[tribaloverkill]

Reservoir #2, POD254z! The Fountain. Yes,... I want a fountain reservoir. Here we go,...

May-14-2006

What the hell is this? If I was to ask BODDAKER,... he might know


A 6.5hp shop vac attached to the bottom of this "thing".


The shop vac. You probably know what I'm about to do,...


I'm going to vacuum form a dome for the top of my reservoir Now,.. here's the trick. The acrylic HAS to be heated EVENLY. If not it wont form a nice dome shape. Also,... It's best to leave the shop vac off until your acrylic reaches it's temperature. The hotter the acrylic the more it will strectch to form a nice dome. If you heat the acrylic to much you risk creating bubbles in the plastic and under vacuum you could over stretch forimg a hole. It's pretty cool actually, lol.


This is what you'll end up with. I dont reccommend heating while under vacuum. It's best you heat evenly to the temp you want first then apply vacuum. You will probably have to keep heating it some but the idea is to heat as little as possible while under vacuum. You risk unevenly applying heat which will warp your dome.


While appling vacuum the sides of the acrylic will pull upwards. It a good idea to try and keep the sides down as much as possible. After you reach a nice stretch, flatten the sides out like in this picture. Keep the vacuum on for a bit while cooling. Acrylic tends to warp or move around when hot. Leave it one to hold the shape. after a couple of minutes turn it off and remove your dome. Let it cool.


you should end up with something like this. Also, remember that the larger the area is that needs to be heated, the harder it will be to heat it evenly. This is why BODDAKER had a heating box to heat his large sheets. No way you could do that with a heating gun.


2.5"OD tube,...


Perfect fit. You want the vacuum hole to be just a tid bit larger then your target diameter. tid bit meaning a 1/32" - 1/16" larger. That it.


Other attempts. The acrlyic I am using is .118" thick.


This one is a larger diameter heated unevenly and to much. You can tell by the blow out or should I say in


Nice shape but wasnt heated enough.


This one is kind of warped a tiny bit and there's one bubble. LOL. As you can see I heated this one a bit more.


This one has a beautiful shape, nice dome. BUT,... was heated to much. There are heat bubbles. You need to keep the nozzle of the heat gun away from the acrylic. About 6" or so. To close and bubbles will form real quick. Plus if you keep your distance the btter your chances for heating it evenly.


Here,... I ground away all the side and I am now grinding it down to fit the diameter of the tube perfectly. I used tape to make a little handle. You have to grind this evenly too. Light pressure and keep the piece spinning. Dont sand in one spot to long.


You want a nice mating surface for strength. This is a bit smaller then the tube. The tube is 1/8", this is 3/32". Close.


I was lazy. I used the sander to sand off all the extra plastic arond the dome. Here the left overs.


Perfect.


Now because the dome's mating surface was smaller then the tubes,... I sander down the insides edge of the tube a bit to better match the dome. I didnt want any reall hard edges in there. I wont the fluid to flow smoothly.


Here's the shaft or "IN" port. Water gets pushed up through this and I think you know the rest.


You want to shaft to come close to the top but not to close.


Pretty sweet. Reminds me of an oil filter for a car


That was a long update. Damn.