These are some notes regarding how we are machining our rapid prototypes for the https://nerdocs.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/NER/pages/5177380 project. This is being done via waxing and micro-machining.

Fixturing

We are using special wax to glue the nickel to a sacrificial block of aluminum. The wax is from Mitee Bites and their procedure is in this PDF:

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We followed this more or less:

1. Heat oven to 350F

2. Clean stock and plate thoroughly with isopropyl

3. Put plate in oven with a small piece of wax to gauge temperature

4. Once wax was starting to melt, put nickel sheet into oven

   1. For bigger parts/different materials you would put both in at the same time, but the nickel is so thin and conductive we figured later is best to not overheat it

5. After a few more minutes, remove plate

6. Rub wax bar directly on plate to melt it on

7. Place nickel on top of wax

8. Compress with something big and heavy, or a clamp

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First nickel fixture, pre-compression/cooling

Machining

Rick has a speeder for the Tormach’s that allows the 7500 max RPM to step up to 15000 RPM, however this part cannot get coolant on it. Given this constraint we are first attempting at 7500 RPM to see if we can get away with it. If not, we will find a way to protect the speeder from coolant.

Another note, given that this part is so thin, we can plan to use the mill like a laser cutter, and just mill the outline of what we need. This will avoid clearing operations of all the material, minimizing heating.