So let's talk about grease...

[dremu]

I have a mechanism which I am attempting to lubricate, and I'm unsure of how thick a grease to use.

(It's part of an autochanger mechanism for a DVD burner, so as to do automated backups of many, many discs, fwiw.)

The gizmo in question is bearing driven and slides horizontally on a ~3/8" steel rod. It binds, just a bit, and this throws the whole works into a fit. The bearings are inside, but look like maybe 1/16-1/8" diameter ball bearings, to give you an idea of the scale of the thing (i.e. it's fricken tiny in comparison to the trucks! )

I've had the best luck with wheel bearing grease, i.e. thick stuff, though it's still not quite right. I also tried white lithium, which if anything seemed a bit worse, and silicone spray didn't do squat.

I guess, rather than specifics, I'm looking for general guidance as to when to use what type of lube (no jokes! ) ... given bearing and/or clearance sizes of (x), use a lubricant like .

Or any suggestions of what's next thickest after wheel bearing grease ... if anything. After that it seems like sticky mud might be best =))

Thanks!

(And no, I can't go to the manufacturer for advise ... seeing as I am he and he is an idiot, i.e. this is home-built.)

-- A

 

[Jason4x4]

sewing machine lube??

 

[Drey]

Have you tryed graphite? I know it makes a mess but might get good results.

Maybe gear box grease for RC trucks, im not sure of what it is, but hobby shops should carry it.

 

[dhcomp]

Maybe gear box grease for RC trucks, im not sure of what it is, but hobby shops should carry it.

Pretty sure that is white lithium

 

[dremu]

Have you tryed graphite? I know it makes a mess but might get good results.

Maybe gear box grease for RC trucks, im not sure of what it is, but hobby shops should carry it.

What grease doesn't make a mess?

Don't remind me, I'm STILL cleaning thumbprints off the acrylic... dumb of me to use clear, live and learn.

-- A

 

[darkshadow]

sewing machine lube??

yeah a nice thin lube, like that or hops #9 gun lube, or even hydraulic oil would work

 

[Confedneck79K30]

redline synthetic spray lube ulube, etc light and super sticky

 

[dremu]

I ended up tossing the original sleeve bushings and their holder, and drilling out a piece of high density polyethylene, aka HDPE ... aka cutting board. My local plastics place knows me by name now ... but it's cheap, good stuff, and self lubricating, no less ... just drill it slightly larger than the rod it rides on, and voila, it moves.

My camera takes crappy video -- why is it so dang orange? -- but anyway, it's the mechanism that slides left-to-right.

-- A

 

[darkshadow]

that is cool! my brother will love that, when did you take robotics?

 

[dremu]

that is cool! my brother will love that, when did you take robotics?

Take? Like in *school*?

Nah man, I'm an old fogey ... when I was in school we wrote on stone tablets with chisels.

This stuff is just a hobby ... self-taught, and got bored a few weeks ago, with a soldering iron, a drill press, and a very patient local plastics shop...

-- A

 

[darkshadow]

cool.

I ask because my brother messed around with robotics in school, and worked on some too at an electroplating plant we worked at.

What runs it? a PLC or are you able to do it right off your pc?

 

[dremu]

cool.

I ask because my brother messed around with robotics in school, and worked on some too at an electroplating plant we worked at.

What runs it? a PLC or are you able to do it right off your pc?

Actually a dedicated single-board PC ... Via makes these crazy small, low-power motherboards with EVERYTHING built in. They're not really fast -- this one is middle of the line and is a whopping 1GHz ... but the whole board takes something like 20W, which is less power than just the Intel CPU chips alone require these days. They're also SMALL -- ~6.7" on a side -- so they fit lots of places. You can't see it 'cuz it's on the far side of the drive cage ... oh, I have some better pix...

http://www.slosh.com/florian/epia-motherboard.JPG

http://www.slosh.com/florian/overall-view.JPG

For scale, the entire thing is ~26" square at the base, and about 22" high.

The various little boards scattered around are either kits I built (most of them several years ago) or stuff I soldered up by hand, like the stepper controller. The vertical motion is a stepper, something like 7200 steps from top to bottom, and the horizontal axis is just your basic DC motor with serious gearing to move the tower side to side.

The devil is of course in the details, but the joy of it being a full-blown PC is it's easy to change stuff.

The other reason for a whole PC as opposed to a PLC or something little, is that I can then run Nero on the thing to burn the discs, so it can run straight from the fileserver, across the network, and do backups. Just to back up my MP3's takes like 50-odd discs, and that's a PITA to do by hand ... so, have the machine do it!

Anyway, more detail than you want I'm sure, but at least I can prolly retain my status as king geek here @ CK5 =))

-- A

 

[darkshadow]

No no detail is good, I thought it was just a disk loader for your PC, while it is a PC with a built in loader, very cool.

 

[dremu]

No no detail is good, I thought it was just a disk loader for your PC, while it is a PC with a built in loader, very cool.

Well, I'm a big fan of having dedicated PC's for specific tasks, especially when they can be so small / low power / low noise.

I did up one as a digital picture frame, for instance. Not as cheap as the ones you can get at Wal-mart these days, but it's a 14" LCD, has a nice wooden frame, and a web interface for uploading pictures =))

-- A

 

[BGKYK5]

Very cool, I always wanted to build one of those battle bot thingies they used to have on TV where the two "robots" (actually just remote control vehicles) would fight it out in an arena with spikes and saws and stuff. Never did any more than think about it though.

BTW, that must be a serious MP3 collection!

 

[dremu]

Very cool, I always wanted to build one of those battle bot thingies they used to have on TV where the two "robots" (actually just remote control vehicles) would fight it out in an arena with spikes and saws and stuff. Never did any more than think about it though.

BTW, that must be a serious MP3 collection!

The really good battle robots, actually, are locally controlled, i.e. have all the electronics on-board. Gets crazy, and there is SOOO much work involved in building them I am not AT ALL prone to letting anybody mash it up =)) ... god knows I have enough trouble with the damn thing breaking on its own

And yeah, the CD and DVD collection ... well, we had that post in the Lounge about collecting the other week ... we each have our issues

-- A

 

[BKinzey]

Crappy Camera Video Who Knew

First it's low light conditions. It's a still camera first & foremost. So outside, high noon, is best for video

It's orange-y because it's tungsten based light source. If you'd shone a 500w work light on it the brighter light source would clear that up to some extent.

There is a lot more to it but basically you needed more light for proper exposure.

Maybe try some firearms type grease? A little goes a long way.

 

[dremu]

Crappy Camera Video Who Knew

First it's low light conditions. It's a still camera first & foremost. So outside, high noon, is best for video

It's orange-y because it's tungsten based light source. If you'd shone a 500w work light on it the brighter light source would clear that up to some extent.

There is a lot more to it but basically you needed more light for proper exposure.

Maybe try some firearms type grease? A little goes a long way.

I think I have now COMPLETELY hijacked my own thread. Does that make it threadsturbation?

Anyway, the grease thing is moot, as I switched to HDPE which is self-lubricating, and since I had a solid block (well, a 3/4" sheet) I can set it so that it doesn't bind.

Now, as for the camera, I blame the camera because obviously I am an expert photographer ... and even more so for video.

So a halogen type bulb would give me whiter light?

I am NOT toting that thing outside as it'll go out of adjustment from the movement, never mind the temperature shift, but even at noon it's bloody dark these days

I'll attempt to close the thread with a link to my notes and pix on the project, since some folks have expressed interest, and it's a handy way to out-geek 73k5Blazer and his UPS-backed moisture alarm.

http://www.slosh.com/florian/

[NB: I also have a kilowatt-and-change enterprise-class UPS. I found out last week -- the hard way! -- that one of the battery terminals was corroded, had a nice turquoise crystal garden growing on it ]

-- A

 

[pvfjr]

Dremu, I had no idea you were such a geek! I've got a whole new respect for you now. It's good to see that there's others out there, you inspired me a bit with that mini motherboard. Didn't know about those, where'd you find it? Anyway, if you're looking for more geeky stuff to do, I suggest you head here...www.lumenlab.com You can build yourself a pretty nice DIY projector, I've been enjoying mine for three years now, and am on starting another one. They've got a section on homemade DIY CNC routers too, pretty cool stuff.

 

[dremu]

Dremu, I had no idea you were such a geek! I've got a whole new respect for you now. It's good to see that there's others out there, you inspired me a bit with that mini motherboard. Didn't know about those, where'd you find it? Anyway, if you're looking for more geeky stuff to do, I suggest you head here...www.lumenlab.com You can build yourself a pretty nice DIY projector, I've been enjoying mine for three years now, and am on starting another one. They've got a section on homemade DIY CNC routers too, pretty cool stuff.

Yeah, after doing this I am tempted to do some CNC stuff ... this basically is an X-Y CNC whatever, right, just with its plane vertical instead of horizontal.

The mini-mobos are VIA's Mini-ITX form factor ... I have a place I get them locally, though you can mail-order them lots of places. Great info (and a store, though they're in the UK ) on http://www.mini-itx.com (I have one of my old fileservers in their Projects section, back when 1TB was hard to build =)) and I'll be sending them this one when it's more finished.)

(oh, and thanks! )

-- A