Scanning a fishing lure

[vintagecop]

Trying to duplicate a lure. Split it in half for the scan. The original is 2 1/2" long, 7/16" at the thickest, The tail is 1/2" at the very end.

The finished scan changes the measurements. Its still 2 1/2" long. But the tail is about 3/16". The carved piece is about 3/32 too thick. I set the depth to be about 1/16" from the bottom. The bottom sides of the carved piece comes out with a 1/8" + perfectly straight vertical cut, not round like the model.

Should I sandwich two boards, so that I can cut thru the first to let the vertical cut and extra thickness go to the bottom board.

Why is the tail coming out too small. Don't know if I have explained this well. But hope someone understand what I an trying to say.

[gashawk]

Seems like the last time I scanned, there was sittings like draft and optimum and they speak for their selfs. Also pattern editor can change roundness.
Pattern scan runs from right to left, unlike carver and my sand belt always seem to tear.

[vintagecop]

thanks, I used optimum, best etc. I didn't know about the roundness issue. That may help if I can figure it out. Any ideas why the tail comes out about 1/2 the size it should be?

Jim

[mtylerfl]

Trying to duplicate a lure. Split it in half for the scan. The original is 2 1/2" long, 7/16" at the thickest, The tail is 1/2" at the very end.

The finished scan changes the measurements. Its still 2 1/2" long. But the tail is about 3/16". The carved piece is about 3/32 too thick. I set the depth to be about 1/16" from the bottom. The bottom sides of the carved piece comes out with a 1/8" + perfectly straight vertical cut, not round like the model.

Should I sandwich two boards, so that I can cut thru the first to let the vertical cut and extra thickness go to the bottom board.

Why is the tail coming out too small. Don't know if I have explained this well. But hope someone understand what I an trying to say.

Hello,

Post a photo of the lure, as well as a photo of your jig/sled setup (showing exactly how you mounted the lure for scanning) and the actual MPW file of the scan itself. Armed with complete information in the form of your photos and MPW, we'll be able to target what you can do to improve your results (instead of guessing).

[cnsranch]

Jim -

For what it's worth.........

Although I haven't done tons of scanning, I have done quite a lot. Until the last one I did, I really didn't care about the scan coming out EXACT.

However, the last scan I did was of some pistol grips for a 1911. As you might imagine, they have to be perfect, or they simply won't fit the gun. Man, did I learn a lot.

I'll post pics in another thread if I can ever remember to bring my camera in to the office, but here are a few tips that will make life a lot easier:

1. You want the scanning probe to stop where the bottom of the piece to be scanned is (in your case, the lure). If the probe is set to go lower than the lure, the scan will be thicker than the real piece. And, the edges will fall straight off, not be contoured like the lure. It will fall straight off from where the lure stops, to where the probe is set to stop. I did just that in my first try with the grips, and it was impossible to get rid of that extra thickness without changing the dimensions of the grips.

2. When scanning a piece that you need to make an exact replica of, you don't want to mount the piece directly onto the sled - if you do, the probe will scan the part of the sled surrounding the lure as it completes the scan, leaving what appears to be a flat area around the lure that must be taken away in PE. That's ok, unless you're looking for an exact replica - changing the depth will change the dimensions of the scanned piece. Also, the piece needs to be mounted perfectly level - if it's off a tad, the scan will be off a tad, and the two pieces won't match up.

3. You need to be careful when using the blur and smooth tools in PE - I found that using the blur and smooth tools that allow you to use a scale of 1 to 10 will change the dimensions. Using the tools with your mouse, and running them over the piece will not. Further, however you blur/smooth/de-noise, etc. on a two piece item like yours - do exactly the same thing in exactly the same way on each piece, or they will not match up when you go to put them together.

So, all that said, here's my advice -

1. I mount my pieces to be scanned on a small piece of 3/4" plywood - cabinet grade, so I know it's as flat and the sides are as parallel as they can be. The ply pieces are as large as they can be without protruding outside the edges of the piece to be scanned, and they are completely hidden when you look down on the piece before loading it into the machine. Remember, the piece has to be perfectly level - if it's not, the probe, which is running level, will either make one end of the lure thicker than the other, or it will make one end shallower, resulting in one end of the scan smaller than the actual piece (which is what I think happened to yours).

2. As the machine is in set-up mode, I manually set the depth of the scan by using another piece of ply that is the same thickness as the ply holding the piece to be scanned. That way, I know that the scan will be the right thickness, and the edges won't fall off like yours did. (My grips were .23 inches thick, and the scan was exactly that.)

3. By all means, save the scan immediately upon uploading it into Pattern Editor as an MPW. Then, make all the changes you want, but then save that edited piece with another name. If you goof it up while your editing it, you can always open the original MPW and star over - but NEVER change the original and save those changes with the same name as the original - your raw scan is lost forever.

I am by no means an expert, but I did end up with some pretty sweet rosewood grips for the 1911 that are as close to a copy as they can be - it's my guess that if you follow these tips I've learned, your lure will turn out pretty good as well.