Mantis Wooden Geared Clock

[@claytonboyer8509]

Wow! This is an amazing video, Brian. You've done an excellent job constructing your Mantis wooden clock build, but you've also done a great job showing how you did it. You have an amazing workshop with so many excellent tools. I was drooling! Your shop makes mine look pretty meager. Beautifully done, Brian. You have shown the way these projects are approached by a true craftsman. I'll certainly be referring this video to other Mantis builders. Well Done! Aloha. Clayton

[@briangray5067]

Thank you Clayton! It's been such a pleasure to put together a few of your clock designs, with more coming! I've been a machinist and woodworker for more than a few decades now. But for some reason, clocks have put a huge spark into my inspiration like no other projects in the past. Thank you very for taking the effort to make your plans available. I'm sure that creating an accurate set of plans is much more work than the clock itself, so thank you!

[@a330turbinex7]

Superb! Clayton Boyer clocks are amazing!

[@briangray5067]

Agreed, thanks!

[@LauraMelnik]

As the CNC finishes 1 set, you look to be pulling it up as if it’s stuck down with glue? 3M77? It also looks like the waste block has no marks on it? But yet you are cutting clean through the parts. What magic am I missing?

[@briangray5067]

Thanks! I have a vacuum table which will hold most parts in place. But not all smaller parts will be held by the vacuum, so I also use a low tack double sided tape. And yes, I am cutting through the part and into the spoilboard. But only by about .020" deeper than the part. So the cut into the spoilboard might not be real easy to see.

[@williamb3323]

it's a vacuum table. Keeps the sheet in place as the head cuts. (Cheating?) you tell me. Tomato, Tomotto. I'll take the former.

[@dustancreech7470]

This is amazing. Thanks for sharing. I'm a sculptor, and I teach sculpture at Elmhurst University just outside Chicago. I recently built a makerspace for our department, and I've been learning as much as possible about CNC work and laser-cutting. The laser cutting is a breeze, but our CNC is another animal, but I'm slowly getting there. I want to incorporate this technology into my sculpture courses (this semester was the first time I included it) and it has gone pretty well. As I'm learning and experimenting more and more, my plans are to cover one wall in our makerspace dozens of kinetic pieces like this, that all get connected together in some way, some that the entire wall is animated at the same time. So, I'll share my accomplishments as they unfold. I do have a question about the clock. How accurate is it (as a clock) and how well does it stay in time? Does it require an operator to "wind it" like a grandfather clock, or does that electric motor component do that? Sonin a nutshell, is it self-sustaining after its started, or does it require occasional re-winding or resetting? Thank you again. I will be purchasing your plans and building mine soon!

[@briangray5067]

Thanks for the kind words, appreciated. My clock is accurate over about 4-5 days. After this, you might need to bump the minute hand here and there. But you can continued to tune it in. Just very tiny adjustments to the bob length. The clock doesn't need winding. The weight of the motor as well as the brass weight pulls down on the main wheel, running the clock. Then there is a motor with a mercury switch that runs on a 9V battery. So when the mercury switch senses that the motor has dropped, it engages the motor, lifting it and the weight back up. The 9V battery lasts about 2 months.

[@MyGrowthRings]

Wow, that has a healthy beat. How is the mdf holding up?

[@briangray5067]

Just fine. I haven't noticed any kind of disadvantage to using MDF vs plywood. Thanks!

[@MyGrowthRings]

@@briangray5067 Glad to hear it. BTW, Clayton is the man!

[@briangray5067]

@@MyGrowthRings Yeah no kidding! It's one thing to build one of these clocks. That's enough of a challenge. But designing them? I think that's over my head!

[@williamb3323]

you never showed it wind. That's what I came for. I'm using a ball tilt switch on mine in place of the mercury switch. So I'm trolling the videos of Mantis to see them wind. I like your project. It came out nice. Just not a CNC fan. I'm old school, bandsaw, scroll saw, drill press, dremel for this guy. Thanks for a nice video.

[@saeeddarvish3458]

Hi .I have seen your amazing video constructing Mantis wooden clock .You have done an excellent job . I also purchased the plan and I want to built it . I am having work bee 1010 cnc machine it works on openbuilds software with Gcode . I am having v-carve pro as my cam program . I am able to do close vector, balancing. but for the tool path I am having problem as I do not know which type of bit to select (pass depth - step over - feed rate ) and also the rest of the setting how to do . Please help me in this regard for the tool path setting for cutting material for this beautiful clock I will be grateful to you (SAEED)

[@briangray5067]

Hi there. Thanks for the kind words. Regarding your feeds and speeds, all of that is given to you by the manufacturer of your router bits. I usually buy Amana tooling. They list all that you need to know regarding feeds, speeds, depth of cut, etc. As far as which bit you should use, I would recommend the widest bit that you can that will still get into the corners that you need to. In the case of this clock, there are a lot of small corners, so you'll likely want to go pretty small.

[@randrcomputers]

Question for ya… I just purchased these wonderful plans and for cnc import it has a lot…almost every part has open vectors. Did you run into same issue? I can join them but will take some time. Just wondering if you had same issue. Great build btw

[@briangray5067]

Yes, lots of open vectors. I use vCarve and it has a very nice tool for closing open vectors. I just "select all", set the tolerance, and vCarve closes them for me. Not sure what software you are using, but with vCarve this is super simple.

[@randrcomputers]

@@briangray5067 I use carbide create and not very easy to fix them. Sadly with this software it’s node by node. Thanks for clarifying its not just my setup causing issues.

[@briangray5067]

@@randrcomputers OK understood. I'm not familiar with carbide create. If you have any difficulties during construction, feel free to check in with me. The way that the minute hand drives the hour hand on the daisy wheel was kind of difficult for me to grasp when I first built the same setup on Clayton's Swingtime. The Mantis is the same in these regards. That was probably the only item that I really had to slow down and be sure that I had a good grasp of the concept. Good luck and be sure to share your progress/completion!

[@randrcomputers]

@@briangray5067 watching your video… how you attaching wood to cnc surface? Super glue/tape method or double stick tape? Looks like it works well. I need to know! Ha ha

[@briangray5067]

@@randrcomputers Thanks! The spoilboard is attached to the bed with a vacuum unit. Then the parts are held to the spoilboard with double-stick tape. I have a couple different kinds of tape, each with different adhesion properties. High adhesion for small parts that might wiggle loose, and lower adhesion for larger parts. Removing tape can be a huge pain, so I always shoot for the lowest adhesion that will get the job done.

[@randrcomputers]

I completed my Mantis. Have a look here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oILJe5eMj76VkKM