Thanks Doug. I thought they were good but I was just a touch off on the first attempt so wanted to be sure on this one. First attempt was in some 1/8" I got that was supposed to be translucent. Of course I didn’t check it before hand. Nope its white. No light getting though. So had to back up and punt
I had the same thing happen to me a while back. (note to self: it pays to pay attention to the Amazon details. !!!)
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FINALLY getting back on this rebuild. Ended up finding the root of the cause. Aparently I’m tightening the spindle like it has to take a ride to the moon lol. Found a huge crack in my smaller machine and after that I went and looked closer at the full sheet core and sure enough it was cracked in the same place. When @vicious1 says to go easy he means it lol.
With the new core installed on the smaller LR3 now it’s time to mill out the acrylic needed to go behind @DougJoseph fancy front strut. And that is in the works right now…
1/8” Single Flute Bit
Trochoidal milling at 25mm/s and 20% stepover. Will post more pics when it’s done. Usually I would run air blowing as well but didn’t get it put on the new core yet and didn’t want to wait any longer. Ready to get the full sheet back in action lol
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Cool idea with the acrylic lighting
I messed with it a bit tried polishing the edge and then silver paint the sides to help direct the light. The concept worked. Where I went wrong was not accounting for acrylics expansion rate. The holes were too tight and I cut them on my mpcnc and then screwed it together and left in my cold garage woke up and the acrylic had shrunk a lot more than the screws and it cracked all the holes. Make sure to de burr and maybe give a bit extra wiggle room if your not in a temp controlled environment.
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Acrylic is cut. About to put the countersink on the aluminum and try to lock it all down. Hopefully it will look good when it’s done
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Man, this is a monster. 
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Exciting!
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The acrylic looks like sparks coming out in the thermal camera…
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Why have you all got thermal cameras? 
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I don’t have one. So it’s at least two (you and me) short of all having them.
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Better question is why DONT you have one??? LOL. In all seriousness when I was much younger and had just bought my first house my mom and stepdad paid a guy to come over and do thermal imaging and help me find spots where air was leaking and what not. To be able to help get my power bill a little lower. And it did help. It was very neat to see. So when I sold that house and bought the next one I wanted to see it as well. Come to find out I could buy the camera for less than he charged to come out and do it. So that’s what I did. Mine is a cheapo though. Still actual Flir but it just sticks in the bottom of my phone
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0716WZW12/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1
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Just 500€, what a steal… But for your purpose it does make sense. 
4 years ago it wasn’t that much LOL. And you can get the $299 one.… doesn’t have to be the $500 one lol
And me. But when I saw this video last night I thought, “Great, now I gotta figure out how to convince my wife I NEED a thermal camera…”
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And I just gave you that solution as well!
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Reality is she probably wouldn’t really question it, but I have to justify it to myself a little too.
I have very often considered buying one for exactly the reason you did, especially since I’m in an older house, but I’ve just replaced all the windows this year, and probably knocked out 75% of the inefficiency we had.
Until you get one and point it at the wall to realize that all of the insulation they installed in 1967 has slid down the wall and your basically half insulated… Yeah…
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Flir will help you find cracks/gaps worth caulking to seal. With or without FLIR, caulking has great ROI for helping reduce unwanted thermal transfer. Flir helped identify insufficient wall insulation as well. Helped a friend find rats/mice and other infestations in his walls…
I don’t understand why FLIRs are so expensive, unlikely to get a return on that investment. But it can earn passive 6-pack income from every buddy you loan out to. It’s a useful toy that will bring you joy.
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1981, but I can just go in the attic and see that lol
It’s a mess.
Our biggest inefficiency was the single pane, metal frame windows. 20º temperature difference when you stood near them.
That replacement knocked $130 a month off our electric bill this summer compared to last, even though it was much, much hotter this year
But a thermal camera has always been a toy on my wishlist
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Lucky for me windows were replaced before I bought this house in 2018 and they are good. But the rest of the insulation may as well be non existent. And 2 story house with half of the bottom floor in the ground and all runs off of 1 4ton unit. Just a crappy design all the way around. August and September my power bills were both a touch over $800. It’s just insane. This winter I’m hoping to be able to get some more/better insulation in the attic at least. It needs it bad. There is a section of my computer room that “bumps out” on the front of the house. They didn’t put any insulation over that part. Makes absolutely no sense at all.
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