Phi Calipers : Calipers With Scale
New Caliper design: For a while now (eg, about 2 years) it’s bugged me that the calipers I make can only measure down to a certain size – rather than all the way down to zero. I made hundreds of designs… nothing worked terribly well… but eventually a design turned up which caused the complexity to shrink (which is a good sign)… going from 5 parts to 2. Complexity reasserted itself in the shape of a scale and case… I generated the scales (both inches/mm) by writing a PHP script that generates SVG (zipped script here)… SVG can be imported straight into Inkscape… tweaked, then into the laser-cutter – which can also etch, using Cermark spray. Cermark Spray is fairly crazy stuff – costs about $150 a can – a type of muddy water-based paint, but when it’s lasered, it winds up being harder than burnt-on rice. It is actually…