Eric Girard – Who said it’s impossible?

Feb282023 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Designing a cool smart doorbell for my house

CNC, Electronics, Uncategorized, Woodworking

Introduction Our doorbell's button stuck in the pressed position and caused the electromagnets coils to melt. I decided to use this project as an opportunity to design my own door bell using off the shelf hardware for the electronic and custom wood / acrylic case. I was also looking at a small project to try resin coating wood in order to get some experience for my upcoming computer desk project. Requirements: Fit with the decor - approx 10'' x 5'' x 2'' Play a mp3 / wav file when the doorbell button is pressed Include addressable led strips for lighting effects Use off the shelf component for the electronics Easy to program so my kids can help Use existing wiring (2 wire power + 2 wire button) Hardware Raspberry PI 3b + Raspian OS I wanted to use ...

May92021 by Eric GirardNo Comments

New Power Panel for CNC mill/table machine

3D Printing, CNC, Electronics

New Power Panel It's been a while since my last post here. I've been quite busy added a new workshop to have a nice plice for all my toys... I finally moved my CNC mill/table from my basement to my new workshop. I made a steel base, which I'll cover in another post to replace the wobbly wood base I used in the basement. I also re-wired most of the circuits : Added contactors to control power to the computer, control boards, motors drives and spindleAdded a hard-wired emergency button to physically cut the power to motors / spindle. The temporary emergency was software only which wasn't that great from a safety point of viewAdded an software controlled relay to turn the spindle cooling pump on/offAdded a flow sensor on spindle cooling line to ensure proper coolant flowAdded ...

Mar232019 by Eric GirardNo Comments

PoE Security Camera for timelapse

Cameras And Videocameras

With winter finally winding down, I'm looking at ways to document the construction of my workshop (more details coming soon). One easy way is to install a camera device and capture a snapshot at fixed intervals, allowing for easy creation of timelapses. Here's a list of my initial requirements : Affordable ( 50-150$ / camera)Prefer a digital system over an analog (actually, avoid analog!)Weatherproof camerasMust be reusable in the future for an upcoming security systemCamera must expose the captured image in a documented way : allow for integration in custom softwareNo battery-powered deviceIf possible, HD picture With this idea in mind, I started to look at what's available. I dismissed prosumer / professional PTZ cameras (over 300$). It's been a few year since I took the ...

Feb282018 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Material height measurement sensor

CNC, Uncategorized

I added a puck-style probing sensor in order to quickly find the top of the raw material I'm milling. I wanted a sensor that would work on both conductive and non-conductive material and wouldn't require to remove the current tool and install my 3 axis probing tool. I quickly turned a 2" puck 626 mils thick and milled a flat on the side to attach a wire. I also designed a 3D printed holder to store the puck when not in used. I configured the input wired to the puck to be Probe 3 in Mach4. So now, when I want to probe any material height, I put the puck on the top of the material and execute a G91 G31.2 Z-2.0 F15 and when the probing is done, I can set the Z position to 0.626" I'm planning to add a custom macro in the future and get Fusion 360 to generate it at th...

Feb282018 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Start / Stop buttons

CNC, Electronics

I finally wired and configured Mach4 to use the start / stop buttons that I installed along the emergency stop button a while ago. Moving all the home / limit / probing switches to SmoothStepper Port 3 freed inputs on Port1 than I was then able to use for the buttons. The start button that I used is recessed, making accidental activation less likely. I had to change the screen script to call CycleStart / CycleStop on inputs activation. All in all, I'm pretty happy : The buttons allow me to look at the machine instead of mouse / screen to start / stop the machine

Feb282018 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Limit and homing switches

3D Printing, CNC, Electronics

In order to use my newly added tool touch pad, I needed to be able to move the machine to a known (absolute) physical position. So it was time to finish my half-wired limit / homing switches system. I did a bit of cleanup in the schematic and added a quick and dirty 'breakout' board for the SmoothStepper Port 3. This also allowed me to regroup all limit / homing / probing inputs on the same port I used cheap 6 pins / 4 pins round connector to make it easy to disconnect the wiring (I'll move the machine in my upcoming workshop this summer). I actually used the machine itself to machine the connector openings in the board (non-circular holes) The 'switches' are actually optical barriers. I decided to use optical switches due to easier installation, ...

Feb282018 by Eric Girard1 Comment

Add a tool touch sensor

3D Printing, CNC, Electronics

A few weeks ago, I made a wooden plate using my mill machine and decided to time how long it would take to mill the whole plate. I found out that I spent 25 minutes out of 67 doing material Z measurement (zero) and Tool Z adjustement after each tool change (I want a toolchanger!) I realized that a few thing that I could do to streamline operations (and prevent small tool breakage) would be : Automated material height sensing (Z). must work with both conductive and non-conductive materials. Automated tool length measurement before and after a tool change in order to automatically adjust the current Z position 3 axis touch sensor (I already have it, just need to make connection easy to do) I decided that the biggest time saving would be #2 - Automated tool length...

Jan272018 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Wooden coaster

CNC, Uncategorized, Woodworking

I experimented inlaying different woods to produce attractive design. I decided to make a coaster so I could use it afterward. I used my upcoming company logo as the basis of the design and decided on a 4" coaster diameter, plain round for now. I used a 60 degrees v-bit, 16K RPM, 65IPM feedrate (could have gone faster but I went with safe values). I then glued the two parts together, making sure there was glue in every corner to prevent lift-up / delamination later, used regulard yellow wood glue. I then clamped overnight to allow to dry. Next morning, I used my bandsaw to remove the backing of the inlay and then sanded everything smooth using 180, 320 and 400 grit. I than applied 6 coats of glossy varnish, sanding with 600 grit in b...

Jan72018 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Site is now running on an Azure Linux VM

Computer

I'm happy to report that I'm mostly done migrating my site from Shared GoDaddy to a dedicated VM on Azure! Knowing that I would need a 2nd site for my personal business (more on this soon), I spent the last few weeks reviewing hosting options for either shared or dedicated hosting. I read a lot of review and finally made the jump to an azure VM. Reasoning Price-wise, for about the same amount I get a dedicated VM that I can do whatever I want with (multi site wordpress, services etc) Pros: Low cost (24 CAD$ / month Pay-As-You-Go or 9.95 CAD$ / month for 3 years) More consistent performance Can easily scale up / down resources (CPU + RAM) as needed Access to the full cloud infrastructure as needed (backups, virtual network, other VM, storage, tiered storage e...

Nov192017 by Eric GirardNo Comments

Sieg SC4 Mini-Lathe! (and a new project)

CNC, Lathe

I (finally) bought a (slightly) used Sieg SC4 Mini-Lathe! I installed the machine beside my milling machine until my new workshop is ready next year. I spent the last weekend drawing & 3D Printing various lathe tools support in order to have a tidy setup for all the tooling. I'm planning to convert the mini-lathe to a CNC lathe in the near future. I already started to shop around for various parts in order to establish a preliminary budget 2 x Nema 23 Stepper (279 oz/in), dual shafts so I can still manually operate the machine 2 x 4.2A @ 50VDC stepper drives 36V Power supply 1204 ballscrews for X/Y Allow for a future tool turret (ATC) prob. Nema 17 + few inputs Encoder on the spindle (rigid tapping) MESA 6i25 + 7i76...