Or... instead of fitting the tamper directly to the can crusher, attach a dowel or other rod to the driven arm. Drill a hole in the base plate slightly larger than the dowel (or, to fit a bushing that will keep the dowel in the right line).
Fit the tamper face to the bottom end of the dowel, which can now go down to the scale (or just the basket) a convenient distance below.
Also, the tamper piston could be wood, carefully sanded, turned down to slightly smaller than the right diameter, and coated in a pour-on resin. Clamped in the right orientation (perfectly flat, relative to gravity), that can make an extremely smooth finish. (Is static an issue with resin coatings?)
A countersunk flat head screw in the middle (installed before the resin), can secure the piston face to the drive rod.
A modestly equipped woodworking shop should be able to do most of this work.
Those are good ideas William!! Thank you!! Little D says thank you too!!!
"Three of the four elements are variable, but the fourth one has to be adaptable, knowledgeable and intuitive." Mark Prince Click Here (www.coffeegeek.com)
A polished hard wood tamper would indeed work, a plain disc of pine (say cut from a 2 x 4) or similar would likely not work as the grain is too large to take a good polish, that is where I came from when I said that a wooden tamper would not work, my mistake for not being more clear.
You indeed could use the crusher on top and a scale on the bottom but as was said, they do need to be fixed between each other, they need not be attached to each other but you need to make your device so that they won't move apart from each other while in use. You can put a scale under the rig and cut the bottom out of the crusher so that the PF sits on the scale while you are pressing with the crusher.
The place I am coming from is that if you are going to go through the trouble of making this device, make it so you don't need to watch a scale for ease of use. However, if you want to or don't mind watching a scale, there is no reason against using a scale, you are the tool designer, make it any way you want! :D
In real life, my name is Wayne P.
Feed the newbs, starve the trolls and above all enjoy what you drink!
"Three of the four elements are variable, but the fourth one has to be adaptable, knowledgeable and intuitive." Mark Prince Click Here (www.coffeegeek.com)
mtcummins Senior Member Joined: 9 May 2012 Posts: 19 Location: Pittsburgh, PA Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: Izzo Alex II Grinder: Baratza Vario Drip: Cheapo 12 cup
Posted Thu Jun 21, 2012, 5:40pm Subject: Re: Low Tech Auto Tamper Project
TheMummaFamily Said:
Nice--thanks. It was a juicer I saw at samsclub.com that made me think of this, but the juicer wasn't that cheap. I am going to go read that and see what juicers cost.
Did you ever end up making one of these? How did it turn out? I'm very interested in the one referred to here, step by step instructions are available here: Click Here (makeprojects.com)
I just don't have the time/tools to do the fabrication. If you were interested in doing it, I would be interested in purchasing one from you... seems like most of the time involved will be in getting the parts together, etc. Looks like building it would be fairly quick. Maybe your time in figuring it out can pay for your machine by me buying a 2nd one you build at the same time :)
I started a new thread here: "Hydraulic Tamper project" about this, but found this one in a search, so thought I'd post here as well.
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