welshchris77

Printed out an imperial insignia on a Laser printer, laminated it to give it rigidity then cut out the bits to make a stencil. Also cut out some circle templates in Hardboard using a circle cutting attachment on the dremel and a tidy up with sand paper ready for routing.

Thanks Ian, yeah I was kinda waiting for a mention of fish tanks alright, lol!

Started Building a new display case for my E11 sterling conversion (will show that in a separate post soon) recently. I built a similar case last year and have build glass cases before but never this big!. The last case was made from 4mm glass which was too thin for a case this size as the top piece kept cracking a few days after assembling it, It might have been changes in temperature and expansion and contraction between the glass and the wood was causing this so this time around I'm using some 6mm glass I have recycled from an old single glaze patio door. I found that using white electrical Tape to mask off the area's before glueing is the best tape on glass for removal and application, anything that squishes out I trimmed off with a new blade after letting it set for 24 hours. I built a chipboard former that fits around the glass before assembling too that holds the glass in place when glueing and also wood braces for the inside. I glued two sides first, with ordinary builders silicone by the way, and let set, then the other two sides and screw former together and let everything set. The next day removed former and cut the top piece of glass to suit, masked it off and glued it on, I didn't put any pressure or clamps on the top piece just gently pressed it down and left it. When dry I removed all the tape and did some clean up with a blade. On previous cases I used ordinary masking tape and didn't mask both edges in relation to the edge being glued, spent hours trying to get the silicone off the area's I didn't want it on!, seems to take a long time making off all edges on all the pieces of glass inside and out but it is so worth it in the long run and gives a nice clean crisp edge. The Timber base is White oak joined in 3 pieces, I always make the base second to suit the size of the glass as discrepancies in the size of the glass due to the way it splits when cutting it means the groove has to be tailor made to fit the edge(sometimes off square), if your thinking why doesn't he use perspex?, Ive gone down that road before and leaving it for now for 2 reasons; First is its hard to join, to get the best join I used dichloromethane which I had to import from the UK as it was too expensive here in Ireland, not that it wasn't cheap anyway, have to be careful with this stuff as its quite toxic!, touching the pieces together you apply it with a syringe across the edge and it chemically cements the two surfaces together, it worked fine on smaller pieces but on large lengths it just didn't seem to want to behave, I tied all sorts of ways of clamping it but wasn't working out for me so Ive returned to using glass for now. Second reason is glass doesn't scratch as easy as perspex, has more clarity and is easy to clean, some drawbacks though is it can break easy if not handled with care and its heavy, I mean real heavy!, with the oak base and 6mm glass it already weighs a ton, when I put my E11 conversion inside I will have to move it around in sections lol. Anyway all thoughts and idea's appreciated!

Been sick for a while after having an operation but back now, wow didnt think the cylinders could get 'more detailed', well done Andy! above and beyond the call of duty trooper

Painted one of my prototype cylinders yesterday, just letting the paint harden off now.

tried shaving down my end caps to a more screen accurate size today, they look alot better but making them smaller has exposed the thread I put on the brass bar so had to try fill it in with the solder, not so pretty ,only other option is to buy some more 10mm brass bar and re-thread some new ones.

Thanks Mark, they are shiny alright, if my blaster failed I could dazzle the rebels with my cylinders lol Good work on the 'Tunisian version' Andy, love to see a 'in focus' shoot of them.

Thanks Joshua!

Thanks Sergiu

Spent the last few days trying to solder my brass power cylinder parts together, replaced the copper wire on the capacitors with 0.5mm brass wire. Soldering the capacitors to the base plate wasnt too bad but as the whole build is quite small its very tricky soldering multiple parts together close to each other. when I tried to solder the cylinders on, the heat would transfer over to the capacitors causing them to fall apart, I then had to desolder everything, sand it all back clean and start again, on my forth attempt today I got it looking alot better, managed to adjust my pen torch a bit lower and also changed my solder for a different size and type, still had a good bit of clean up after soldering as it didnt look pretty but so far pleased with the results. A dremel with various size engraving bits was great for cleaning up the solder along with some fine grit sandpaper.

Done some more work on my cylinders the other day. My brass end caps had to be shaved down as they were too long, didnt take pics of this but I scribed a line then put them on the belt sander, they heat up a good bit so had to do a little on each one alternately. The end caps are threaded so I thought it would be a nice touch to die cut the brass rod and screw the end caps on. tapered the ends on the belt sander to get them started.

made up a few trial run brass plate carriers today and test fitted them with my capacitors, they are off a bit but something to do while I wait for my 10mm brass rod and end caps to arrive from ebay DSC_0723_zps3ea0224f.jpg DSC_0724_zpse4d59c08.jpg DSC_0720_zps9e152ec9.jpg DSC_0721_zps2d10c401.jpg DSC_0722_zps67affc26.jpg been trying to upload my my pics straight to my post but say 'You can upload up to 80.54K of files (Max. single file size: 80.54K)', If I reduce my pics to this size they are too fuzzy, sorry bit of a newbie at doing posts, any help appreciated.

Thanks Andy and great tip about the rest for my makeshift lathe/drill. wow never saw a gold plated sterling before, very shiny and bling, must cost a fortune. would be afraid to put a fingerprint on it

Hi everyone, im chipping in late here but have been following this thread for some time with great interest. well done to everyone involved with all the research and work on the cylinders. Im starting a sterling conversion soon, just sorting out paperwork for importing, and have all my bits and pieces except the cylinders. Thought I would have a go at making them so will post pics as I go, I fancy the idea of making them mostly in brass, made some brass capacitors yesterday, I dont have a lathe so have improvised by clamping a cordless drill in the vice and clamping the trigger, power can be turned on and off by just removing the battery, im using a file and sandpaper to shape the them, the hardest bit is getting the groove started without the file slipping off the end, once you get an groove its easier to remove material by sliding the file back and forth like a saw as the drill wouldnt spin as fast as a lathe. after shaping I drilled a hole in each end and soldered in piece's of 0.5mm wire. DSC_0700_zps5aae91d5.jpg DSC_0701_zps5c5aff51.jpg DSC_0702_zpsdafd333d.jpg DSC_0703_zps950c5ff5.jpg DSC_0704_zpsaca6b6da.jpg DSC_0705_zpsa56e54f5.jpg DSC_0707_zps93af6105.jpg DSC_0708_zps5e366761.jpg DSC_0710_zpscd05b1a2.jpg