don't need a 12v power supply, speed controller or air-valve footpedal that is required when building Shaun's version.
Just remove the motor on the car tyre compressor...
Yeah, it works well, it saves precious seconds in the sharpening process that can be used on more pleasurable activities like drinking coffee. You can also store them together so you're not searching for the matching pair.
Yes Its's pneumatic. I don't have any plans on paper, but here's the link to my Youtube channel with videos on what I've made:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkbnoDuOQym7DCe0T9Dl7TQ/video
If you are handy in the workshop you could make your own power-graver, sharpening templates, turntable etc. for under $100 as I did, a 3D printer and a mini lathe comes in handy though.
I certainly love the line streamlining and stabilization in Procreate and the way you can re-position the line once you have drawn it, beats my shakey pen and paper drawings, but pen and paper is quick for just getting ideas down.
I've heard that if you are using a laser printed image that you can use a heat gun to fuse the toner onto the metal and it won't rub off. Laser printers use heat to fuse the toner to the paper, so makes sense to fuse it to the metal.
Are you melting down and rolling scrap, if so it could be that some of the scrap is of a different alloy mix and it doesn't melt and mix with the rest, it may look like it has all melted together, but if you fish around in the molten metal you can pull out solid bits, then when you put it...
The others making them on Youtube include me, I've made a few of them, not the pulsed air version that Shaun Hughes makes, but one that works directly from a compressor so no modified piston is needed and no maintenance is needed, they seem to run forever.
You can check it out on the Youtube...