That’s way better than my idea to slope the bottom of the hover puck via sanding. Sometimes the simplest solutions elude me.
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Neat. Thanks for the link. Every once in awhile I want something smaller than I can find locally. Great find.
Very helpful post. 0.01 inches is about 1/4 mm. I plan on using 1 mm pivot holes in 1/8 acrylic so my needs are easily met. The silly small bits evaporate on the slightest breath, at 5-10 Rasbuckniks apiece.
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I have some of those solid carbide circuit board drills and they cut almost anything, but are REALLY sensitive to runout in the drill chuck or drill press spindle. They want high speeds, and they don’t want any kind of side-to-side motion.
The HSS drills are a little more forgiving (but not much) since they will flex a bit before they snap and disappear. The downside is that since their shanks are usually the same size as the fluted area you need a very small and highly precise chuck to hold them in.
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Very cool Josh! I was just wondering if it might be possible to make some sort of vacuum manifold for a Silhouette…
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That was my first thought too. It looks kind of like halftone from certain angles. I bet it could make for a very cool effect in those led lamps.
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I broke two bits like that last week trying to make some jewelry for my wife for her birthday. Tiny drill bits and I don’t mix.
So cool! Can’t wait to try this with my kids!!! So much science-y fun and learning in store for our family when this thing finally arrives!
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Strainers and filters in my future. Making lots of small holes of certain sizes will surely be a boon to anyone wanting to sift materials into different grades. Large peas, small peas. Solutions in search of an application.
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Just btw (I’ve done a fair amount of playing with hoverthings made from restaurant take-out containers) regular fans won’t work for this kind of thing, because what you need is pressure in preference to airflow. Blowers or those double-thickness server fans seem to do the trick.
I wonder if you could etch channels into the bottom of the puck and get some kinds of directional control.
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McMaster-Carr sells carbide bits in wire gauge sizes for a pretty decent price. A high-speed drill press with low run-out is best like one of these little Cameron drill presses is a nice tool to use with them. Barring that a sensitive drill chuck on a regular drill press or decent quality mill is good.
http://cameronmicrodrillpress.com/manual-micro-drill-presses/
http://www.royalproducts.com/product.cfm?catID=16
https://www.amazon.com/Sensitive-Drill-Feed-Keyless-Chuck/dp/B00UCI3Y44
The Royal attachment with Albrecht chuck is around $250-400, but there are imports available for $110 or so from Amazon. They are worth their cost if you have to drill a lot of small, deep holes in metal.
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Annealing.
Valuable lesson Josh, thanks for that - and for sharing the creativity!
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Does it make sense to anneal a whole sheet of acrylic, instead of the parts cut from it?
If I understand the discussion correctly, some of the stresses are going in as a result of the cutting itself (where the cut edge re-solidifies and wants to shrink but can’t) rather than being created during the casting process and then simply exposed by the cutting. Might be worth a try to anneal first and then re-anneal if needed.
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you need to anneal after the cut due to the thermal shock that the cut creates. annealing softens it up slowly instead of shock so that when it firms back up it does so slowly and more uniform. the stress doesn’t exist pre cut
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Ah, that’s what I was missing. The residual stresses are not from the manufacturing of the sheet, but from the laser cutting. Thanks @paulw and @Clone .
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What a really fun and innovative idea. I love these!
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The annealing info is wonderful. Thank you!
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Wonderful project!
Your GlowForge isn’t level. 
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I can imagine repurposing this tiny cpap to create a go anywhere air hockey game. If it can create enough flow for 5-20 cm of water pressure it’ll certainly float some plastic. 
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