Thread: Making a Pan Brake "Folder with fingers" for home

Hi Steve,
I made the large and small pivots tonight. See photo.
I have to make four of the smaller pivots but before I make the other two I had a thought - dangerous. Rather than milling a couple of flats do you think a 8mm threaded shaft at right angles would work. Similar concept to a vice handle but stop threaded so it doesn't interfere with the through bolt. I hope I am describing this with the right terminology. Is there enough clearance to spin the handle around without fouling on any of the other bits?
Thanks and be gentle.

Mig, Tig, arc or oxy, which welder should we use???

The plasma is not CNC, but another guy here does have that, and if I wished I guess I could ask him to do it, but it's a bit of a hassle, and I don't really want to bother him with all these bits and pieces for the fun of it. Problem is, he wouldn't take money for it either. FWIW, he usually cuts out crane parts and ship bits from thickish steel. I don't know what his plasma will cut, but I know it doesn't even flinch with 50mm or thicker.

The fingers, I think I might have a cunning plan for them involving a piece of 6mm along with another piece or three of 4.5mm. Whatever, now I can print out all this stuff, and re-work it. One thing is for sure, we won't be getting flimsy benders, and if I can, I'll put up how we do it with the thinner stuff. We don't have a milling machine we can easily access, so avoiding those operations where possible is kinda important to me.

Grahame, I am not keen on the notched pin myself, but I have not worked out how to avoid it just yet. I think I can dodge most of the other things I can't manage, but I dunno about that one.

Now that tax here is done, I might be able to have a stab at this thing.

(Oh yeah, no tax this year. )

As always rod nice work. For those that dont know rods actually ahead of the drawings, hes doing the final stage now as per that photo which is the locking assy, hes only missing the round cross bar and a handle at its complete. Ill get this posted up this week, its actually fairly simple one to do.
As far as not notching the guides, thats fine just mark out the four quarters on the 20mm round and then weld the main arm onto one of those quarter sections, same for the other side, have a look at the attached photo no need to drill and mill the main bar and no need to make sliding assemblys ect. Remember but the bends are always going to be tight because you loose your adjustment feature. Weld the bits with whatever you want mig tig arc, doesnt matter just keep the heat out as much as possible, eg stitch weld the item
Steve

Rod that idea is fine because it allows you to move the bed back and forth without the use of a shifter across the flats. To that end if anyone when making these finds an easier or better idea for any of the components or alternatives feel free to post the info all advice is appreciated.

Well I changed my mind again and turned up some 50mm knobs and knurled them. Photo below is the ends set up. I still have a bit to do but hope to make a dent in it this weekend.

Sorry guys been a busy week, Ill finish the folder plans of this week, okay the next bit is part of the locking assy which has a total of 5 items and then the folder is complete, this lot is pretty easy to do

Step 18. Locking Assy canter lever. Okay you need two of these items, they are 155mm long by 70mm wide by 10mm thick, the shape I have given is purely aesthetical you can use a flat piece with square edges. Laser cut they cost about 8 bucks each. One end has a 47mm hole and the other end a 20mm hole, distance between hole centres is 100mm

Step 19. This is word for word the same as step 14, so when you make the two for step 14 make 4 so that way this steps done as well, but lets say it again anyway. Okay 2 pieces of 25 - 35mm hex bar 22mm in length with one side turned down to approx 20mm by 10mm length. I say approx because this needs to fit into the locking assy end piece which you’ve already made, so if they have a slightly larger or smaller hole then you can compensate for this now. You also need to drill a 8mm hole through the entire piece, off centre by about 5mm, its not critical just so long as you don’t drill through the outer wall.

Step 20. This is the pivoter units, it allows the clamping assy to be locked by overcentring the clamping arm. It’s two simple pieces of round turned down to fit into the canter levers with a shoulder still present and a 20mm hole drilled of centre and a small m8 hole drilled and tapped for handle attachment later on. Use the drawing supplied for locations and measurement points

Step 21. Easiest piece to make, it connects the two pivoters together and allows them to turn in unison to each other. It’s a 20mm round bar 730mm long with m8 threads drilled and tapped into each end for bolting the handle on later. I recommend whilst you’ve got this out of the unit, scribe a line through the centre of both ends in the same plane as each other, this will help in jigging the pivoters squarely when we fit them in the final assembly. Okay one handle and 2 bushes and were finished

Step 22 Okay there are two of these, they are simply a plastic bush that pops into the 25mm hole in the end pieces from stage 1. It allows the crossbar from this stage to rotate smoothly. The shoulder can be any dia or thicknbess but I went with 5mm because that gave a bit of strength to the bushing, I would not go greater than 10mm because it may bind the canter levers up during there movement. The centre outer bit is 25mm but machine to fit your end pieces and the bore is 20mm but once again machine to suit your crossbar.

Step 23. Last piece and a nice easy one to do as well. Its just a piece of 20mm round or box tube ect about 450mm long doesn’t really matter what length and a piece of 25mm angle line welded on the bottom with two holes through it for attaching onto the pivoter unit. That’s it no more parts to make, just assemble this stage and wolla one folder completed, with many years of use to come

Step 24. Okay lets assemble the locking mechanism, which also completes the final step in the folder. Insert the plastic bushes from step 22 into the end pieces of your base bed these are the ones you made in step 1. Insert the locking assembly cross shaft though both bushes this is the item from step 21. Now assemble the pivoter item from step 20 into the canter levers from step 18. Push the canter lever over the top of the shaft protruding from your plastic bushes until the end of the cross arm is flush with the pivoter. Now we have to lock the pivoter and cross arm together, I hope you marked a line on each end like I said to in step 21, you have a choice now you can weld the two items together that is the cross arm and pivoter but it meand you will not be able to disassemble the unit again. I like to scotch key the two items together. That is drill a hole between the two pieces and tap a thread and insert a bolt in, havce alook at one of the phots Ive attacehed for clarification. The important thing here is to ensure that both pivoters are in alignment with each other and locked to the shaft. Okay pop in your pivot units from step 19 into the top of your canter levers and bolt them onto the clamping assy ends from step 12. Bolt your handle onto one of the pivoter ends left or right it doesn’t matter its universal. And your finished. Yayyyyy
Now have a play

The rear pivot units move your bed back and forth and the front pivot units vary the clamping force on the job, you want to set this so that way with a piece of 1.6mm steel it overcentre locks, youll see what I mean when you do it.
Enjoy for many years to come
Steve

Just saying hi

Is there a file with a parts list and all the drawings that can be downloaded for printing off??? By the way top article and looks like a great product

I have the completed folder drawn on cad where you can click and remove any piece and it is perfectly scaled that you can save each piece for the laser cutters.