Hoeken wrote:
> would it be possible to print an enclosed space, and fill it with an
> oil during the print process? there was talk about using oil to
> lubricate surfaces to seperate parts. it would be really elegant to
> be able to use the lubricating part to pump oil in too. one use i
> could think of for this is to make actuators... it would be very cool
> to attempt to create a bot that used hydraulic actuated legs (much
> like how bugs work i gather).
>
> this project is so fricking exciting in so many ways. reprap is
> starting to look alot less like a printer and more like an organism
> that we are creating.
Love it! I think we must distinguish clearly between lubrication films and bulk
hydraulics.
Including bulk fluids is a bit heroic, I think. I realise that we grow with a
bloodstream inside us, but I can think of no engineering product where the
liquids aren't added after manufacture for the simple reason that it is so much
easier to do that and then seal up, than to try to maintain a seal throughout
the manufacturing process.
But I really like the idea of including sealed lubrication films in inaccessible
moving parts as they are built (especially as I had to take a Black & Decker
lawn strimmer apart over the w.e. to replace the motor brushes, and found that
the sealed bearings had dried out. This was largely because the designers seemed
to have ignored the possibility that the presence of motor-heat-dried grass
clippings might soak away the lubricant...). Combining this idea with our
support-separation experiments ought to be straightforward, I think.
Yours
Adrian
http://staff.bath.ac.uk/ensab
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