It brings me joy to learn about the exciting activities our clients engage in. Alex Rich, a long-standing CNCCookbook reader and G-Wizard Calculator user, has created and established Stickvise, an impressive product. I will give Alex the floor to share the Stickvise journey in his own voice.
I am a long time customer of yours, I work at a company called BriarTek where I use your software all the time for machining aluminum molds and that sort of thing on a Tormach. I have probably read every article on your site, what a fantastic compilation of knowledge. I am completely self taught, but the truth is that CNC Cookbook is responsible for most of what I know about CNC.
I’m emailing to share a story about a side project I have been working on called Stickvise. It’s a little machined aluminum vise for holding circuit boards and doing surface mount soldering. I’m trying to get the word out about it, plus there is a great story behind it that relates to you so I thought it might be a neat topic for a blog post.
I machined all of the prototypes myself using your calculator of course. The best part is, one of the most unique/clever features of the design is the shaft clamp which was inspired by this article of yours explaining the vise stop you built using split cotter style clamps.
My shaft clamp is not a true split cotter, but a simplified version that is easier to manufacture. I basically took a socket head cap screw and ground an angled flat under the head. I draw this flat against the shaft using a wing nut, the flat prevents the head of the cap screw from turning and also clamps the movable vise jaw to the shaft. There is a spring loaded jaw that holds the PCB in place. This clamp is nowhere near as strong as a true split cotter but it does the trick for my light duty vise.
Stickvise is for soldering and working on PC Boards…
Here’s the half-a-split-collet he mentions…
The neat thing about split collets, if you’ve never played with one, is they clamp a lot harder for a given amount of force than the usual rod clamp that is just a split with a set screw. Stickvise can also take custom jaws. I don’t know why, but there’s a part of me that sees a Selfie-Stick for after hours use of Stickvise with the right jaws, LOL.
Folks, keep those cards and letters coming, We love hearing what people are doing with our software and tales of entrepreneurship are icing on the cake. Congrats to Alex for launching his product.
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Bob is responsible for the development and implementation of the popular G-Wizard CNC Software. Bob is also the founder of CNCCookbook, the largest CNC-related blog on the Internet.
Brilliant little device, I’m forever frustrated trying to hold PCB’s and their associated components in place while soldering, and worse when you have to flip them over and over to get access to both sides.
-Bert
That’s impressive that he has managed to do what he has done being self-taught. It seems like this would be a pretty good software. The problem for me though would be getting the hardware to work on, that is what’s currently holding me back.
Brilliant little device, I’m forever frustrated trying to hold PCB’s and their associated components in place while soldering, and worse when you have to flip them over and over to get access to both sides.
-Bert
That’s impressive that he has managed to do what he has done being self-taught. It seems like this would be a pretty good software. The problem for me though would be getting the hardware to work on, that is what’s currently holding me back.