www.TK560.com

I put a little clip up on YouTube of the mini-former in use:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mpl1KGS8q1A

A stronger shop vac would help it along greatly, but the little one here worked out fine f ...

That reminds me of the Mattel Vac-U-Form

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpSkHmmnfPs

Yup! I hadn't thought about it, but I did essentially reinvent that wheel.

Now I think I need to make some ...

Tonight I cleaned up the mini-clone to make it pull better:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5201/5350816847_72056e3ced.jpghttp://farm6.static.flickr.com/5125/5351429650_696e33428b.jpghttp://farm6.st ...

I pieced it together enough to do a test pull, and it worked!

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5167/5347698017_eb372832e9.jpghttp://farm6.static.flickr.com/5003/5344910641_7e4e5be700.jpghttp://farm6. ...

hehe... that's huge by comparison Smile

this one has a 5.25 x 5.25 work surface. useless for actually making anything, but a cool scale replica of a real system.

tonight i've been building the &quo ...

i'd also venture to guess you let it sag too much. if you sag too much you have excess plastic with no where to go.

Project goes forward... I've got a tiny little 5.25" forming surface now. Waiting for the silicone caulking to dry before I test it all out, but the major parts are all working: heater, forming s ...

good tips all around!

i had thought about the 45s, but i don't have a good steel cutting saw. these were hand cut with an angle grinder, so i figured my chances of getting nice 45s all around were ...

I may have made the tiniest welded steel plastic carrier ever tonight! 6" x 6" inside, 7.5" outside. I figure this will give me a MASSIVE 5" x 5" usable area.

http://farm6 ...

Tonight I picked up a small shop vac, some 3/4" steel angle stock and the other misc. bits I need to build this thing.

I also contacted my plastics supplier to see if they had any thin styren ...

simple 15A dimmer switch worked great. Here's my "test fit" of the electrical components:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5005/5313862406_de12d04da8.jpg

I heated up a scrap of 0.080 HIP ...

Resurrecting this thread, as I'm finally tackling the project! Tonight I dismantled the bread machine to see what I'm dealing with.

Are there any guides to power requirements for a calrod heating e ...

hmmm... high heat. high pressure. $800 toy. Doesn't sound like a good plan to me.

if anything, i'd make a mold of an ipad, cast it, and form over that. but even making the mold is more risk than i' ...

I have to cut a lot of my pieces off...

This pile of parts shows how the plastic has to be trimmed to get it to release:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4092/5005687626_42414b26b6.jpg

like others have said... if you aren't 100% sure you know what you're doing, you don't want to take web board advice on lethal dosage electricity.