DtD Update: Soft jaws are finished!

Got the soft jaws finished up yesterday! Now it's time to start cutting some parts and tweak the programming. I've already done the body machining and tailcap machining. Today I'm going to be working on the head and the small copper post that holds the electronics.

So far I've only ruined one set of soft jaws. What happens when you get it wrong? I had the wrong diameter offset. The machine is cutting with a tool that is 3/4" in diameter but the machine "thinks" the tool is only 3/8" diameter. In this case I was lucky, and ended up with an oversize hole and a ruined set of 20 dollar soft jaws. It was also the first hole of five so I didn't waste that much invested time either. It gets worse when you break a $100 3/4" cutting tool...and a tool that big is really really hard to break, which means it often breaks something else in the machine that is way more expensive. This is fun right?

This shot shows the raw stock on the left and the finished parts on the right. So far so good! Stay tuned, I should have the last two components finished up tomorrow.