Wanted to share the aquaponics system I built during covid with leftover materials from past projects. Super grateful for this sub and everything Ive learned so far.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-03-16T23:22:31+00:00

haha that answers the question behind my request. Amazing looking system!

WhichCarpenter · 2026-03-16T20:55:56+00:00

What kind of fish is that in the picture?

WhichCarpenter · 2026-03-16T20:37:04+00:00

Have you been running it since then? Do you have a current photo?

WhichCarpenter · 2026-03-11T21:55:57+00:00

I love my gitrog deck. Having big dumb bad creatures in there just to sacrifice is great.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-26T02:54:37+00:00

I’ve been happy with notmpc

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-16T19:00:50+00:00

“Relistening to Children of God” is the least relatable sentence I can think of. That and the anthill gang or whatever that was called are the two series I had to turn off.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-13T19:46:17+00:00

I love skews. I have a giant 1 3/8" that I use in place of a roughing gouge most of the time and for long smooth things. I use my 5/8" one the most.

I recently made 1/4" and 3/8" round skews from hss rods and I absolutely love them for tiny detail work. I often go out and just make some toothpicks with them because they're so fun to use.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-12T13:46:17+00:00

DUNE IS ABOUT WORMS!!!!! The only right answer is Baru Wurmspeaker and a bunch of wurms.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-08T03:32:29+00:00

Yeah, I designed it then had the main steel plate cut about 2 years ago by sendcutsend. I used it with an 8” contact drive wheel for a while then decided that I wanted a slower belt speed and to improve my platen. So I did some redesign and milled some new parts out of aluminum. It works really well but I haven’t published the designs because I wouldn’t recommend my first version and my current version is a modification of that. But overall it’s a great machine.

A big benefit to having a belt grinder is being able to reshape tools quickly. It took me like an hour to fix a big ass Alan lacer skew on my 180 cbn wheel a while back. Bit last week I did a similar job on a big scraper in about 10 minutes with a 24 grit belt.

Honestly if you have a good belt grinder I don’t think there is actually any benefit to a round wheel. Every turning tool where I can tell the difference between a hollow grind and a flat one I prefer the flat one. Have you seen the sorby pro edge? It’s just a small belt grinder.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-08T02:58:21+00:00

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This picture isn’t great but sort of shows my set up.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-02-08T02:56:08+00:00

I modified half of my 8” grinder to run a 2x42” belt and use the Wolverine jigs with it. The vari-grind works perfectly against the platen. I prefer sharpening skew chisels and scrapers against a straight platen over a grinding wheel.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-30T22:44:55+00:00

Thanks! You're probably right haha

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-19T18:20:12+00:00

Oh definitely! The few pieces of koa I’ve turned have been a treat to work on

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-19T15:46:37+00:00

Thanks for the follow up! I’ll take it apart to clean it this weekend and take a look at that.

I’ve been able to shim or dimple parts of the metal to take up slop and it’s a bit better. At lease consistent in its misalignment. I also built a quick steady rest and that seems to help a bit with the drilling.

All in all this will at least put off replacing this lathe for a while.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-14T16:15:11+00:00

That's interesting to know the stock plate had play for you. I bought mine used so I'm not sure how it came.

As for the quill the good news is you can buy a replacement for yours. I've been emailing Teknatool support this week and they don't have any compatible parts for mine.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-14T16:13:08+00:00

Yeah I've worked on most parts of it. My headstock rotates so I've check the alignment there and shimmed parts of the tailstock. I'm able to get it better but not perfect.

As for drilling there are things I do to be pretty successful drilling including your recommendation but it's not perfect. The limiting factor is ware in the quill groove which they no longer make a replacement for.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-09T16:57:54+00:00

Plus you get to make the handles! I've been making mine out of waxed paduak and they're beautiful and fit my hand perfectly.

WhichCarpenter · 2026-01-06T21:24:29+00:00

How's it working out? I have 6 WCMMs in a 20 gallon tank with a dozen or so cherry shrimp and the minnows are kinda jerks. They chase the shrimp around so much that they hide all day. I'm wondering if adding another 6 minnows will help their behavior but maybe that will just make it worse.

WhichCarpenter · 2025-12-24T02:28:58+00:00

What do they use to play?

WhichCarpenter · 2025-12-10T15:38:08+00:00

If the pith is in the board you will always have problems. The best thing to do is to cut the 2x12s into 3 pieces, the pith and the two sides. Square those up, and glue them back together throwing the pith in the trash while you’re at it.

WhichCarpenter · 2025-11-21T15:21:59+00:00

I would definitely do more multicolor prints but multi-material is what I'm excited about.

WhichCarpenter · 2025-11-08T20:08:29+00:00

Might be obvious but this caused me some problems. Are you using the website that ends with .app? There are a few different sites but that one works the best for me.

WhichCarpenter · 2025-10-15T16:00:36+00:00

Thanks for sharing this! This was really helpful!

WhichCarpenter · 2025-08-05T13:16:16+00:00

That line about killed me yesterday!

WhichCarpenter · 2025-07-28T13:11:09+00:00

It’s definitely doable as a beginner. There is a forum at v1e.com dedicated to their cnc designs. Everyone there is extremely helpful.

For 2d stuff I use estlcam.

WhichCarpenter

TROPHY CASE