Portable 3D Scanner

A mouthpiece scanner small enough to travel in my luggage.

The model behind Helix Brass needed precise measurements of the inside profile of hundreds of mouthpieces, far more than I could ever buy. So I built a scanner I could take to the mouthpieces instead.

The scanner is a small desktop CNC mill, a Stepcraft 300, with a Renishaw ruby-tipped touch probe mounted in place of the cutting tool. I programmed it to trace the inside of a mouthpiece clamped to the bed, building a precise 3D model of the interior and rim.

The suitcase PC

Accurate measurements depended on the computer handling interrupts from the parallel port instantly, so the mill ran on a real-time build of Linux with LinuxCNC. Every USB-to-parallel-port adapter that worked with my laptop added enough latency to throw off the measurements. Instead, I took a tiny PC I already had, which had a parallel port built into the motherboard, and built it into a small suitcase.

On tour

I took the scanner with me several times while on tour with the National Band of the Naval Reserve. Musicians I met along the way lent me their mouthpieces, and I scanned hundreds of different models: at the Royal Nova Scotia International Tattoo, while instructing at the Canadian Forces School of Music in Borden, and while performing with the Stadacona and Naden Bands of the Royal Canadian Navy. Those scans became the database behind the Helix Brass mouthpiece builder.

Pictures

Mini-ITX motherboard, power supply and hard drive laid out on a table — The starting point: a small PC I already had, with a parallel port on the motherboard.

Metal panel cut to shape — A metal panel cut to fit inside the suitcase.

The red panel with white trim around its edges — Trim added around the edges.

Power supply mounted on the panel — The power supply mounted.

Motherboard and power supply mounted on the panel — The motherboard in place.

Back of the panel with an SSD, power supply and tied-down wiring — The back of the panel, with the SSD mounted and the wiring tied down for travel.

The finished PC fitted inside a suitcase — Fitted into the suitcase.

The suitcase PC connected to a small CNC mill on a desk — Set up on tour, with the suitcase PC driving the mill.

The touch probe on the mill above a clamped mouthpiece — Scanning a mouthpiece clamped to the bed.

A scanned profile in LinuxCNC.

A case full of trumpet mouthpieces — A case of trumpet mouthpieces waiting to be scanned.

Mouthpieces soaking in a glass — Soaking the mouthpieces for a good cleaning.

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