wood burner

[george morris]

Well I tried a search of the forum, no luck. Does anyone have info on building a wood burner from a battery charger? I did a Google search found a good u tube for converting the charger not one for the pen .
Anyone have this in a pdf? or better site.

Thanks! George

 

[Charlie Knighton]

i believe you could search for Molly Winton, she has a $5 paperback book (notes)with that information

the book is mostly on making the pens with different tips

 

[john lucas]

Try this. If it's not the one do a google search for Wood Vaporizer and you'll probably find it.
http://www.woodturnersresource.com/extras/projects/priddle/WoodBurner.html

 

[Rob Wallace]

Easy conversion - just be careful ! ! !

About 2 or 3 years ago I converted a manual battery charger (Schumacher Model SE-1010-2 - Seen HERE ) to a Graeme Priddle style "Wood Vaporizer" using the conversion instructions included in the link that John provided. It works great with "brute force", home made "pens", as well as manufacturer-built pens as long as you carefully control the current going to the pens. If you turn-up the power supply (sometimes known as a pyrography "machine") too high, you can vaporize the nichrome element or burn-up/melt the pen irreparably, so be very careful with the voltage adjustment setting when using one of these high-current power units, particularly with commercial pens.

Also, heed the warnings about voltage being an efficient killer, and be sure that you pay attention to accurate wiring, sufficient insulation, and how you handle the hot part of the rig. I still have a pair of jeans somewhere with a burn-through "brand" on the leg where an accidental slip of a red-hot wood vaporizer nichrome element off of my bench burned a hole in the cloth within a second or two. Fortunately the skin of my leg beneath was not damaged, but the cuss-words I emitted during this episode could have burned a hole in the ceiling! Had the hot element landed on a part of the jeans that was not a seam, I could have easily received second- or third-degree burns from this element. Be VERY careful!

Rob Wallace

 

[Jack Gaskins]

Well I tried a search of the forum, no luck. Does anyone have info on building a wood burner from a battery charger? I did a Google search found a good u tube for converting the charger not one for the pen .
Anyone have this in a pdf? or better site.

Thanks! George

There is a new thread over on the Saw Mill Creek turners site and it has a link to the American Woodworkers web site that has the video.

Jack

 

[Bill Boehme]

If you are wanting to do detail work or use it to sign your name then the battery charger option is probably much too powerful. Woodburning tools like the Detail Master are very nice, but horribly overpriced for what they consist of. On the other hand, it would take a lot of time and effort gathering up all of the components and fabricating the housing, circuit board and so forth. Basically, it is a filament transformer and a thyristor voltage controller circuit along with switches and jacks to plug in the pens. If electronics is not your bag then that is not an option anyway. I have a Detail Master Excalibre along with a few pens. It is a nice rig and works very well for fine details. The heat can be adjusted from barely warm to bright yellow on the tip. Andi Wolfe has a great idea to keep from getting your fingers too hot when holding the pen. It is plastic tubing that is slotted so that it can expand like expanded metal. I don't know what it is called or where to find it. She handed it out to a group of us taking a class from her a few years ago.

 

[Hugh]

Hi there George,
Sounds like you are going to move on to something from our class........cool!!!!

Here is a connection to a video that someone from one of my clubs sent me. Take a look - not too difficult - but be careful. Let me know how it works.

http://videos.americanwoodworker.com/video/Make-A-Wood-Burning-Transformer

Another place to Google is "Gramme Priddle's wood burner" or something like that. Someone in Silicone Valley did a paper on how to make one also. If you can not find anything on the net - let me know and I will try to find it or send you a copy.

Good luck - and don't forget to send pictures.
Hope you had a great week - I know I did.
Hugh

 

[Ian Thorn]

Thanksfor the link Hugh i too have been looking at the same thing after watching Graham Priddle do a demo and talking to him 🙂


Cheers Ian

 

[KellyDunn]

Graeme Priddle has directions and the Napa model to get. I think on his website. A lot of folks have made one. I am still using one he made for me many years ago from a transformer. folks here on the Big island that made one of Graemes burners in a class with him say its very controlable. Graeme however is now using a burner a fellow Kiwi made for him from microwave oven parts. He told me he loves it.

 

[Doug Wolf]

Fine detail from woodburner

If you are wanting to do detail work or use it to sign your name then the battery charger option is probably much too powerful.

Here is a battery charger woodburning on the bottom of one of my maple plates. I built it two years ago to sign my name and recently started woodburning designs. It works good for fine details if you build the correct tip for your pen.

 

[Bill Boehme]

Here is a battery charger woodburning on the bottom of one of my maple plates. I built it two years ago to sign my name and recently started woodburning designs. It works good for fine details if you build the correct tip for your pen.

That is great work. I got the impression from an earlier post in the thread that it was more like a wood vaporizer.

 

[george morris]

Thanks for all the help ! The Video is excellent and I built the wood-burner today. Not hard I reused the cord from the charger for power to the dimmer. I also reused the wires to the charging clips,cut them off turned a maple pen drilled a 3/8 hole thru pen then cut off 1/2 of end for clips. this seams to work well. Again thanks for all the help! G

 

[bhask]

I have made a number of pyography pens along the lines of the Molly Winton approach. They work just fine for wood burning and branding. Just one set of terminal strip connectors removed from the plastic strip.

What is the benefit or reason for using two sets of connectors with solid copper wire in-between them. I would think the longer portrusion and possibly additional flexibility would be undesirable.

On another matter, any suggestions on how to incorporate a small piece of brass tubing cross section to burn a circle or oval design?

 

[Rob Wallace]

Bill asked:

What is the benefit or reason for using two sets of connectors with solid copper wire in-between them. I would think the longer portrusion and possibly additional flexibility would be undesirable.

The sections of copper wire provide low resistance support to the high resistance nichrome wire, which means the actual heating that takes place in the nichrome is spatially separated from the plastic mount and insulated wire. If the nichrome was in contact directly with the insulated wire, the likelihood of melting the insulation, etc. would be much greater than if there was a spacer section of low-resistance non-insulated ("bare") copper wire.

On another matter, any suggestions on how to incorporate a small piece of brass tubing cross section to burn a circle or oval design?

You might try wrapping some heavy gauge nichrome wire tightly around the section of brass tubing. If there is not too much of a shorting effect by the brass across the coil(s), there may be enough heat transfer from the hot nichrome to the brass tubing to work OK... just adjust the current to the element slowly and see if there is shorting caused by the metal to metal contact of the heating wire and the brass tube. I may have to try this myself when I get the vaporizer set up next...!!

Hope this helps,

Rob Wallace

 

[Doug Wolf]

how to incorporate a small piece of brass tubing cross section to burn a circle or oval design?

I use a straight wire connector that is normally used to connect two wires by crimping the connector with a wire inserted in each end. I bend a piece of the nichrome wire in the middle and insert the bend in one end of the connector. Crimp that end of the connector and sharpen the other end on a grinder or with a file. It will make good circles and the connectors come in various sizes depending how big you want the circle.

 

[Bill Boehme]

You might try wrapping some heavy gauge nichrome wire tightly around the section of brass tubing.

Brass is a much better conductor than nichrome so that won't work. The difficult thing would be to find an electrical insulator that won't melt or burn and is also a good heat conductor -- I hear that unobtainium would fit the bill, but is almost impossible to find.

 

[hockenbery]

Brass is a much better conductor than nichrome so that won't work. The difficult thing would be to find an electrical insulator that won't melt or burn and is also a good heat conductor -- I hear that unobtainium would fit the bill, but is almost impossible to find.

If you use unobtainium you will need a vapor ware controller. Is April coming early?

 

[Rob Wallace]

Brass is a much better conductor than nichrome so that won't work. The difficult thing would be to find an electrical insulator that won't melt or burn and is also a good heat conductor -- I hear that unobtainium would fit the bill, but is almost impossible to find.

Bill: Just wondering if oxidation on the surface of the nichrome would reduce electrical conductivity against the brass enough to get around the higher conductivity of the brass. Also wondering if silicon-based heat sink compound (the kind used to thermally bond power semiconductors (e.g. TO-3 mounts) would provide electrical insulation and thermal conductivity? (Might not stand-up to red-hot conditions of the conducting nichrome though....??)

Can't you get sheets of unobtainium through the MSC catalog?

Rob

 

[Dale Miner]

Bill,

I have wrapped a nichrome wire around a crimp style butt connector after removing the plastic insulation. The butt connector was for a #8 wire, and about six wraps were used. Initially, the wire did short to the tin plated copper butt connector. I pulled the butt connector from the wire leaving the coils in the wound state, and heated the coil red for a while. After cooling, the butt connector was reinserted and the wire loops 'snugged' a bit by winding them tighter with a pair of pliers.

After the bit of surface oxidation from holding the wire at red heat for a while, I did not have trouble with the nichrome shorting to the copper butt connector. It takes a while for the connector to get hot, but once hot, it does a good job. I did sharpen the business end of the connector. It seems to work best with a slight rocking motion, that is, touch the connector on one side and rock it over to the other side. I have the battery charger set up, and on my ampmeter, it takes about 7 or 8 amps to keep the connector at the right temperature while burning circles. Any pause in the action and the temperature gets hotter.

 

[Bill Boehme]

Bill: Just wondering if oxidation on the surface of the nichrome would reduce electrical conductivity against the brass enough to get around the higher conductivity of the brass. Also wondering if silicon-based heat sink compound (the kind used to thermally bond power semiconductors (e.g. TO-3 mounts) would provide electrical insulation and thermal conductivity? (Might not stand-up to red-hot conditions of the conducting nichrome though....??)

Can't you get sheets of unobtainium through the MSC catalog?

Rob

My thought was that the oxides might not be sufficient to completely shunt conduction through the nichrome, but apparently Dale has been able to get it to work after sufficiently oxidizing the nichrome wire. Brute force always wins out over elegance.

The various heat sink compounds are mainly silicone grease and sometimes non-conductive oxides such as aluminum oxide. Although the grease is not a conductor is not a suitable insulator. It is only intended to improve thermal conduction. A sheet of mica insulator is used when the collector needs to be electrically isolated from the heat sink.

Unobainium is always on back order at MSC and the price is really high. They suggested substituting Delirium which is plentiful and cheap, but unfortunately is also a highly unstable element that has been known to go high order without any apparent cause.

Bill,

I have wrapped a nichrome wire around a crimp style butt connector after removing the plastic insulation. The butt connector was for a #8 wire, and about six wraps were used. Initially, the wire did short to the tin plated copper butt connector. I pulled the butt connector from the wire leaving the coils in the wound state, and heated the coil red for a while. After cooling, the butt connector was reinserted and the wire loops 'snugged' a bit by winding them tighter with a pair of pliers.

After the bit of surface oxidation from holding the wire at red heat for a while, I did not have trouble with the nichrome shorting to the copper butt connector. It takes a while for the connector to get hot, but once hot, it does a good job. I did sharpen the business end of the connector. It seems to work best with a slight rocking motion, that is, touch the connector on one side and rock it over to the other side. I have the battery charger set up, and on my ampmeter, it takes about 7 or 8 amps to keep the connector at the right temperature while burning circles. Any pause in the action and the temperature gets hotter.

Thermal stability is the big issue with all of these woodburners that have small directly heated tips, but building one with thermal feedback might make them rather expensive.

 

[Rob Wallace]

Delirium.....

Unobtainium is always on back order at MSC and the price is really high. They suggested substituting Delirium which is plentiful and cheap, but unfortunately is also a highly unstable element that has been known to go high order without any apparent cause.

The Belgians have been using delirium to make a rather tasty beer for quite a while. Look HERE and HERE. [ IUPAC classification: Beer - Belgian Ale - Trippel ] I don't know delirium's valence, reactivity, or mass number, but I do know (from personal experimentation in the Netherlands) that after ingestion, it reduces the activation energy of the individual consuming it, particularly the morning after it is 'reacted'. The average taste enjoyment level coefficient is above 0.9874, and closely approaching 1.000 for most individuals having been exposed to the compound.

"Better things, for better living, through Chemistry"

Rob Wallace

😉