I've been spending time over on Reddit lately. It's a great resource that uses the Wisdom of Crowds to curate content. What I mean by that is they not only vote content up and down, but they're very strict about posting. Nothing too spammy or too troll-like is tolerated. Having dealt with some online communities that are overrun with Trolls, I value that. To give you some examples of what's to be found on Reddit, here are 5 posts I found just this morning that I liked.
Cheap and Cheerful Dust Control for Carbon Fiber Milling
Carbon Fiber is a neat material-extremely strong, lightweight, and gorgeous to look at. But it is not without its problems. As a composite material, it is very abrasive, and the dust it produces is hazardous to breath. For more about machining the stuff, read our series on Composites.
It's all doable, but on a hobby class machine, the dust control can be a bit vexing. That is, unless you're Apollo, one of Carbide3D's founders. He shows how to machine carbon fiber by submerging it in a little container of water:
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Clever trick, Apollo!
Here's the Reddit Link and the link back to Carbide3D's Community.
Harbor Freight Dust Collector with Thien Disk Separator
Adding a cyclone or other dust separator to your dust collection system or Shop-Vac is a great upgrade that we've written about before. Here's a neat installation done on a shop dust collection system:
Dust blower and separator-barrel...
Disc separator is super simple...
3D Printed Fallout Cosplay Helmet
Cosplay (DIY movie quality props) are always fun. This 3D printed helmet from the Fallout game came out looking spectacular:
Imagine showing up to a costume party in this rig!
Some great tips in the article too. For example, using iron filings to achieve the finish on the helmet.
Free Tutorial on Workholding
Sometimes you find gold in the comments of an unrelated post. I found a link to Enerpac's School of Workholding. It's a great set of articles on Fixturing.
CNC'd Business Cards for a CNC Business
How best to communicate your CNC business's capabilities? Perhaps by CNC'ing your business cards:
Laser printed business cards. They even come apart to make a little dollhouse-sized chair. Aren't they neat?
Conclusion
These 5 were just the haul form one morning's trawling. It's not always this rich, but I do nearly always find something interesting to check out on Reddit. You'll want to decide which groups (subreddits) to investigate. I generally hang out around 3DPRINTING, MACHINISTS, CNC, HOBBYCNC, SHAPEOKO, CNCMACHINING, MACHINING, and DIYCNC.
Enjoy!
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