Oxford eBooks scanner

[Oxford eBooks]

... that's Oxford, England to be clear!

We scan a lot of books here, and of late I've been increasingly uncomfortable with having to 'unbind' books in order to get a reliable scan. (I use the word 'unbind' as a slightly less scary euphamism for taking the poor tome down to the workshop and setting about it with power-tools).

Some of our clients have sent boxes of rather ancient tomes that they want scanned, OCR'd and made into ePub or MObi format. A lot of those books are older than me and it really seems to be a shame to destroy them.

SO: We begin the construction of a scanning rig. I was very taken by the ScanRobot from Treventus http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlOQuuLYavY but the price is really out of this world.
Daniel's designs (or at least his elegant presentation of the culmination of all that work) seem to me to be one of the best around - the video walking through the latest design really sold the concept to me.

So, in the true spirit of makers around the world, I'm going to build a scanner inspired by this design. I particularly like the flippalble platern module for paperbacks.

I started with an exploration of the cradle lifting levers built from Lego...



I was really impressed with the action.

And so, to collect all the parts. I have bearings on order, threaded rod, MDF and all kinds of fasteners. Plus a good supply of greenhouse glass.
I'm hoping to put my mini-lathe to work with some special parts somewhere.

I've chosen MDF over what seems to be the standard PLY because I REALLY hate it's propensity for chipping. I'll also use a router to cut as much as possible, doubling up the MDF to cut mirrored parts at the same time.
I guess I ought to carefully seal the MDF in case it starts to puff in time, so a good paint-job is called for.


.... well, wish me luck. Will post back when I get to the next step.


Aiming to have something by the London Book Fair.

Andy

[rob]

Hi Andy,

I'll be very interested to hear about your progress! Cutting the parts manually using a router will take some work, but it can be, and has been, done. Good luck!

[Oxford eBooks]

Yay. Bearings arrived today.
MIGHT be able to get a chance to start cutting some wood next week.

[Oxford eBooks]

I downloaded a free CAD program to print out the dxf files.
My dining room table (it's a BIG one!) is now strewn with paper than I'm carefully sticking together prior to cutting loads of MDF.

[Oxford eBooks]

Marking up the MDF...

Stuck all the pieces together, taped to the MDF and marked the corners with a centrepunch, then jonined up all the dots.
Here's the back plate of the platern module all drawn out.

[Oxford eBooks]

First pieces cut.
Here you can see two pairs of cross members for the platen module.
Going to start cutting the front and back plates tomorrow.
I screwed two pieces of MDF together to save cutting time.
Was going to use a router but my trusty jig saw worked a treat.

[rob]

Nice! They look just like the ones from the CNC.

[Oxford eBooks]

Here, the platern panels all cut out.
I used the router for the internal cut-out, top and glass holding edges to ensure a nice clean finish.
Just needs a bit of a clean up


But in the meantime... Space invaders!!!

[rob]

Just to be sure you know, the two platen panels are slightly different in their sides.

[Oxford eBooks]

Yep, that's the common shape. I'd noticed the differences at the bottom where it docks into the cradle lifter. Will cut those out when I separate the two layers.
With luck I'll get it assembled tomorrow.
Perhaps I'll machine my own screws for the camera mounts on my lathe.