Berl Mendenhall Posted January 3, 2012 Report Posted January 3, 2012 Just got my Strad and turned to Trade Secrets article and to my surprise there was Michael Molnar. Very good article on his CNC machine and how he uses it to carve his plates. Enjoyed it very much. Great job Michael. Also our own Don Noon was quoted a couple of times in article on wood treatment. Way to go Maestroneters. Berl
Carl Stross Posted January 3, 2012 Report Posted January 3, 2012 Thanks, Berl. Michael, what about a couple of pics for us here ?
Anders Buen Posted January 3, 2012 Report Posted January 3, 2012 Thaks for sharing that information with us Michael. A really useful article. Is there some soft foam material or something in that cabinet?
Berl Mendenhall Posted January 4, 2012 Author Report Posted January 4, 2012 Michael, I have a friend that uses a CNC to carve mandolin top and backs. He uses a vacuum system to hold his plates down, it works very well. He made it out of aluminum. He routed groves in the alum. plate for suction and uses a rubber gasket that goes in a grove around the edges. It holds so tight you can't move it with your fingers. His CNC is a little bigger than yours. Sears was selling a duplicating carver that is a small CNC. Berl
actonern Posted January 4, 2012 Report Posted January 4, 2012 "Also our own Don Noon was quoted a couple of times in article on wood treatment. Way to go Maestroneters." Without any criticism of Don implied, I must say Ariane's article to me conveyed a vague sense that baking/steaming/preparing wood is going to be the next "thing" in violin land, like tap-tuning was for a while, (well, a good long while.) Best regards, E
joerobson Posted January 4, 2012 Report Posted January 4, 2012 Just got my Strad and turned to Trade Secrets article and to my surprise there was Michael Molnar. Very good article on his CNC machine and how he uses it to carve his plates. Enjoyed it very much. Great job Michael. Also our own Don Noon was quoted a couple of times in article on wood treatment. Way to go Maestroneters. Berl Cudos to you both...! Joe
Michael_Molnar Posted January 4, 2012 Report Posted January 4, 2012 Thaks for sharing that information with us Michael. A really useful article. Is there some soft foam material or something in that cabinet? The cabinet serves two purposes: dust containment and noise abatement. The cabinet is MDF which helps retard sound, but the white material is ordinary acoustical ceiling tiles that really soak up the high pitch noise from the router. I can work next to the cabinet comfortably without ear protection when the CNC is running. When the front door is off for setups I wear "ear muffs" as I call them. As for photos, I think it would violate The Strad's copyright to the article. I suggest interested parties to buy a copy and also read about Don Noon's work. Thanks again to everyone. Stay Tuned. Mike
joerobson Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 The cabinet serves two purposes: dust containment and noise abatement. The cabinet is MDF which helps retard sound, but the white material is ordinary acoustical ceiling tiles that really soak up the high pitch noise from the router. I can work next to the cabinet comfortably without ear protection when the CNC is running. When the front door is off for setups I wear "ear muffs" as I call them. As for photos, I think it would violate The Strad's copyright to the article. I suggest interested parties to buy a copy and also read about Don Noon's work. Thanks again to everyone. Stay Tuned. Mike Mike, In the not too distant future, Ariane will let you know that you can post the article on your web site along with any peripheral info you may want to add. Let us know when that happens, eh? Joe
Michael_Molnar Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Michael, I have a friend that uses a CNC to carve mandolin top and backs. He uses a vacuum system to hold his plates down, it works very well. He made it out of aluminum. He routed groves in the alum. plate for suction and uses a rubber gasket that goes in a grove around the edges. It holds so tight you can't move it with your fingers. His CNC is a little bigger than yours. Sears was selling a duplicating carver that is a small CNC. Berl I do not have the money for a vacuum chuck nor the time to make one. It is only good for doing one plate side and the bottom must be flat otherwise the plate will flex under vacuum. Of course, you can make a jig for flipping the plate, or you can hollow out the inside by hand - something that I used to do. There are many ways to use a machine to reduce the grunt work. Stay Tuned. Mike
Bill Yacey Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 I look forward to reading the article. My December issue of The Strad just arrived a couple days ago. You would think they are still delivering the mail by dog sled around here, except we don't have enough snow for that. In fact, we broke a record here the yesterday, the temperature was up to 11C.
lyndon Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 now i understand why michael has so much trouble talking about or noticing tap tones, after processing through his cnc machine his wood has no tap tones!!
Bill Yacey Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Lyndon, I understand you are a used violin salesman. Most professional sales people I know of are courteous and pleasant. If you display the same obnoxious, petty behavior to your potential clients as you display here, I can't see it helping your reputation. It would appear you have much to learn about interacting with society.
Wm. Johnston Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 The cabinet serves two purposes: dust containment and noise abatement. The cabinet is MDF which helps retard sound, but the white material is ordinary acoustical ceiling tiles that really soak up the high pitch noise from the router. I can work next to the cabinet comfortably without ear protection when the CNC is running. When the front door is off for setups I wear "ear muffs" as I call them. As for photos, I think it would violate The Strad's copyright to the article. I suggest interested parties to buy a copy and also read about Don Noon's work. Thanks again to everyone. Stay Tuned. Mike I'll be very interested to see the pictures of your setup. I have a cnc machine in my garage and also had to build a soundproof box before the nieghbors started complaining about the noise. I built a plywood box that pretty much killed all of the sound but I quickly became concerned about the dust inside the box. The router motor that I'm using has brushes that arc a bit when it's running, I was very worried about the possibility of an explosion so I added a Harbor Frieght dust collector to the box. It works great at sucking the dust out but it turned out to be as loud as the router had originally been before I added the box. Luckily the new noise is much less obnoxious sounding than the router was and the nieghbors have not said a thing yet.
Bill Yacey Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Michael, did you build the CNC from scratch, or is it a commercial product?<br>
lyndon Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 bill your dead wrong, im not just a salesman, im the chief restoration expert, im the buyer, and i own the company, what i dont do is sell crappy machine made violins, so i wouldnt be interested in this product most of the worst made violins of the 20th century where made using machine tools, of which the cnc is just the latest version, they tend to be dead as dead can be when you tap on them and sound, well just aweful, its hard to rise far above that level with machine tools
NewNewbie Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Just got my Strad and turned to Trade Secrets article and to my surprise there was Michael Molnar. Very good article on his CNC machine and how he uses it to carve his plates. Enjoyed it very much. Great job Michael. Also our own Don Noon was quoted a couple of times in article on wood treatment. Way to go Maestroneters. Berl Thanks for the notice, and I look forward to reading it. Thumbs-up Maestronetter's!
NewNewbie Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 As for photos, I think it would violate The Strad's copyright to the article. I suggest interested parties to buy a copy and also read about Don Noon's work. Thanks again to everyone. Stay Tuned. Mike In the past, The Strad would allow after a certain period of time, the author to post the article, though ti has been a while since this happened. Last I know of is David Burgess's article on Hide Glue. "Trade Secrets: February 2010 David Burgess shares his techniques for working efficiently with hot glue" - Trade Secrets Oddly enough a Maestronetter too! Hmmmm I may have stumbled upon a conspiracy here! Lyndon are you secretly working for The Strad?
lyndon Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 not the magazine, i work for antonio, the one and only strad IMO
Berl Mendenhall Posted January 5, 2012 Author Report Posted January 5, 2012 I do not have the money for a vacuum chuck nor the time to make one. It is only good for doing one plate side and the bottom must be flat otherwise the plate will flex under vacuum. Of course, you can make a jig for flipping the plate, or you can hollow out the inside by hand - something that I used to do. There are many ways to use a machine to reduce the grunt work. Stay Tuned. Mike Michael, please don't misunderstand me, I wasn't saying I thought you should use a vacuum system to hold the plates. Your hold down system looks very good. I was only telling you about his system. I got the feeling I may have offended you, I certainly hope not. Berl
Michael_Molnar Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Michael, did you build the CNC from scratch, or is it a commercial product?<br> Bill, It is the basic Shark CNC that is now sold by Rockler. I bought one of the earliest models directly from the manufacturer near Toledo, OH. Stay tuned. Mike
Michael_Molnar Posted January 5, 2012 Report Posted January 5, 2012 Michael, please don't misunderstand me, I wasn't saying I thought you should use a vacuum system to hold the plates. Your hold down system looks very good. I was only telling you about his system. I got the feeling I may have offended you, I certainly hope not. Berl Berl, No offense taken! BTW, IIRC the Betts Project used a vacuum chuck with good results. Maybe if I had the money I would be using one too. Stay Tuned. Mike
Michael_Molnar Posted January 6, 2012 Report Posted January 6, 2012 ... what i dont do is sell crappy machine made violins,... . Neither do I. Get Tuned. Mike
phatfiddle Posted January 6, 2012 Report Posted January 6, 2012 Great here we go again with another pissing in the wind thread gets really old. Why even go there I really want to stay around here to learn and one day contribute but it is getting difficult with some folks. It would be very cool if you can post some photos of the cabinet. Thanks, PF
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now