I was intending to mill machinable wax in the modella mdx-20, but I found that FabModules couldn't see beyond a certain depth in the STL
Similar results in mods and fabmodules, I decided to move to the shopbot for milling
This is a high-poly STL, i tried a low-poly STL as well
Probably a setting I've overlooked
No depth
No depth
Creating the toolpath in Partworks3D
The STL opened fine in Partworks3D, the first set of settings are to determine the orientation of the model, units, origin location
The roughing toolpath, notice any blunder?
The finishing toolpath
previewing the output
Fixturing the wax on the bed involved creating braces on all sides
Feeds and speeds
Path
Feedrate
Plungerate
Overlap/stepover
Roughing
3 inch/sec
1 inch/sec
35%
Finishing
4 inch/sec
2 inch/sec
10%
Machined wax
Apparently, I mis-specified the milling bit as a ball-nosed one, while using a straight end one. I could've sweared that i double checked, probably forgot to 'apply' the settings
the molding and casting begins, nonetheless
room temperatures over here are almost double that (without air-conditioning) >.>
The mixing is to be done by weight
That's me
pouring the mixture
Timelapse of liquid plastic drying
Hero-shot
In summary - these are the materials used and workflow followed
The sequence of making a finished part through molding and casting is typically like this
Machine the 'positive' in machinable wax >>> Cast a flexible mold using liquid rubber using the machined wax and derive a 'negative' >>> Use the flexible mold created from the liquid rubber cast and cast a 'positive' in liquid plastic
Methods of calculating required molding/casting liquids
While designing the mold the design software itself can tell you the volume of a closed solid model, this would be a good enough way of determining the volume required, most design softwares can give you the volume of a certain closed solid by checking the properties of that solid
Another method is the waterway, where you use water to fill up the mold and measure the water's volume by transfering the water from the mold to a measuring cup
the method I used is the gut feeling method, not exactly scientific but prepare the liquid based on what your gut says should be the right amount. I guessed my mold will require 20grams, but i was wrong by a factor of 2.