Beta Project: Steampunk Gauge

Made on a Glowforge
1

One of the problems I face is a good source of cheap pressure gauges for various Steampunk applications. Today I think I came up with a reasonable solution. I took an insert for a closet door like this one.

Cut out a bezel, a ring for the outer edge and a back and simply printed a face for it. A bit of spray paint and ultimately it came out like this. The accuracy of the cuts is what makes this work.

763Ă—655 100 KB

At this point the face is not my art so it is just an early piece for testing and It needs a stem for mounting but that’s all. I am quite happy with how this came out.

40 Likes
2

Cool! I’m amazed by your creativity and by spray paint, both, I think. :slight_smile:

Would you say more about which piece(s) of this the Glowforge was useful
for? It looks like the bezel is acrylic that you cut, is that right?

5 Likes
3

Yes the bezel and most of the body. Getting nice concentric rings to match up is difficult by hand. The Glowforge made it ridiculously easy. I cut three parts, the bezel with an etched ring for detail, the body which had to match the diameter of the door pull and the back which had to match the body.

979Ă—510 141 KB

25 Likes
4

WOW. I love seeing Glowforge + other techniques!

4 Likes
5

Nicely done! Very creative choice for the gauge body. :hearts:

3 Likes
6

Now I am wondering if there is a flat D’Arsonval movement that will fit inside?

2 Likes
7

I am hoping I can fit one of the little stepper motors they use in an automotive dash cluster.

3 Likes
8

How deep is that? [quote=“Kallisti, post:7, topic:2897, full:true”]
I am hoping I can fit one of the little stepper motors they use in an automotive dash cluster.
[/quote]

Ooh! I didn’t even know those existed. If that won’t fit, you might be able to use the stepper out of an old CD-ROM drive, which is about the same thickness (but will need a driver) or a microservo. There are other pancake steppers out there, but they’re mostly thicker.

9

They’re a bit over 1/3 of an inch thick, 0.35 to be precise. The current door pull I have is 1/4 of an inch deep so I would either have to find a different one or just fab the whole thing. The advantage of the door pull is having the nicely beveled edge since it is not the easiest thing to make by hand.

2 Likes
10

Creative resourcefulness! Very nice!
Thank you for the inspiration! :sunglasses:

2 Likes
11

Very clever! :slight_smile:

1 Like
12

Great design and good post. Definitely could use this technique to make some type of keepsake holder. Sand from the wedding beach, a lock of hair from the first haircut.

8 Likes
13

That is a wonderful idea!

3 Likes
14

@Kallisti do we know each other?

15

Maybe, but I doubt it. I’ve attended a fair amount of Steampunk events and cons and have met a lot of people but I don’t recall meeting you. I’ll be at Steamposium so I’ll make a point of saying Hi :slight_smile:

16

we go by Lord and Lady Towers and we are fairly well known in the steampunk community and yea we will see you there

17

I’ll see if I can hunt you down to say Hi :slight_smile:

1 Like
18

i won’t be hard to find i have around 15 panels and am 6 foot 9 inches tall 7 foot with top hat on and i have a backpack that produces steam i am also running the nerf war while there so i am all over steamposium

also i just added you on facebook

4 Likes