Mech kit arrived, & Arjen's visit to Vik in NZ

[Arjen Lentz]

Hi all!

Well, finally... the BitsFromBytes mech kit arrived. It's a huge pile
of acrylic bits (needs to be separated and plastic coating be peeled
off before assembly), bags full of nuts, washers and the like, and
plenty of steel rods and such.
For assembly example, see http://www.bitsfrombytes.com/pdfs/X%20Assembly.pdf
(overview at http://bitsfrombytes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=category&sectionid=5&id=16&Itemid=28)

Then, while in Auckland last week for work I had free time over the
weekend, and I drove down to meet Vik, see the disaster zone that the
US TSA made of RepRap Child, and play with the original Darwin. Also
saw Vik's own acrylic lasercuts (from ponoko) which are very similar
to the bitsfrombytes, so he was able to tell me quite a bit about it.
And he was kind enough to give me a little bit of CAPA and a whole
100m roll of PLA. Plus a few other little bits like more belt, and DC
motors and gears for making another extruder.

Now, unfortunately I'll be away again for a few days every week the
coming few weeks and taking care of my daughter the remaining time.
After that there'll be some quieter weeks, and I'll be trying to make
some progress with both the soldering and putting some of the
mechanics together. There's just a lot of little bits that need doing,
and the only way to get it done is to start somewhere and keeping
going ;-)

I'd be happy for a group of you to come here and do both soldering and
mechanical stuff, we'll just need to sort out what day/time is best
and make that a regular thing.


In terms of schedule... the reason Vik still travels with RepRap Child
(will be named Phoenix after rebuild ;-) is that it is of course the
first one consisting of replicated plastic components. We can show off
our RepRap at OSDC early December and definitely LCA in Hobart end
January, however if we want to negate the need for Vik to bring
Phoenix to Hobart, we'll need to have put together a full replica by
then, not just this first one.
In terms of replication time, it takes about a month, if you take into
account the babysitting of the machine while operational, the
inevitable mishaps, and so on. This estimate comes from Vik. And then
there's of course the assembly as well.

Cheers,
Arjen.

[Dan]

Hi Arjen,

Very exciting that the kit has arrived.

Although im down in GC im happy to come up anytime and help work on
the build.

Just name a few times and place and ill work my schedual into it.

I have a nice new dual head soldering iron that i have been using and
it helps big time with IC type work.

Dan

[Greg Fairbrother]

On 16/09/2008, at 12:51 PM, Dan wrote:

> Just name a few times and place and ill work my schedual into it.

please post any times etc. you organise on the list as I should be
able to make it along too.

ta

--
Greg Fairbrother
_______________________________________________________
Intrepica - a learning revolution
http://www.intrepica.com.au
p 07 5656 9696 m 0421 006618

[pelrun]

Oooh, finally :)

I'll be away for a week at the end of the month, but I'm happy to help
build at any other time.

- James

[Dan]

Hi Arjen,

Just wondering what the hold up is?

If your not going to be able to host the builds can we put it in the
hands of someone else?

Really hard to move forward with 1 post a month.

Dan