For Sale 3D printed lens boards for 2x3 Century Graphic

rawhead · Feb 13, 2013

I'm not quite sure this is the perfect place to post this as this is not a direct sales from me but via a website, but I designed a lens board for 3D printing at Shapeways.com to use on my 2x3 Century, as they are difficult to find, and/or expensive ($30 for blanks, $50 fabricated at SK Grimes), and not so easy to fabricate yourself, unlike boards for some other LF gear. The material and the size makes the 3D printed boards more than adequate, I think, unless you attach something seriously heavy on it. You can buy them here:

http://www.shapeways.com/shops/rawhead

I've made available Copal #0 and Copal #1 versions, but I can make the holes any size you please. The price will vary slightly depending on the hole size (bigger the hole, the cheaper, as it uses less material). I hope this will come in handy for people.

Here's the Copal #0 version I made to use with my Apo-Grandagon 35/4.5

Mods: if this particular listing is not appropriate, please let me know and/or move it to a location that is. Thank you.

jernejk · Feb 13, 2013

Wow, we really are there already?

I need to design a lens board for my Meopta enlarger and I'm currently thinking to find somebody who has a lathe to make it for me...
Is it feasible to just find somebody with a 3d printer??

rawhead · Feb 13, 2013

jernejk said:
Wow, we really are there already?

I need to design a lens board for my Meopta enlarger and I'm currently thinking to find somebody who has a lathe to make it for me...
Is it feasible to just find somebody with a 3d printer??

What I will tell you is this; it was easier for me to download Google Sketchup for free, design the board, and get Shapeways to make it, than for me to order a blank, buy some circular saw bits for my DeWalt or find someone who can do all of that for me, not to mention cheaper.

Finding someone who has a 3D printer might be a bit hard right now, but in a few years, that won't be the case. I've convinced myself that I'm going to buy one for myself in the next year. It is too awesome. If you go to my "shop" there, you'll see something that's a little more elaborate (filter adapter for Kodak Aero-Ektar). 3D printing is the bomb, and it will reshape our world, no hyperbole.

mgb74 · Feb 13, 2013

Have you checked out http://artisansasylum.com/

What material do you use for the boards? And here's a suggestion: Graflex XL focus ring.

Randy Moe · Feb 14, 2013

Very cool. Ordering soon.

Great idea and execution!

Thanks!

rawhead · Feb 15, 2013

Randy Moe said:
Very cool. Ordering soon.

Great idea and execution!

Thanks!

Thanks, and like I say on the page, if you want any other hole size, you just contact me with the hole diameter (in millimeters) and I can have the appropriate model for order up in 10 minutes

AgX · Feb 15, 2013

rawhead said:
What I will tell you is this; it was easier for me to download Google Sketchup for free, design the board, and get Shapeways to make it, than for me to order a blank, buy some circular saw bits for my DeWalt or find someone who can do all of that for me, not to mention cheaper.

I belong to that generation that first would grasp for their jigsaw.

rbultman · Jan 28, 2014

I know this thread is a little old, but what material did you use to make the lens board? I am considering making one for the Busch Pressman.

Thanks,
Rob

rawhead · Jan 28, 2014

rbultman said:
I know this thread is a little old, but what material did you use to make the lens board? I am considering making one for the Busch Pressman.

Thanks,
Rob

I used the standard "black strong elastic" that Shapeways has. Alas, I found later that the material, at least at 1mm thickness, is not light-tight.

Kylefornia · Jan 28, 2014

Is there anyway you could design one of these for a 4x5 Speed Graphic? I've got a few non standard sized projector lenses I'm trying to use with it.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

jcc · Jul 18, 2014

Kylefornia said:
Is there anyway you could design one of these for a 4x5 Speed Graphic? I've got a few non standard sized projector lenses I'm trying to use with it.

I just made a file (read: yet to be tested) for a Speed Graphic lens board with an 80mm hole. Now I'm on the look out for someone local who can print it.

Milos Gazdic · Jul 18, 2014

What about the painting it with primer in 2-3 layers & then black matt paint both inside & outside? Wound't that make the board light tight?

bliorg · Jul 18, 2014

That is frickin' cool.

Fotoguy20d · Jul 18, 2014

I printed some pacemaker boards a couple of years ago on a Stratasys Dimension (black abs). The issue I found is that without black tape as a liner, it wasn't light tight, unless I made it fairly thick.

eng1er · Jul 18, 2014

3D printing is the wrong way to manufacture a lens board. Such additive processes are best suited to low volume production or prototyping of three dimensional (read: non-flat) objects where casting or injection molding is impractical. A lens board is relatively simple: a large hole, some small holes for screws and key pins, and maybe a bevel or rabbet. It should be machined, whether it is done on a mill, a drill press, or with a hand drill and hole saw. I fear that the trendiness of 3D printing has people, who otherwise have no experience with manufacturing processes, excited to make stuff, but they're overlooking simpler more elegant solutions.

Barry S · Jul 18, 2014

It seems like you're contradicting yourself. If you need five lens boards, each with a different size hole--how is that not low-volume production? How many people can machine their own KMV boards? Even for simple boards, 3D printing from a template is simpler than using tools. Fewer and fewer people have mills, lathes, and drill presses these days. It reminds me of the old-timers who always recommend running down to the corner machine shop where they'll make anything you need for $5 and a coke. As 3D printing becomes ubiquitous, it'll be the cheapest and easiest way to make the one-off parts we need. The counterpart to the 3D printers will be affordable CNC routers for when you need it made out of cherry wood or any material that needs a subtractive process.

eng1er · Jul 18, 2014

You're right, five boards with different holes is low volume production--low volume production suited to milling, not 3D printing. I'm saying use the right tool for the job. As stated in this thread, folks are finding little success 3D printing lens boards because the extrusion materials aren't suited to the task (not light tight). Why not just use the right material and right tools? Do you need mill or even a drill press? No, you can use a hand drill with careful measurement and set-up. Are machine tools uncommon? Certainly not. Much easier to find than a 3D printer. Chances are someone on you block has a drill press in the garage. If you want to send a CAD or Sketchup file out for manufacture, you've answered that question: send it to a shop providing CNC router services. It is but a mill by another name.

trythis · Jul 18, 2014

I agree. No sense in printing a flat board with holes. Send a drawing file to any plastic or metal shop and they can CNC mill it out in seconds. It should be cheaper since they start with a big sheet of whatever plastic or aluminum you want. If you need bevels or rabbeted edges that is just as easy milled. The materials will be stronger and more uniform.

If you have no basic tools having this done seems sensible but if you have a decent shop at home you wouldn't even think of farming this stuff out

jcc · Jul 19, 2014

They probably had the same point when people first started working with tools that need to be mined from the ground then forged. So much work, when stones have been successful — if it ain't broke, why fix it, right?

Also, if money were no object, I'd have carbon fiber lens boards. But... Money is an object, which I don't have much of, so I'm going to take the STL file to a service in the university union and they print it out for free. If a machinist can offer the same price, I'd take them up on it in a heartbeat.

eng1er · Jul 19, 2014

Uhhh... You're conflating instrumentality with process. Stone-copper-bronze-iron-steel tooling: each a vast improvement upon its predecessor, but skinning an animal or making a hole in a log is still the same process regardless on the tooling material.

The cost of machining for something with the loose tolerances of a lens board is the same whether the material is wood, mild steel, stainless, aluminum, carbon fiber, etc. A lens board size piece of carbon fiber won't break the bank. In fact, it would be a scrap to someone doing significant work with the material, so go of it.

Dr Croubie · Jul 19, 2014

jcc said:
If a machinist can offer the same price, I'd take them up on it in a heartbeat.

I think that's the reason everyone's going nuts over 3D printing recently, it's bringing rapid-prototyping to the masses, just like 5D mkII did for hD video or the box brownie did for stills.
And yes, in a lot of cases 3D printing is cheaper than milling, but you get what you pay for, and eng1er is right, use the right tool for the right job.
3D printing (at least, the affordable type) is to replace injection-moulding for low-volumes of plastic where moulds are expensive, not mills and lathes. The biggest difference is that anyone can put a 3D printer on their desk and feed in spaghettis of plastic, not everyone can use or afford a CNC mill.

Lensboards demand a CNC mill, or at least just a sheet of metal and hand-drill a few holes and maybe clip off the corners if it's a Technika board.
Lens adapters need a CNC lathe, you can't (easily and accurately) print 0.5mm pitch lens threads.
Even if I may soon have access to (indeed, be the operator of, if I get the job I want) a rather expensive metal/ceramic 3D printer, and I've got some lens adapters designed that I want made, I'm still getting them lathed, not printed.
Polyglot's designed an adapter to extend a 120 jobo reel to develop 70mm film, that's what 3D printing is for. Cheap, easy, plastic is fine, and no major requirements on strength or light-tightness.

But there's no reason you can't use the software. I use AutoCAD in my dayjob, but I'm really getting into using OpenSCAD lately. With any CAD program (and there are a lot of good free ones) you can design your board/adapter/whatever, then take it to someone to mill/machine/print, or even just print a good old 2D plan view with dimensions and get someone handy with wood to make it.

Steve Smith · Jul 19, 2014

There is a lot of overlap with what can be produced with 3D printing, CNC routing and laser cutting as I pointed out in Mustafa's thread: (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Whatever the thoughts are on the right tool for the job, this is trumped by what you actually have available. For the lens boards, I would personally use a CNC router, but I have the luxury of the use of all three types of manufacturing.

Without the router, I'm sure I could make a functioning lens board using our 3D printer or our laser cutter... or even with hand tools!!!

Steve.

jcc · Jul 19, 2014

eng1er said:
Uhhh... You're conflating instrumentality with process. Stone-copper-bronze-iron-steel tooling: each a vast improvement upon its predecessor, but skinning an animal or making a hole in a log is still the same process regardless on the tooling material.

The cost of machining for something with the loose tolerances of a lens board is the same whether the material is wood, mild steel, stainless, aluminum, carbon fiber, etc. A lens board size piece of carbon fiber won't break the bank. In fact, it would be a scrap to someone doing significant work with the material, so go of it.

Tooling = C&C, woodworking, 3D printing; Skinning = Mounting a lens on a camera.
No matter what tool you use to make the board, it still mounts on the camera the same way.

The cheapest quote from a CF fabricator (who is also long-time friend of mine) is that it would probably cost about $200/board to make a flat Linhof Tech-type board. Unless (1) the order is in the hundreds, which will drop the price some, or also if (2) you don't need the board to be flat (i.e., randomly not parallel to the film plane).

For Sale 3D printed lens boards for 2x3 Century Graphic

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