ebirkey's blog

Benefit Items

2013-04-04T04:19:00Z

Students at Fort Dodge Senior High School used the Shopbot Desktop to make a few country style signs for a local benefit. I heard they raised over 40k for the person in need. It is a good experience to have students learn about using their skills to help raise money for people in need. Pay it Forward is a great concept for kids to learn and using this type of technology made it pretty easy to produce these projects.

Robotic Claw With SHOPBOT

2013-02-18T15:28:00Z

Students used the SHOPBOT DESKTOP that was given to us by American Woodworker and SHOPBOT to fabricate parts for our robot that we used in the First Robotics Challenge this year. The students did a great job designing and fabricating all the plastic parts and then mounting the servo motors/gears with it. They are already talking about improvements for next year. We also have been machining out some Corian counter top material that from a local shop. They make great cutting boards! I also saw that you can machine out molds in the solid Corian and then pour lead into them for a casting activity. Pretty neat Idea…. May have to a student design my ultimate fishing lead head!

Pictures are the gripper and a start of a inlay for the local shop that makes coutertops. They gave us the Corian to machine out.

ShopBot CNC Mill Schools Open House

2013-01-15T01:29:00Z

We had the ShopBot that was given to us through the American Woodworker Magazine Education Contest at a Student Showcase at our Parent Teacher Conferences tonight. We had the students make coasters with our school-Fort Dodge Senior High's Logo on it- they gave them away to people who observed the machine work. We also had some examples of projects they have been doing on the router. A lot of parents and students who don’t make it down our hallway were pretty impressed with what the ShopBot can do. It really does have a lot of punch for a small machine.

The picture is a sign that was made for our entry door to our woodshop There is going to be some other details that will be made with the router that you will see later in the school year.

Completed A Number Of Projects In My Classroom and Shop At School

2013-01-10T23:26:00Z

I have been working on a number of Items since I got the ShopBot Desktop and I finally got them up on the wall. We have had some great success in SkillsUSA here at Fort Dodge Senior High so I made a few plaques to remember the past State Champions we have had. My woodworking students had a lot of fun with the Cabinetmaking one in my wood shop. I thought it was funny that they asked me -"what do we do when we run out of room?" I told them we tear all the names down, put my picture up and make it into a shrine. They just looked at me like I was crazy! We just got the plans done for the entry way into the shop from the hallway completed. This will be amazing! Students are pretty fired up about this!

GO STATE

2012-12-10T15:12:00Z

My independent learning student has taken a real interest in the Shopbot. In fact he is the person I ask when something isn’t working right for me. He plans on going to Iowa State for engineering in a few years and I gave him the idea of making an ISU Logo. He drew the Logo on Autodesk Inventor and then transferred all the geometry and machined out a prototype. I thought it would be a good suck up since Randy’s (who is the Editor in Cheif of AmericanWoodworker) Son is planning on going to ISU also…. Go Clones!

BENEFIT AUCTION ITEM..

2012-12-04T14:11:00Z

I thought it was nice that I had a student that wanted to make a piece for a benefit auction for the local DU chapter. He had an old walnut log that he finished and then he engraved their logo on it. I am excited to hear how much it makes for the chapter…

YES WE DO WOODWORKING ALSO...

2012-11-20T15:28:00Z

I bet a number of people wonder -do if I do anything related to woodworking? And the answer to that question is yes! In fact, Fort Dodge had the State SkillsUSA Champion Cabinetmaker the Past 3 years and last year we also placed 2^nd and 3^rd in the contest. Before I came to Fort Dodge I had the State Champion Cabinetmaker 5 years in a row (Orange City, Iowa). Until now, I did not have much for woodworking but I have 3 classes this trimester that will allow students to do more in the woodworking areas.

Last week I sat down with a number of my independent study students and we figured out the ShopBot PartWorks Program that comes with the Router. It was pretty simple to understand and with some of the templates that are already installed on the machines it is pretty easy to make nice looking signs like you see in this blog. The only thing you have to be careful about is the speeds. I did not like the feeds and speeds that the software automatically had in the program… way to fast… It also was taking too big Depth of cuts for me… I always liked the rule of thumb ½ the distance for the diameter of your bit for a depth of each pass.

My Students have big plans for my entry door coming into my shop… I think it will be pretty neat.

I also have Ideas for Christmas…..

These Pictures are a plywood prototype of a sign we made… The real one will be made of Maple….

Getting Ready For SkillsUSA

2012-11-15T21:29:00Z

I am taking a team of three students to this year’s State SkillsUSA Automated Manufacturing Contest that will take place this spring- This is the reason I wanted the Desktop and entered the contest-each team must be able to take their own benchtop mill much like the the Shopbot Desktop. In the school I was at before-MOC-FV in Orange City, Iowa I had a number of teams win this contest and even place in the top 4 at the National Contest that took place in Kansas City. The real neat thing is that a few of these students went on to college and competed in the same contest at the post-secondary level and were National Champions. I hope to have the same successes with kids here at Fort Dodge!

One of my 3 students is getting pretty good at running tool paths and then producing 3D parts using the ShopBot in my CAD LAB. As you can see with the pictures he drew the part using Autodesk Inventor and then developed the tool paths. We used foam board for the material which worked good because you can machine it out fast in the class period that we have. You should have seen the pack of student around the mill when he was running this part... It was pretty special not to mention the spark in many of the younger students eyes.

This is a picture of the part the student had to draw in Inventer

This is the Toolpaths of the 3D Part

Here is the finished part. Just had to cut it out with a utility knife-Now that is an educatio

Thank you American Woodworker and Shopbot for making this happen!

My thoughts about the Desktop....

2012-11-15T21:24:00Z

I would like to say after playing with the Mill that I am impressed with many of it’s features! The first thing I like is the Spindle…. As an educator I was used to using a “Techno” that often had a small router installed on their machine The Desktop spindle is quiet and with the ½” and ¼” spindle attachment it allows for a lot of different cutters.

The Z Clearance plate is great! I never had anything like this before and that is probably the best thing about the machine! You talk about a time saver…… Now if they can make it work with a X and Y axis….. Get to work on that one production people….

The package also comes with a lot of engraving features that allows you to make professional looking signs... It is a pretty simple process.

The one thing that directions said to do with the desktop was to install a sacrificial board and then surface it for the table of the router…. It then said to use double sided tape to secure your work pieces…. I found this not to be a good idea… I got rid of the table right away and purchased some CAM clamps to use in the Slot table that comes with the machine. I don’t like my work coming loose with 90% of it complete….

Project Project Projects!

2012-10-30T14:06:00Z

Well my kids and I are building a variety of projects using the shopbot.

I am building some wall signs using the mill to honor all our past State Champions we have had in SkillsUSA. Here is what I have done right now I will post a picture when I am done... I engraved the logo and lettering then used a sharie to color it in... worked great! My plan is to build one for Technical Drafting, Architectural Drafting , and Cabinetmaking.

I also have one student who is evolving (He was a State Champion Technical Drafter as a 10th Grader). He is playing around with a prototype for a Planetary Gear Box Housing. As You Can See It is a Little more advanced than most items... He doing the tool paths for this on Mastercam.

I also had a number of student who were ahead do a pocket activity in my Intro to CAD course they thought it was pretty neat that they could take what they drew and then use that geometry to build something !

One spur-of- the- moment thing that I did last Friday after I found out that they were having a benefit for my neighbor who was injured in an ambulance call-he is a volunteer fire fighter. Is that I made a Iowa Hawkeye wall sign they auctioned off for over $150… I thought that was pretty good since they got beat the past two weeks in a row… the Hawkeye symbol price has declined in the past two weeks that is for sure. I didn’t take a picture but It looked great!

Win a Shopbot for a Year Contest

2012-09-28T20:29:00Z

My name is Ed Birkey and I wrote an essay that was selected as the educational winner of the American Woodworker "WIn a ShopBot for a Year" contest. This blog will be used to keep people informed of the neat things that a small CNC router can do and more important how it sparks interest. The ShopBot Desktop was delivered a week ago and I aready have a number of students who never leave my room. I sure hope they are passing other classes!

Our students had it out of the box and milling parts is less that 24 hours.... It is nice to have kids that make you look smart!