Entries feed - PROPIEDADESINTERNET.ES https://propiedadesinternet.es Supplies for the Sculpting Artist! Sun, 16 Jan 2022 17:31:04 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://cdn.propiedadesinternet.es/media/2020/03/favicon.ico Entries feed - PROPIEDADESINTERNET.ES https://propiedadesinternet.es 32 32 Entries feed - PROPIEDADESINTERNET.ES https://propiedadesinternet.es/spindle-turbine-cleaner/ Fri, 01 May 2020 00:17:06 +0000 https://propiedadesinternet.es/?p=8890

Spindle & Turbine Cleaner - You need this!

If you are like me, my work area gets covered quickly in carving dust. As you carve on your work you will undoubtedly change your burs to get different cuts. After awhile you may notice your burs are just a little harder to insert into the spindle. During carving, you may notice the bur does not stay firmly locked inside the spindle or it falls out completely. So what is going on and how can this problem be fixed? Easy, you need to flush out the debris and build-up inside your spindle.

Spindle Anatomy 101

To answer this question requires an understanding what the spindle does and how it does it. Take a look at this photo. Above is the spindle with a dummy bur inserted. The button on the right side is depressed to release the bur. Looking at the X-ray view, a  push button shown in green presses against the spring shown in red. When the button is pushed, the spring is compressed causing it to expand slightly, thus release its grip on the bur. This spring is the “collet.”

Get A Grip!

Dust and debris is the major cause of your bur being lose or even falling out your carver. It is the bur itself that is transporting debris into the spindle, and therein lies the problem. This debris gets caught in the coil of the spring. Once the gap between each coil become clogged, the spring can no longer grip the bur. The solution of course is to break lose the build-up on the spring and flush out the debris. 

Spring Cleaning

We have developed a cleaning process that works well to break the build-up of debris on the spindle spring and flush it out at the same time. It is called “Spindle & Turbine Cleaner” for lack of a better marketing term. Our Spindle Cleaner contains 1/2  fluid ounce (15ml ) of non-toxic cleaner designed to dissolve the debris and not harm the turbine bearings or o-rings.

Vrotex F5 Turbine Spindle Cleaner
vsc-right
vsc-left

Back Cap - Open Detent Position

Back Cap - Close Detent Position

Step-By-Step Vortex F5 Spindle & Turbine Cleaning Guide

  1. Place a paper towel on you counter. This will capture the cleaner during flushing.
  2. Remove bur from your carver
  3. Turn the back cap to the “open” position. This will prevent cleaner from entering the bearings.
  4. Hold your carver horizontally
  5. Insert cleaner needle into spindle until it stops.  Now move it back about 1/8 of an inch.
  6. Squeeze the bottle until cleaner begins to run out of the spindle
  7. Remove the needle from spindle
  8. Hold your carver vertical with the nosecone pointed down towards the paper towel
  9. Work the back cap by opening and closing it several times
  10. Repeat steps 3 – 8 two more time
  11. Close the back cap without a bur in the spindle and run the tools for 10 seconds to remove remaining cleaner

Tip to keep your spindle spring and turbine cleaner

Just before you insert a bur into your carver, use your thumb and index finger to wipe the bur shaft clean. This will reduce the amount of debris entering your spindle and obstructing your collet spring.

]]> Entries feed - PROPIEDADESINTERNET.ES https://propiedadesinternet.es/bearing-failure/ Mon, 27 Apr 2020 01:56:39 +0000 https://propiedadesinternet.es/?p=8844

This simple carving mistake is the cause of most bearing failures. The good news is this mistake is easily solved in less than 1 second. First lets look at the photo below of a failed Vortex F5 bearing.

What are we looking at?

The object in the middle of the photo is the bearing retainer clip. The purpose of this clip is to separate the ceramic balls and hold the bearing assembly together. The other two objects are the Vortex F5 front bearing shown on the left and the rear bearing on the right. As you can see, the rear bearing still has the bearing retainer clip seated in place. The front bearing failed when the bearing retainer clip was unable to hold the balls in place.

The Failure

A closer examination reveals that the ball sockets look normal on the top, but are worn down to just nubs on the bottom. When this happens, the balls are no longer separated causing them to make contact with each other. The sockets between the balls has worn down to small nubs. This causes bearing failure.

The Fix and How To Get Up To 400% More Life!

Next time you pick up your Vortex F5 carver, rotate it a small amount as shown in the photo. An easy way to remember is the star pattern used when changing a tire. Rotate your Vortex F5 for every 30 minutes of carving. By doing this, you will even out the wear on your bearing retainer clip and get up to 400% more life from your bearings.

Don’t hesitate to leave a reply below if you have any questions or comments.

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]]> Entries feed - PROPIEDADESINTERNET.ES https://propiedadesinternet.es/compare-7-carvers-side-by-side/ Wed, 25 Mar 2020 02:44:21 +0000 https://propiedadesinternet.es/?p=6803

We compare 7 carvers side-by-side

Here is a roundup of 7 carvers currently on the market. The photo below shows all 7 side-by-side so you can see how they compare. Let’s check each of them out with our test equipment.
Note: The Vortex XJ7 below was upgraded in 2016 and renamed to the Vortex F5 with a New Autochuck Collet/Cam System, Higher Speed & Torque, Ceramic Bearings, No Plunger, Integrated Hosebarb, etc. The PLAY POLO RED EMBLEM (RED).
Vortex F5 Plus

Table of Contents

From left to right: SCM Original Power Carver (entry level), SCM Power Carver (entry level), Shofu Lab Air-Z (rebranded SCM Power Carver 400xs), Powercrafter, NSK Presto, Unbridled Vortex XJ7, Turbo Carver.

Lets start our comparison by watching two unbiased videos by Roger Wolford

Carving on Wood, by Roger Wolford

Engraving Glass, by Roger Wolford

What is common with all the carver? The cutting bur.

When it comes to selecting a high speed carver, how do you decide which one to purchase? You start with the business end, the cutting bur. This is the first criteria you need to examine. The bur is the part that does the cutting and they all have one thing in common, the shaft diameter is 1/16 of an inch or 1.6mm. This size bur is commonly know as a Friction Grip bur of FG for short. All the carver use the FG size bur. The actual cutting head is attached to the shaft and comes in many different shapes and sized. Only high quality burs should be used for carving. Most burs are rated for 360,000 – 500,000 RPM. The speed of the tool must be run lower than the bur’s maximum RPM rating or you risk injury. If you run the tool faster than the bur’s rated speed, the bur could disintegrate causing injury.

Power or RPM?

The answer is both. Like an automobile engine measured in horsepower and torque, we measure carvers in Watts instead. This is where RPM (how fast the bur is spinning) comes into play. If you have low RPM and high torque, you will have low power carver. Likewise, high RPM and low torque will get you a low power carver. What is best is high torque and high RPM to give you a high powered carver. 

Carvers range from just a couple of watts of power up to 20 watts. A good rule of thumb is to look at the maximum RPM and the amount of air consumed. Higher RPM and more air consumed usually means higher power (Watts).

What is the "Sweet Spot "?

All carvers have something called the “Sweet Spot.” It is well known as you go faster in RPM, power output goes down. What happens when you start carving and press the bur against your work, the RPM will start to go down but something interesting happens. The cutting power starts to go up until you reach a point where no more increase in power is realized. This is the referred to as the “sweet spot”. Most carvers reach their maximum power a 1/2 their RPM. So, a 400,000 RPM carver reaches maximum power at 200,000 RPM.

Air Pressure & Turbine Bearings

Is there an ideal air pressure to run a carver? Carvers running at lower air pressure lack enough power to cut. At higher pressures, the RPM will be great, but the life of the turbine is compromised and short lived. Permanently lubricated bearings are designed last 1,000 to 2,000 hours with a maximum air pressure of 38 PSI. Higher pressures of 45 PSI or more are reserved for wet bearings, meaning they require a drop of oil every 20 minutes to an hour of use. Ideally, a carver requiring an air pressure of 30-38 PSI is a good range for carving.

An interesting side effect when carving is the ability of the bearings to handle lateral loading. This is the ability for the bearings to handle the sideways cutting when carving. Since carving is not the same as drilling, most of the force the bearings see is sideways and not downwards. Small diameter bearings have a high failure rate, while large diameter bearings are able to take the load much better. Carvers are designed using two bearings holding something called a “spindle”. 

The spindle holds the bur in place as you carve. If the bearings on the spindle are close to each other, they cannot handle the lateral force, the sideways carving. Bearings spaced further apart on the spindle, not spindle length, are much better for obtaining a longer bearing life. Ideally, radial bearings giving more stability with lateral pressure from carving on the side of the bur. Carvers with a plunger usually use angular bearings because the burs are inserted into the spindle by pressing down vertically on a hard surface.

Time to check out the carvers

Test Equipment

Full disclosure, Unbridled have sold Turbo Carvers, Powercrafters and Power Carvers for many years, but elected to discontinue their product lines. We discontinued selling the Turbo Carver brand due to poor reliability. The Powercrafter brand went out of business. We discontinued the SCM Power Carver line due to turbine failures and lack of quality.

Specifications

  • Accumulator Air Tank, 3 Gallon
  • Pressure Regulator, SMC ITV2030, 0.005-0.5 MPa (0-72.5 PSI), 0-5 Volts
  • Volumetric Flow Rate, Mass Flow Meter, Sierra Instruments, 0-5 Volts, 0-70 SLM
  • Pressure Gauge measured at carver, SSI Technologies, 0-100PSI, 1.0% Full Scale
  • Tachometer, Micron, HPW-2, 5,000-999,000 RPM, 1-200KHz
  • Torque and Power, Stall Torque Method, Diameter 1.62 mm, Pressure 0.25 MPa (36 PSI)
  • Noise/Loudness, Digital Sound Level Meter, 30-130dBA, 32-8.5KHz, 18 inches

Weights and Measures

The carvers were put on graph paper with ¼ inch scale squares along with a rule for accurate length measurements. Widths of the carvers are easily estimated by the scale squares. Weights were measured using an Acculab V-3000 laboratory scale with a readability of 1 gram. A video below the photo shows the weigh in.
From top to bottom: SCM Original Power Carver (entry level), SCM Power Carver (entry level), Shofu Lab Air-Z (rebranded SCM Power Carver 400xs), Powercrafter, NSK Presto, Unbridled Vortex XJ7, Turbo Carver.

The Weigh-in

We set the scale to weigh in grams. Since we are used to ounces in the United States, there is math involved. So we we did the math for you in the “Test Results” section below. If you are nerdy, take grams divided by 28.35.

Order of weigh in: SCM Original Power Carver (entry level), SCM Power Carver (entry level), Shofu Lab Air-Z (rebranded SCM Power Carver 400xs), Powercrafter, NSK Presto, Unbridled Vortex XJ7, Turbo Carver. The newer Vortex F5 is shown in the video below.

Loudness Measurements

For this test, we use dB(A) Digital Sound Level Meter, 30-130dBA, 32-8.5KHz at a distance of 18 inches. This is about the distance your ears will be from the carver while carving. The meter was placed next to the artist’s ear and the tool was run for a few seconds to get a stable reading. The measurement scaled was A-weighted. A-weighting is the most commonly used of a family of curves defined in the International standard IEC 61672:2026 and various national standards relating to the measurement of sound pressure level. A-weighting is applied to instrument-measured sound levels in an effort to account for the relative loudness perceived by the human ear, as the ear is less sensitive to low audio frequencies. It is employed by arithmetically adding a table of values, listed by octave or third-octave bands, to the measured sound pressure levels in dB.

The Decibel Loudness Comparison Chart provides some interesting numbers to help you understand the volume levels across various sources and the affect on hearing.

Environmental Noise

  • 30dB Whisper Quiet Library at 6'
  • 65dB Normal Conversation at 3'
  • 80dBTelephone Dial Tone
  • 85dB OSHS Max Safe Level
  • 95dB Hearing Loss Begins
  • 95dB Jackhammer at 50'
  • 98dB Hand Drill
  • 107dB Lawn Mower
  • 115 dB Rock Concert
  • 125db Pain Begins
  • 140dB Permanent Hearing Loss
  • 140db Jet Engine at 100'

Video of Testing Process

Each carver was tested for sound pressure in dB(A) (loudness) at the manufacturer’s maximum air pressure. There is a digital air pressure gauge in the upper left of the video showing the air pressure entering the tool. After the dB(A) measurement is captured, a few seconds of carving was done to see if the loudness changed.

Mass Air Flow Measurements

Each carver have their air flow measured at the manufacturer’s specified maximum air pressure. The more air flow (larger number on the mass flow meter), the higher the power the carver is capable of producing. Carvers measured: SCM Power Carver (entry level), Shofu Lab Air-Z (rebranded SCM Power Carver 400xs), Powercrafter, NSK Presto, Unbridled Vortex XJ7, Turbo Carver.

Equipment used for measurements were “Accumulator Air Tank, 3 Gallon”, “Pressure Regulator, SMC ITV2030, 0.005-0.5 MPa (0-72.5 PSI), 0-5 Volts”, “Volumetric Flow Rate, Mass Flow Meter, Sierra Instruments, 0-5 Volts, 0-70 SLM”.

Nerdy math stuff again. We measured the pressure in Megapascal and air consumption in Liters per minute; say what? We know what you are thinking; just use good old American terms like PSI and CFM. You got it. No Nerdy Math. The video shows the results in American measurements! 

Test Results: Vortex F5 vs Power Carver vs Turbo Carver

  • Max Pressure1
  • CFM/Lpm2
  • RPM
  • Loudness – dB(A) 18″
  • Weight
  • Carver Length
  • Spindle Length
  • Bearing Spacing
  • Bearing Diameter
  • Impeller Diameter
  • Turbine Replacement6
  • F/F/F/Q/Score4
  • Warranty5
  • Street Price6
Check this out 🠊 🠊 🠊
Vortex F5
  • 38psi, 2.6bar
  • 1.42/40
  • 400,000 @ 35psi
  • 83
  • 1.8oz / 52g
  • 4.5″
  • 14.9mm
  • 10.8mm
  • 6.4mm
  • 8.7mm
  • $50/$1353
  • 5/5/5/5/20
  • Lifetime
  • $43995
Vortex F5
SCM Power Carver
  • 37psi, 2.55bar
  • 1.67/47.2
  • 304,000 @ 37psi
  • 81.9
  • 3.3oz / 94g
  • 6.0″
  • 20.2mm
  • 12.0mm
  • 8.0mm
  • 8.8mm
  • $175
  • 3/2/3/2/10
  • Lifetime
  • $499 (400xs $550)
Power Carver
Turbo Carver
  • 45psi, 3.10bar
  • 1.36/38.5
  • 387.000 @ 45psi
  • 96.3
  • 0.6oz / 16g
  • 4.0″
  • 11.5mm
  • 9.6mm
  • 6.3mm
  • 7.6mm
  • Unknown
  • 1/2/2/1/6
  • 6 Months
  • $325
Turbo Carver

Test Results: Vortex F5 vs NSK Presto vs Shofu Lab Air-Z

  • Max Pressure1
  • CFM/Lpm2
  • RPM
  • Loudness – dB(A) 18″
  • Weight
  • Carver Length
  • Spindle Length
  • Bearing Spacing
  • Bearing Diameter
  • Impeller Diameter
  • Turbine Replacement6
  • F/F/F/Q/Score4
  • Warranty5
  • Street Price6
Check this out 🠊 🠊 🠊
Vortex F5
  • 38psi, 2.6bar
  • 1.42/40
  • 400,000 @ 35psi
  • 83
  • 1.8oz / 52g
  • 4.5″
  • 14.9mm
  • 10.8mm
  • 6.4mm
  • 8.7mm
  • $50/$1353
  • 5/5/5/5/20
  • Lifetime
  • $43995
Vortex F5
NSK Presto
  • 36psi, 2.48bar
  • 1.48/42
  • 324,000 @ 36psi
  • 77.2
  • 2.5oz / 70g
  • 5.25″
  • 18.7mm
  • 13.8mm
  • 6.4mm
  • 10.8mm
  • $186
  • 3/4/4/5/16
  • 90 Days
  • $550 (GSR $850)
NSK Presto
Shofu Lab Air-Z
  • 36psi, 2.48bar
  • 1.17/33.1
  • 329.000 @ 36psi
  • 87.7
  • 3oz / 83g
  • 5.5″
  • 18.5mm
  • 12.1mm
  • 6.8mm
  • 8.5mm
  • $245
  • 4/4/3/4/15
  • 90 Days
  • $498-$594
Shofu Lab Air-Z

Test Results: Vortex F5 vs Vortex XJ7 vs Powercrafter

  • Max Pressure1
  • CFM/Lpm2
  • RPM
  • Loudness – dB(A) 18″
  • Weight
  • Carver Length
  • Spindle Length
  • Bearing Spacing
  • Bearing Diameter
  • Impeller Diameter
  • Turbine Replacement6
  • F/F/F/Q/Score4
  • Warranty5
  • Street Price6
Check this out 🠊 🠊 🠊
Vortex F5
  • 38psi, 2.6bar
  • 1.42/40
  • 400,000 @ 35psi
  • 83
  • 1.8oz / 52g
  • 4.5″
  • 14.9mm
  • 10.8mm
  • 6.4mm
  • 8.7mm
  • $50/$1353
  • 5/5/5/5/20
  • Lifetime
  • $43995
Vortex F5
Vortex XJ7
  • 38psi, 2.62bar
  • 2.01/57
  • 333,000 @ 38psi
  • 79.6
  • 1.4oz / 40
  • 4.25″
  • 16.5mm
  • 14.0mm
  • 8.0mm
  • 11.2mm
  • N/A
  • 5/4/5/5/19
  • Lifetime
  • Discontinued
Vortex XJ7
Powercrafter
  • 45psi, 3.10bar
  • 1.17/33.1
  • 284,000 @ 45psi
  • 87.2
  • 2.2oz / 61g
  • 5.6″
  • 20.2mm
  • 17.2mm
  • 8.0mm
  • 7.5mm
  • $99 – $130
  • 4/2/4/4/14
  • 1 Year
  • $299 NOS7
Powercrafter

Footnotes for Test Results

  1. Max PSI/Bar is the recommend air pressure supplied to the carver per the manufacturer’s specifications. If you watched the video for air flow measurements, the pressure displayed on the digital pressure regulator is in megapascals (MPa).
  2. CFM/Lpm is a measure of how much air is flowing through the turbine. If you watched the video for air flow measurements, the digital mass flow meter displays in liters per minute (Lpm).
  3. Turbine rebuild price / New nosecone assembly with new turbine.
  4. Larger number is better – F3Q is a qualitative score for Form, Fit, Function and Quality. A perfect score would be 20.
  5. Turbine may not be covered or limited by the warranty.
  6. Prices were determined by Google searching and prior pricing sheets.
  7. New old stock. Limited supply.

Vortex F5 Test Carving

Internals of Power Carver, Powercrafter, Turbo Carver

All trademarks and brands are the property of their respective owners.

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