Tag: Drawing

Elmer’s Metric Standby Engine

Journeyman

I have added two new pages detailing the construction of my version of Elmer’s Standby Engine (No. 19). Elmer Verburg designed many small engines and published his designs in a book “Elmer′s Engines” in 1989. The book is out of print but I have seen copies available through Amazon for £200.00 up. Fortunately most of the book is available online from john-tom.com.

Elmers Metric Standby Engine
Elmers Metric Standby Engine

All of the original engines are designed with imperial measurements and the Standby Engine is quite small so I up-scaled it and redrew the plans using metric measurements. I slightly altered a few bits but essentially it follows the original, just a bit bigger. The re-drawn plans are available in the article as a PDF and can be printed onto 4 A4 sheets. I got a bit carried away with the photos and there are about 70 of them so I split the build over two pages so that download time isn′t too slow. I also experimented with HTML5 video for the first time and added a short clip at the end showing the engine running. The two new pages are in the Models tab of the menu which has, to say the least, been sparsley populated since I first set up the website.

Elmers Metric Standby Engine – The static bits.
Elmers Metric Standby Engine – The moving bits.

Geomagic Design

Journeyman
geomag2

I have been using Alibre for my drawings for some time, the learning curve is pretty steep and on an expertise scale of 1 to 10, I am still firmly at 1 or thereabouts! The latest version for 2013 has been renamed Geomagic Design following the purchase of Geomagic by Alibre’s parent company 3D Systems. There are a number of new features and some tweaks to the interface. There are different versions of the program with Geomagic Design Personal being the entry level that I have. Not all features are available in the Personal version but it is probably the most suitable for the home user and definitely the most affordable. There are plenty of free tutorial videos available and a useful users forum so the new user is well catered for. All you need is a brain slightly less fuzzy than mine…

UPDATE April 2015 – 3D Systems have now decided not to support Design Elements any longer and wanted a whole heap of cash to upgrade to the next higher version. I will keep on with what I have until it no longer functions. Can’t afford lots of pension money for something I don’t use that much!