Step 3) Removal of emitters & detectors. Since the assembly is not working, you should be able to carefully wiggle out at least one or more of the sensors that you've exposed. Any which are still stuck to the curcuit should be desoldered and removed. Use a sharpie to mark the leads so the polarity is maintained.

Step 4) Remove the Circuit board. It should lift out now by hand from the assembly. Put the PCB aside for now.

Step 5) Carving out the assembly. If your plastic housing is not in terrible shape, or you are comfortable with it. Then using the dremel with cutoff wheel, remove the entire portion where the LED leads went through (see porrly drawn image to see what parts to cut in blue & green). You will make the entire opening bigger, and remove the inner "wall" entirely. You will also expand the opening on the underside as well.

BONUS Step 5b)  I chose to cut a replacement for the plastic enclosure out of aluminum. Get a piece of aluminum L bar from your local shop and using dremel, hack saw, hand file, drill etc... create a replacement. Make sure you test it for a good fit before you go further, test to make sure it can in fact be screwed back into the drill assembly without cross threading or any other undesirable result. Bear in mind, you will need to be carefull when adhering the PCB as the housing is now conductive.

Step 6) Solder the emitters & detectors onto the PCB exactly the way they came off. Using your sharpie marks, you will get the leads into the proper spots.

Step 7) Put Fiber Optics In Place. Using your Fiber Optic (light pipe) estimate a length from the detector (middle item, the darkest one) so that the fiber optic hangs 1/8" below the 2 other ones (the emitters). Slip the heat shrink tubing in place, using heat gun (or other safe heat source) make the tube shrink to the detector & over the fiber optics.

Step 8) Testing. Put the circuit board into your carvewright, and plug it back in under the cutting head. There is no need to bolt it in, we are just seeing if it works. Power on your CarveWright, goto Options, then #7. Use up down to see this sensors output. Using paper, wood, nothing etc... see if the readings change. It will show you in realtime what it sees. If you get nothing but zeros, then you need to verify your soldering. Otherwise you should see the numbers jump around.

Step 9) Assembly Part 1. We will now create the "solid part" of the assembly. Using a glue gun, glue all emiiters & detectors to the circuit board. Make sure you do NOT cover the bottom where the light comes out & is read. The poorly drawn image here shows in green where you will put the glue. Keep in mind, this needs to go back into the machine so don't build a glue tee-pee. This will make the sensors move with the circuit board.

Step 10) Mounting the modified board. Now grab your silicone tube and glue the cicuit board to the plastic (or aluminum) housing. Be generous with the silicone, but don't make it so that it is too thick to go back in. Also don't cover the sensors. Let this sit overnight to set.

IMPORTANT: Do NOT use liquid nails. This material is conductive and will short the board out. If you do not use generic silicone seal, please please please use a voltmeter to see if the material you will use is conductive. You do NOT want to make a sparkler!

Step 11) Installation. Put the modified assembly back into the machine. Goto options, #7 to verify that it gives numbers. Now use a piece of white paper on a piece of wood and do a width measure to check your results.

You should be done now.

Here are a few pics of the assembly I made out of aluminum. Note: I didn't chose white silicone, it's what I found in the garage at the time. I apologize for the poor quality pictures, I took them with my cell phone.

Summary. So far so good, it works and has not broken. But that just means "so far". I will find out what the lifespan is for this modification. and will report it when it breaks.

Thanks,

Andy