CNC Filament Winding Machine

Hey guys,

I made a filament winding machine for carbon/glass fiber. The machine has been 3D printed, the electronic is self-made runs with a modified Marlin firmware (to support rotation axis).

I started a wiki page (which is not yet up-to-date - [www.reprap.org]) but I would like to share some fotos and videos ( [vimeo.com] ) to get some feedback. The updates to the wiki will follow sooner or later.

The machines resin "bath" is really prototypically but it works ... The gcode generator is a ruby script which I have written on my own. Right now I use replicatorg 5D version ( [code.google.com] ) to run the program. Plans are to integrated the generator into a host software.

thx, to the reprap community

Neat project! Do you have a need for custom-wound tubes, or are you mainly interested in the process?

Excellent design.

You need to ensure you have good tension on the filament though to produce a strong tube. This gives the fibres pre tension, but also avoids any voids or resin rich areas in the tube. You can do this by taping over the tube after lay up to squeeze out the excess resin, but this is messy.

A better method may be to apply the resin separately at the back of the machine onto the previous layer and then lay the fibre on dry rather than using a bath. This way you could have a dry tensioning wheel setup on the fibre feed. This would also give you direct control of how much resin you are applying. It would work well for single filament winding.

Really nice concept though and would be good for oval, square or hexagonal tubing.

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Helium Frog Website

Dale Dunn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Neat project! Do you have a need for custom-wound
> tubes, or are you mainly interested in the
> process?


Hi Dale,

thx - well, my plan was to use the wounded tubes as structures for model airplanes. But actually its more the machine and the process itself ...

Anyway, the application might come in the future

Hej Martin,

thx for your comments...

> You need to ensure you have good tension on the
> filament though to produce a strong tube. This
> gives the fibres pre tension, but also avoids any
> voids or resin rich areas in the tube.

Thats true, my plan is to replace the syringe resin bath by a more advanced construction that has a so called dancer roll and springs to adjust the tension and some other rolls to put the resin on the fibres... This would solve the tension problem.

> You can do
> this by taping over the tube after lay up to
> squeeze out the excess resin, but this is messy.

Yes, have a look at the video ... But your are right its messy and somehow waste of resin
>
> A better method may be to apply the resin
> separately at the back of the machine onto the
> previous layer and then lay the fibre on dry
> rather than using a bath. This way you could have
> a dry tensioning wheel setup on the fibre feed.
> This would also give you direct control of how
> much resin you are applying. It would work well
> for single filament winding.

This is a really nice idea! It should work for rounded tubes pretty well, not sure how it could be done for the squared (or arbitrary) ones. I like the idea because of the dry fibre feed ... Cleaning up the stuff is anoying Actually, I would love to have an integrated automatic on demand resin mixer

>
> Really nice concept though and would be good for
> oval, square or hexagonal tubing.

Yes, I have already done some squared tubing...

New Video: [vimeo.com]

In this video a squared tube is wounded, however, the gcode generator was written for rounded tubes, thats why the layering is not optimal. The turning zone of around 65mm on each side will be also optimized in future version. The tube has a planned length of 500mm, the total length is around 630mm because of the turning zones on each side. The winding angle is 25 degree. Btw, the squared tube that is already finished (first try) is not the one that has been wounded in the video.

So my plans are to improve the generator to support more complex structures ( as you have mentioned above) and also to reduce the turning zone (by putting the winding eye closer to the tube and by using a differential approach based on the friction of the filament in the turning zone area) . This will increase the usable area of the tube and also allows to use even smaller winding angles.

Thx for your comments

Robert

Having a resin dispenser at the rear of the machine would need to have a motor to pull it in and out depending on the size of the tube and also how many layers you had laid down. I wouldn't be too hard to pull this back and forth in sync with the rotation to produce square or hexagonal tube. Alternatively the part could be tilted back and forth. After all this is how camshafts on automotive engines are ground. See attached video.

Cam Grinding 1

This machine could also be capable of producing tubes with flared ends (butted tube) which would be useful for bike frames.

Carbon fibre "tow" is available in prepreg format. You could just wind it dry and then bake the parts in an oven to cure them.

This would be a nice and clean process.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/15/2013 09:00AM by martinprice2004.

---

Helium Frog Website

Hei Martin,

interessting process, haven't seen that before.

I have attached some images of the tube from the latest video...

Right now, my plans are to do some conical winding, to measure the resin/fibre ratio and to use vacuum after the winding process...

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/25/2013 07:23AM by mindfab.

Hi. Very interested in filament winding. How do you start the software process, ie what does the ruby script do, and what inputs does it need. I am not familiar with g-code, what's it like to work with?

Hi guys.

I´m interested in cnc fimanent winding machine, but with polar winding.
The design fro this topic is similar to www.xbinder.com.
The machine for polar winding must be have almost 3 axes, but my problem is that the machines with 3 axes run in linuxcnc, and i not have experience with that.
MIndfab says that he use marlin modified (firmware).
I believe that the design for the filament winding machine is better with 3 axes, but really i need help, because i don´t have experience with the software.

thanks for your comments.

Jaime.

Quote
fnibble
Hi. Very interested in filament winding. How do you start the software process, ie what does the ruby script do, and what inputs does it need. I am not familiar with g-code, what's it like to work with?

Long time ago but maybe you are still interested in.

My current toolchain looks like that.

CAM Software/GCode Compiler is a ruby script that just generates some X,Y movements (slider+rotation axis) to create the desired winding pattern. This code is then passed into the controller software which is ReplicatorG. This software communicates with the Marlin firmware on the winding machine controller. That hardware controller is basically a modified Gen7 hardware board to meet my needs for winding machines.

The parameters for the ruby script for cylinders are as follows:
- winding pattern angle
- winding length
- winding additional length (this is a value to determine the size of the turning zone where the winding angle goes from +alpha to - alpha and vice versa, there are also other ways to achieve this)
- diameter of the cylinder/core
- overlap of the filament
- width of one filament

Hope that helps, let me know if you need anything else.

Quote
jarango3d
Hi guys.

I´m interested in cnc fimanent winding machine, but with polar winding.
The design fro this topic is similar to www.xbinder.com.
The machine for polar winding must be have almost 3 axes, but my problem is that the machines with 3 axes run in linuxcnc, and i not have experience with that.
MIndfab says that he use marlin modified (firmware).
I believe that the design for the filament winding machine is better with 3 axes, but really i need help, because i don´t have experience with the software.

thanks for your comments.

Jaime.

Hi Jaime,

I think you can also use linuxcnc to controll the machine. What matters/ is difficult is the part that creates the gcode. LinuxCNC itself is also only processing a provided GCode (like ReplicatorG does). However, there is one advantage of using a dedicated hardware controller over a software controller like LinuxCNC. The hardware controller is more precise with respect to timing and hence has smoother control of all axes. The controller hardware is in principle able to controll 4 axis out of the box, but due to lack of time I did not extend the machine itself with more axis.

I would be interested in free CAM software for multiaxis machines. So if you found anything in that direction let me know.

Cheers,

hi interesting project - i worked for years in that industry - I installed dozens of filament winding machines at aerospace companies worldwide - some 40 feet long...if you have any questions I would be happy to help

Gary Ferguson

Hi Gary:

I´m very interested in one machine similar to xwinder 2.0 , with polar winding, but the problem is the software, because the software to operate this machines is very expensive (cadwin, cadfil,etc).
Do you have some software similar?.
thanks for your comments,

Jaime

I bulding my own winder too.

Could you share your ruby script, that generates GCode?