Electronics > Mechanical & Automation Engineering

good material for making a push rod for a switch that broke?

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coppercone2:
I wanted to buy a sheet of material that is the same thickness and just cut the push rod out of it using a jig saw. (1/2 inch thick piece of plastic)
What material is going to be good for this that is durable?

I mean one of those rods that sticks out of the front panel and has a shitty plastic grip collet thing that is designed to break over a spring loaded toggle slide switch deep in the chassis (their usually like 1 foot long)

Mine snapped in two places, but I can still trace the shape on some material, so if I get something that is the correct thickness I can make a brand new one. Otherwise I will just solder one out of brass tube and put a insulator on the end.

And no you can't glue it, it was pathetically weak and easily snapped in even the place that was not damaged ::)

If not I can cut a hole on the side and put a switch on it like a printer



My wavetek 395 had one of those piece of shit plastic hyper engineered for cost push rods in it that has like missing material because you know its going into fucking space and they needed to shave 5 grams off something and maybe to trick the boss that their doing engineering making some kind of i-beam shit instead of giving a solid part with 30% more fill on a critical component. Front panel fell apart too lol, two screws and a giant crumbly plastic flange is the way to go clearly.

Had the same problem on a sorensen unit but that one does not have a key pad in the way of the front panel, so I just drilled a hole and put a normal switch there. Ha ha this is going to end up having fiberglass added to the front panel to help it hold integrity. What a joke design

Berni:
These days 3D printing is a good solution for it.

Even if you don't have a 3D printer you can often find someone you know who has one, or use one of the websites that let people advertise there garage 3D printing services.

If it is just a flat 2D shape you can also get services to laser cut you the shape from plastic, wood or even metal.

But yeah if the shape is simple and you got something like a bandsaw around you can pretty quickly knock out the shape you need from a flat sheet of plastic from the hardware store.

coppercone2:
what plastic though is going to be actually not pathetic?  I want the best plastic, I am not impressed by 3d printer plastic for a push rod, its too weak. I need the best. I think I can make this part on a table saw actually for nice cuts, is just a check mark shape I need, I don't need the last part because I will replace that with a brass tube.

coppercone2:
like the best thing from mcmaster

coppercone2:
bought a new battery for it so I don't end up throwing the unit away, I am infuriated by this.

I am going to solder a brass rod (L Shape) to a cut in half brass tube that is cut down the middle and slides over the switch and then screw that down that to a strait piece of plastic that aligns with the hole. that way I don't need to cut complicated parts. You will need to undo the cover and seperate a screw because it won't fit into the front anymore, but whatever, I don't need that functionality and it will be way stronger.

Infact I just want to make it out of metal put a grounded stud on it with some flexible wire just incase even though the switch is plastic then it will be all metal. I don't know why a normal switch in HV equipment has so much less isolation then a fucking function generator switch that is isolated against 200kV. they are really paranoid about this thing for some reason. Maybe I am being sarcastic but the amount of trouble these plastic rods cause people makes me wonder.

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