Volition 2014

chrismp · Post by **chrismp** » Wed Feb 12, 2014 1:44 pm

Just salvage some old vacuum cleaners...everyone has a couple of those things lying around at home. I built some wooden plates that I glued to the flange with the fan hole with silicone sealant. The hose is just stuck into a hole which I routed into the wooden plate to fit the hose exactly. Cheap and easy solution (pretty loud though).

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Thu Feb 13, 2014 5:48 am

I'm ok with loud if it works!

I can probably find quite a few locally without trying much. Right now I have a shop vac hooked up with a second shopvac hangin around. was thinking of giving it a try.

The more I looked, the more I saw people using custom vacuum setups with much better success then anything you could purchase off the shelf. Sometimes you just can't get away from a little DIY!

ben_mtl · Post by **ben_mtl** » Thu Feb 13, 2014 6:28 am

Here's my vacuum table, it works great with just a regular shopvac, The uncovered holes are just covered with packing tape or I put some MDF leftovers to cover them...
My first operation when I work on a set of cores though is to drill 2 holes at the ends of the core blank, those holes are matching the spacing of the vacuum holes and I use them with dowels so the cores stay in place, it double as locating pins for 2-sides machining.

The suction is there to keep everything tight against the table.

Here's how the table is built:

http://www.skibuilders.com/phpBB2/viewt ... 0410#40410

http://www.skibuilders.com/phpBB2/viewt ... 0918#40918

And here's my drag-knife setup : basically a 1/2" MDF over the whole vacuum table, with only the holes for the base width that are connected to the main vacuum table holes... less masking required, great suction, no problem !

chrismp · Post by **chrismp** » Thu Feb 13, 2014 6:32 am

Haha yeah, custom is the way to go here. We have a huge Rietschle Vacfox vacuum pump with a couple of vacuum pods that came with our CNC, but we don't use it at all. The vacuum cleaner motors are just so much better for ski/snowboard cores. Anyway, the Vacfox pump works great for degassing resins and as a vacuum source for our sublimation press.

Fyi, imo attaching the hoses directly to the vacuum motor increases suction by quite a bit. You always lose some vacuum inside the housing of the cleaner, filters, etc.

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Thu Feb 13, 2014 7:36 am

I opted for the grid method instead of the box method. I was originally just going to skim MDF on both sides instead of doing the hole method.

The hole method works well when my cores are square. But after they have been 2d profiled then sidewalled they become to awkward for the vacuum to hold. I need a greater concentration of holes the specific shape of the core. Or just a lot more vacuum!

I'm going to scan for some vacuum cleaners ala Chris said. Then pull em apart and direct connect hoses. Makes sense to me that they lose efficiency with all the extra BS in the way

chrismp · Post by **chrismp** » Thu Feb 13, 2014 9:25 am

You could increase the hole count on a square area and just cover up the holes which are not covered by the shaped core. Our vacuum table extends over the whole working area of our CNC but some packing tape or some sort of plastic foil work well to cover the holes which are not covered by the workpiece.

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Fri Feb 14, 2014 6:26 am

chrismp wrote:You could increase the hole count on a square area and just cover up the holes which are not covered by the shaped core. Our vacuum table extends over the whole working area of our CNC but some packing tape or some sort of plastic foil work well to cover the holes which are not covered by the workpiece.

I'm going to add concentrated holes to it this weekend and give it a shot again.

skimann20 · Post by **skimann20** » Fri Feb 14, 2014 7:02 am

locator pin! love it!

Chris, my last wood magazine tested shop vacs for how many inches of water they pull. I'll see if I still have it sitting around. the winner was a "crapsman" by a mile.

I believe it was this one:
http://www.sears.com/craftsman-xsp-16-g ... ockType=G4

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Fri Feb 14, 2014 8:22 am

I'm going to pickup another filter for my extra shop vac and set two up to draw. I'm slowly running out of available amperage in my shop

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Thu Feb 20, 2014 5:58 am

I haven't revisited this yet.

However I am on the hunt for house vacs like you said Chris.

I'm going to try adding some extra holes under where I usually place my ski cores And then cover with tape. I never thought of doing that before... Good idea!

So much I want to try before the snow is gone!

chrismp · Post by **chrismp** » Thu Feb 20, 2014 6:41 am

I always cover the larger areas of open holes with a thicker plastic foil (ie cut up some garbage bags) and the smaller sections get covered with packing tape.

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Thu Feb 20, 2014 7:06 am

chrismp wrote:I always cover the larger areas of open holes with a thicker plastic foil (ie cut up some garbage bags) and the smaller sections get covered with packing tape.

Yea, I've been using poly sheet I keep under the tape. I never thought of packing tape. Good idea!

I need to resurface my table pretty bad so once I get a free evening i'll tackle re-aligning holes and surfacing my spoil board all at once.

I need to get better dust collection too. So much stuff!

chrismp · Post by **chrismp** » Thu Feb 20, 2014 9:40 am

Packing tape is also great when you're cutting wavy pieces of base material. Just tape the perimeter of the base sheet and it will lie perfectly flat. Have a look at this clip for reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdwXUhwAsu8

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Sat Feb 22, 2014 7:16 am

Always coming through with useful info! Thanks Chris!

amidnightproject · Post by **amidnightproject** » Sat May 03, 2014 5:12 am

Been a bit busy as of late.

Wanted to share. I finally picked up a real dust collector (HF, nothing fancy) to help control some of the dust in the garage. Works well, only now I need to upgrade my dust shoe. Instead of spending $140 for the Kent shoe (worth it, I know) I decided to make my own for a total of about $20. While not as slick as the nice poly-carbonate shoe they offer as a first round tester it works. I have some tweaks to make which is why I chose to use maple instead of a $30 piece of plastic. I had to cut both pieces twice because of measurement issues which is fine because I was able to utilize all scrap material.

The bottom half un-clips for tool changes via magnets. Pretty convenient. The shoe that came with the mogul was a total PITA. Still need to finish up the brush holder.

You can also see the packing tape method of blocking vac holes like ChrisMP mentioned. Works like a dream!

Also got out for some fantastic turns this past Tuesday to close out my season. I took a high speed spill on the simplest of greens around lunch time which resulted in a minor non-displaced tibial plateau fracture in my knee. Like an idiot I still skiied. Got some sweet photos though! Rocked the new volition V2's which have are a rocker/camber hybrid and the killed the spring conditions. Pounded through crud and stayed on top. I'll post some photo's once I can re-size them!

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Volition 2014