T Cage Plans

[Malodave]

I drew up some 4-up acrylic T cages in CAD for all to enjoy. They can be made stackable with the addition of some small feet on the bottom that fit inside the top portion of the lower cage. I left space on top to put in LED lighting if you want to. I will be building mine soon.

MaloDave




http://home.comcast.net/~n323xl/Arboreal-T-Cage.PDF

http://home.comcast.net/~n323xl/Terrestrial-T-Cage.PDF

 

[Jjpth]

Nice designs Dave!.. I'd love to see pics when you complete them. Are you going to be taking orders in the future possible?..

 

[Malodave]

Nice designs Dave!.. I'd love to see pics when you complete them. Are you going to be taking orders in the future possible?..

I was going to make some for myself to have a nice display of my Ts. I wasn't really looking to go into business with them but since I did the drawings, I placed them here for others to use the design. I tied to go a little larger on the size, but it would start using another sheet of acrylic, so I modified the size to accommodate just the two 24 x 48 inch sheets of acrylic.

I am building my own airplane so these should not be very hard to do. I have also drawn the floor plan for the house I want to have built. The one the builder had was so bad it was pitifull.

Malodave

 

[Harlock]

I like the design, but a few things:
1. acrylic cement is cheaper from tap plastics: http://www.tapplastics.com/shop/product.php?pid=130&PHPSESSID=20101011153153425215533

2. I don't quite get how they stack together, or if I'm looking at this right, it requires cutting very thin slices of acrylic, which is pretty tough to do.

3. Are the hinges for the door? I figured that's what they were for, but didn't see.

4. Whats the total cost per cage?

5. If you order acrylic online, how are you going to cut it? (I buy my stuff at a local store, because it is cheaper than most places, and they do very nice cuts for free, and give out scrap you can use to make shelters in a cage.)

6. If someone else is looking at this, remember to factor in cost of tools; I also had to make a setup where acrylic was sandwiched between 2 pieces of plywood to cut out holes without fracturing the acrylic.



Like I said, I like the designs, just trying to help.

 

[Malodave]

I would probably use a table saw and rip the pieces down with a very fine tooth blade. If you are going to score and snap the acrylic, I agree, the small strips would be difficult to do. The design is not set in stone so any feedback I get here could be incorporated into another REV of this basic design. I didn't include the hinges and hasp in the drawing because I don't have any real dimensions on them and didn't see a CAD model available.

Malodave

 

[Harlock]

Just from experience, you'll probably need to make a jig to drill the holes. I was using a 2" Dewalt circular saw drill bit. Just be careful, I burned my hand once because I didn't realize how hot it was getting. To install the vents themselves, if your using 1/8" thick acrylic, you can use a hammer to gently bend the metal rim down, but anything thicker and you will probably need to find something else to bond it together.

A table saw gave me pretty cruddy cuts, as it can be hard to get a nice clean line on them, and I had it shatter a few pieces, but I was using a very rough toothed blade as that's all I had around.