Yes they are really relatively smooth. But you also have to do a slightly sanding to remove some residues from printing and also have a better surface for the filler and the paint.
Doing them with resin would save a lot more time, both in the printing itself and in the finishing work, but I think I stay with FDM at the moment.
Don't have the money to buy a bigger resin printer now and there is also a lot other material for the pit itself I have still to buy.
So, the basic functions of my CNC are setup and working. Now I have to try out some first simple tasks. if I am familiar with it, I will try some more complex things and I'm hoping that I'm very soon be able to do some simple circuits with it. That would be a dream and help a lot with my project.
I'm also still printing. The Kiowa cyclic big parts are all ready now. I'm printing all the big shell parts first for being able to spray paint them during the summer time at the balcony. Small parts like POV's triggers etc. will done at a later time, cause they can also be carefully brush painted.
At the moment the Kiowa Collective head parts are printing. If all Kiowa parts are ready, I will post a pic of them all together.
The collective grip will still be missing, cause many of my collectives use the same dual-twist-throttle-grip, which still must be printed and only the heads are different (eg. Kiowa, Viper, Venom, Huey share the same twist-grip).
What type of switches did you have in mind when drawing the Collective? I would like to start making a list of parts to order for all those switches And also check the hole diameters.
It's a bit early to say for sure, but the way the collective looks now I might not even have to do any changes apart from the connection to the base. The plan is the sand and fill and sand everything smooth.. maybe even making a silicone mould to cast it out of PU.. but maybe the print is already good enough after sanding, filling and spraying.
I use those buttons in the first two pictures and normal toggles you can get everywhere. I bought a lot of those buttons at ebay.
The POV I will use are from Thingiverse. Look for 4way/5way POV's or hats there. There are a lot of good projects with already done caps. Some are caps missing, especially for the Apache, but they aren't hard to do with eg TinkerCAD.
I have also still to make them, but at the moment my focus is to get all the big parts ready for spray painting until the summer arrives. If this is done, I will do the missing 3D models of all the POV's switches and what's still missing. This work and also the brush painting of those small parts can even be done during bad weather.
The big Kiowa parts are also ready now. 🙂 All smaller HOTAS parts, like the missing triggers, POV etc. will be printed at a later time. First the parts which should be spray painted are important. The parts on the picture are only loosely put together without screws or anything else and also not reworked or sanded yet. They are just like they came out of my printer and only the supports are removed.
My Kiowa cyclic has a bit more big holes, cause I will use more POV's (some will be 5Way) like the original has and also some extra switches, to be able to use the pilot and the co-pilot functions with the same grip. Where the pilot has a button and the co pilot a POV, I will mount a 5way POV to simulate the pilots button with the push function and the co-pilots POV with the direction functions or vice versa. The Cyclic has also a socket instead the type of mounting the original grip has, cause it should be interchangeable with my cyclic extension system. I don't want to make another special extension for such kind of grips eg. the Kiowa and some other helos do use.
The next part, the collective for the Blackhawk, is just at the beginning of it's print.
Thanx, I've seen the hats on thingyverse. Will see if they fit. Since I don't have a resin printer, I think I will have a couple of these POV housings printed at shapeways.
The chassis parts are done.. the grip is amazing! Well done Viper! I will start cleaning it further and sanding and priming it.
I also have a collective base from Virpil on the way to see if i can fit it to that. I think the base rod on the virpil is too long for this grip, so will see if i can modify it.
I'm just printing the Blackhawk collective and it's also a monster. The parts are even bigger as a single grip of the Apache collective. The three parts take ages to finish, cause I print with a 0.12mm layer height and a 60% cubic infill. The right grip shell of the Blackhawk collective is now printing since 19 hours and 35 minutes and is only 64% finished.
And I have still a lot of big parts to print, like the whole C-130 yoke and the 4 engine throttle quadrant, the AV-8B throttle and the MV-22B throttle and so on.
UH-60L/M Blackhawk HOCAS ready for reworks and paint job! 🙂
The big parts of the collective are printed and for the cyclic I will use an old modded TM X-Fighter, I made back those days I did not have a 3D printer. Both parts have to be reworked and sanded before painting, but the raw work is already done. The remaining cable from the old X-Fighter will be removed and one of the sockets of my new connection will be system attached.
P.S: The UH-60 collective has also a trigger like the L/M versions have, but this is somewhat difficult to see in the pictures.
Just printing the AV-8B throttle grip shells. First one is already done and the second is at 64% now.
Meanwhile I'm fighting with my CNC. 😄
The included offline controller is completely useless and cannot execute more complex G-code. Most of the time it does nothing at all. Code that runs fine with Candle or the Android GRBL controller is usually not executed by the offline module.
So I need another offline control module than this cheap original one on the CNC. Since I do not want to leave my smartphone constantly on the mill, I am now building a new holder for a cheap china tablet, which was originally intended for my cockpit as a CDU/FMC input device with appropriate Android interface software.
Unfortunately, this software is no longer compatible with the now completely outdated Android 4.4 on the tablet and for the cockpit I probably have to get a new cheap tablet for this purpose.
But this little thing works perfectly together with the CNC using the Android GRBL Controller after I made it OTG capable by rooting Android and changing the USB settings in the OS using a tool. The advantage of the tablet is that I can leave it permanently attached to the machine and it can also be permanently charged by a DC power supply which is using an independent input plug from USB and can even charge the tablet while the OTG connection is in use.
Just ordered 20 pieces of doublesided 150x100mm copper PCB's. Now the PCB production can also start, provided I get along with it as well as with 3D printing. 😄
I will try to use KiCAD for this and test it with some other combinations of freeware to get my projects done on the CNC. It's probably going to be just as strange a mix as I did with my 3D design. But what the heck, the end result has to fit. 😅
Just flattening the spoil board of my CNC. The job is at arround 33% now and all looks good. The face of the spoil board becomes 100% flat, but it takes ages with a 3mm cutter. 😄
I hope my smartphones battery lasts this long to finish the job. At the moment I'm printing the mount for the tablet and when this is done, there is no more fear of a job that couldn't be finished cause of the battery. The tablet will always be charged during the milling work.
The spindle is really running balanced, nevertheless the little thing makes a hell of a noise. Milling is nothing you can do during the night. 😅
Maybe with just a small cutter or an engraver, I will use for the PCB's the noise is a little more tolerable. 🤔
The CNC with my tablet mounted now and the spoil board I made yesterday. 😄 At the last run I tuned the feedrate up in slow steps until it reached 160mm/min. No problem at least with this material.
The offline controller at the front is pretty useless, but I have no desire to remove it again. If I had known beforehand what kind of crap this is, I could have saved myself the work of housing it and routing the cables to the board. It has trouble to run even the simplest G-code, which doesn't make any problems while using it with the Android GRBL controller on the tablet or with Candle running at Windows.
AH-1Z/UH-1Y collective head is ready printed. At the moment the left shell of the cyclic is printing. It's at 97%, but still will take nearly an hour to finish. I hope I can survive as long. 😄 It's 4 o'clock in the morning now. I have already slept a little before, to wait for the end of the printing. I want to be able to start the right half right away.
Since I want to have all the versions of aircraft I want to fly in a simulation, also as 1/72 models on the wall mounted on 3D printed stands in my cockpit room and I am still missing a few, I have been looking for kits for the AH-1Z and the UH-1Y to shorten the wait for the end of printing. But these two models are hardly available here in Germany as a kit and if so, then only at really horrendous prices.
I can still remember that the 1/72 kits used to be available for pocket money as I was a young boy, today they often did cost much more than the big 1/32 did back those days, if they aren't on sale.
I already bought an UH-1H and an UH-1N the day before yesterday .
I have a relative big collection now for this little room, but some of the aircraft I also want to fly in my pit, are still missing. I always try to get them as cheap as possible, cause there is anyway no time build them before my pit is finished. From time to time I do a search after the missing ones and if I find a bargain, it's mine.
After all, I need something to do when the pit is finished and it has to have something to do with aircraft.
AH-1Z/UH-1Y controlls also printed. As always, they look like they came just out of the printer. The support is not completely removed yet, cause I need a Dremel at some sections to do this. I will make it tomorrow. The cyclic looks very similar to an A-10C or a F-16 grip, but it isn't. It has a totally different trigger system, with two triggers placed on top of each other and the shape itself is also slightly different.
The next print is the AH-1F cyclic and the UH-1N collective head. I will also use this collective for the AH-1F/W models and of course also for the UH-1H (which has slightly less functions and a different shape). The "N"-collective head is also very similar to the one used in the Whiskey Cobra and can also be used for the F-Cobra. For the cyclic of the UH-1H I will use an original TM X-Fighter (standard B8), same goes for the Whiskey Cobra and for the UH-1N a slightly modified X-Fighter with a thumb switch at the left side and a button on the right.
Okay, for the right part, the support is easy to remove. The left one still has a stubborn part in it. Tomorrow I will chop it up with a Dremel. We'll see who wears the pants here. 😅
If there are no cross holes or overhangs blocking the support, removal is quite simple.
Since I print at quite high temperatures, the PLA is very hard and not very flexible. When removing the support, this is an advantage because the interlayer between the support and the part breaks instead of giving way.
Simply go into a gap with the screwdriver and loosen the support piece by piece at various points with light, steady twisting movements. Do not lever while the support is still tight, otherwise something may break on the component.
If parts do not come out so easily, I carefully cut them in suitable places with a Dremel. You really have to be careful not to cut too deep, so as not to damage the component itself.
For the separated parts, I then proceed exactly as described above. I rarely use a cutter knife. At most, I use a pair of flat-nose pliers to carefully pull out a stubborn part.
, currently printing the second half of the lower collective grip.
