Update: I have taken my K40 apart and converted it to a whole new & improved machine: the LAYZOR! Read all about this project here. Want to do the same thing to yours? Check the LAYZOR website.
I received a fine 7x7mm drag chain yesterday, which I bought to route the air assist tube inside the K40.
I didn’t want to re-invent the weel, so I 3D printed a nozzle I found on Thingiverse:
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:976774
I spray-panted it with the last drops of metallic spraypaint left in the can of the booze rack project.
Next I made a little mounting block. I just eyeballed it, no need to over-engineer things. This end will go on the laser head carriage. The other end I just mounted to the wall between the work area and the electronics compartment.
This block was added to the carriage using an already available screw hole.
I wanted to add a support to the back panel too, to keep the drag chain in place (I first made sure the carriage would still reach the whole bed area!).
This is kind of sketchy, since the glass tube is behind that back panel. So inorder to be safe, I drilled a hole in a little block of leftover wood, so the drill bit won’t be able to reach the tube when I get through that panel. The steel panel is thick enough to thread, so I did just that.
A leftover piece of PCB serves as the mounting plate.
If you paid attention in the video, you can see that the drag chain obstructs the light path when I move the carriage to the back left corner. This is a design flaw I may revisit, but since I always put my stock in the front of the machine, it’s not really that urgent imho.
The 3D printed nozzle was supposed to be a lockscrew design, but I don’t really trust threading PLA, so I took my dremel and made slits for my old & trusted tightening method.
Tadaa. Now If I find my hotglue gun I can fix the tube to the nozzle…
