Prusa mk4

[jcdammeyer]

John, did you go any farther with this? It's the weekend and I might play with it a bit

No. Went down a different rabbit hole and the ladder is missing again. Had a bad cold and when i stood up liquid would pour out my nose. So leaking over the shop stuff was a no go. Given the low melting temperature of PLA I suspect the tang on the file can be heated without destroying the file temper. A quick insertion into the insert and likely it would melt in place and stay there.
At the moment I have a few extra file handles a inherited from my son's toolbox but this is project #42.

 

[PeterT]

Meant to add, he blue bodies have a cross index of types/sizes of files which fit their threads

 

[PeterT]

Had a bad cold and when i stood up liquid would pour out my nose.

Me too. Funny story. I tried to remote into work to work from home. They use dual login authentication (PingID) but it refused to connect me. Tried a few more times. You know 'man cold' when you cant think straight & no patience & getting cranky. Turns out PingID was not convinced the beast it was facial scanning with dual Kleenex nostril plugs was actually Peter

 

[Perry]

Not taking anything away from 3DP custom handles but just weigh the cost & effort against buying them.

There are no accountants (or adult supervision I might add) at this factory. lol I realize the cost effectiveness of this venture. Once this is done, it is nice to just be able to plunk one out when you need it. (Plus I can share afterwards.)

 

[Tom O]

As far as I know the tangs on files are not tempered they were apparently ( Old School ) slightly bent and held in place with melted Sulphur.

 

[Mcgyver]

The tangs in my experience are not hardened which lets the metal bit inside the file hand get a bite. Personal preference are the Lutz ones KBC sells, although I did most of my stocking up when they were half that price. https://www.kbctools.ca/catsearch/616/file-handles

 

[slow-poke]

Your making something and you think I just need a little weird shaped "thingy" (could be anything), yesterday it was a cable mounting block/ spacer. 10 minutes later I'm taking exactly what I need off the printer. Could I have milled that little block out of teflon? Certainly. Could I have done it in 10 minutes? No because my smallest block of teflon is 2" x 2" and that would be wasteful.

 

[Perry]

Little Sunday evening CAD. Handle modified. Insert shape ready. Going to have to go measure my file tangs. Spent a little time searching the web and nothing. I'm guessing there is no standard for file tangs. I'm starting to lean towards a SOLID generic insert with a basic guide hole. Heat the file and melt it's way onto the perfect insert.

Got lost in a black hole of trying to wrap text onto the handle. I can do it on a test drawing of a cylinder but it doesn't seem to work on the file handle. I used the loft command to shape the handle. Not sure if that is where my issues are. Few photos for the night. Might even go print one of these this evening just to double check it.

 

[Perry]

The test prints went good. The inserts are a little on the tight side. The black insert face should sit flush with the red handle face. As you can see in the photos the black insert is not flush. A little scaling in the next print should solve that. On a good note the texture from the print layers prevents the insert from ever coming out. When it goes it you can hear a ratchet type sound and it is not coming out.

I spent a little time measuring and fitting the tag for the 10" file and it seems to have worked. No issues there except it will only be good for the 10" newer Nicholson files. The older 10" Nicholson file have a different tang.




The smaller triangle files I tried a different approach. Modeled a small six sided tapered hole. After printing I heated the tang on the file and pressed it into the hole. It worked a charm. That file is not coming out. The one issue is I didn't get the file tang to go in far enough. I think what is needed is a hole all the way thru the insert so that the molten plastic can be pushed out. I'm pretty sure the hole filled up and there was no where to release the pressure.




The square based insert allows you to place the file in a 0 and 90 degrees to the handle. The original model with the built in insert only has one way to put the file into it. If you look closely at my handle there is a recess right before the flange for the file. Your thumb sits perfectly in here and with the handle at the 90 degree the shape fits nicely into your hand. I wish I can take credit for this......haha I do not know where the recess came from. You could not see it in the CAD, but once printed it was obvious. Going back to the CAD, if you rotate the model you can just see it if the lighting is on it correctly. I'm sure it has something to do with the way I lofted the shape of the handle.

 

[Janger]

I discovered Prusa Connect - their cloud service to control your printer farm. Works well and is easier to use than Prusa Link which is the web app they have running on the printer itself. The only thing missing is tighter integration to the slicer software - still have to output a file and load it up in the control panel. And it needs a camera. But no more sneaker net at least.