FlexVat, Aluminium

[Matze]

Hi,

I just wanted to share my experience with making a flexvat. After seeing lots of great designs in this forums I decided to give it a shot myself. After failing with a acrylic version (Too thin material to withstand the forces) I decided to make one out of aluminum. And since I don't have a CNC router I decided to build it out of seperate alumium profiles and put it together with screws. That meant cutting a lot of threads, but now it's stable as hell The outer dimensions are 30x18cm with an inner build size of 20x12cm. The bottom part is made out of a HPL plate because I thought a little bit more flexibility was needed. For now I'm using 0.05mm PTFE film that allows and accuracy of 0.5mm details since it's not clear, but a bit blurry. Still waiting for the FEP-film delivery... Any comments and thoughts are very welcome:

Three parts

Top part

Middle part

[Matze]

Bottom part

Bottom part detail, rounded edges

Assembled vat

[Matze]

In action

[Hugues]

Thanks for sharing !

I was planning to build mine using my FDM 3D Printer. You say acrylic was not strong enough ?

[Matze]

I was using 4mm acrylic. And that didn't go too well. It was ok for a couple of prints, but after changing the film a couple of times (testing different materials) the acrylic started to crack and it "felt" that is could hold the tention. But maybe that was an design error... I think for future builds I'll invest in some CNC routed/laser cut aluminium parts.

[seasicksinbad]

Very nice!! And a good size as well. I made mine out of aluminum and was having a hard time putting the pieces together only with the help of bolts. Until I found out you can actually solder/braze aluminum with Alumiweld rods.
They are very easy to use, inexpensive, and you only need a torch and some practice. Here in the U.S. you can find them at Harbor Freight (cheap) and Home Depot (expensive). There's a bunch of videos on Youtube on how to use them.

[Matze]

Thanks for the hint. I didn't know that. Looks fun