CNC Router

[Brendon5374]

Anyone work with these machines? I run a small kitchen/ commercial cabinets workshop. Have a griggio panel saw, edge bander, blum drill machine. Getting sick of making up jigs for the hand routers. Yesterday I spent nearly the whole of it hand routing. Have looked at ebay, but I don't know what I'm looking at really and once you get lumbered with a white elephant, you can sell it - in theory, only. So I'm asking if there is a cnc router out there that is any good for a budget of about 15K. Or are they duds at that price?

[malb]

Spent a couple of years operating a Procam 14 tool autochanger with a nominal 2400 x 1800 bed for a kitchen maker. Very nice machine to work with, very reliable, easy to maintain, great machine to work with but noisy. 10 HP spindle, 2x 10HP pumps for vac table, 1x 10Hp for dust extractor.

Ours was about 8yo when I started working with it and 10 when I finished a couple of years ago. Was sold off to another manufacturer last year as the owner was transitioning from making custom kitchens and cabs to assembling and installing flat packs for customers. In the two years I worked it, we lost six days due to a failed servo motor driver, otherwise maybe 1hr a week maintenance (cleaning and lubing machine, cleaning, checking and occasional changing bits) typically 20 mins clearing the self contained dusty (44gal drum container to be bagged and dumped), 10 mins startup/setup each day, 3 minutes to shut down at night.

We were cutting custom carcass, benchtop substrates and templates, and facing all day, load sheet, load cut file, start up, clear outfeed table and edge while cutting, slide finished sheet off table to outfeed and park gantry. Sheet times 3min for a 2400x1800 with pair of full height cabinet sides and a back through to about 20 mins for a sheet of 70 or more small components for kicker frames or similar. Each part cut to finished size with all face screw holes, shelf pin holes, draw slide holes, hinge holes etc drilled and ready to assemble.

Unfortunately not in your price range, and you are not likely to get one secondhand, but overall a very good machine and Australian made.

Things to look for.

Decent sheet size capability, various machines available with 2400 and 3600 long beds, and 1200 and 1800 widths. 1200 machines really limit product size and layout, 1800 much less so.

Powerful reliable known brand spindle and servo motors and controllers.

Calculate how many tools to need to mount to do what you need, say rough and finish cutters, 5mm drill for shelf pins and euroscrews, 3mm drill for screw holes, 8mm drill for hinge alignment holes in dooors, 20mm for camlock fastener cavities etc, a few profile bits like quarter round and chamfer bits, and allow for a couple of spares and a couple of system tools like skimming bit and a tracing pencil. Physically changing bits in a spindle or tool holder and setting up depths each time is a PIA not worthy of production work, but a decent autochanger can swap premounted and setup tools in about 10-20 seconds and return to work straight away. In our runs we would typically have 5-6 tool changes on a sheet.

A decent table vacuum system, load a sheet against a set of positioning stops, load the cut file, and press go. The stops retract and vac and extractor start automatically locking the sheet in place. No stuffing around clamping etc and the entire table area is a safe work area, no no go zones around clamps etc.

A decent dusty system, ours dumped into a 44 gallon drum and had enough capacity to hold the waste from about 1/3rd to 2/3rds a pack of 2400x1800 sheets, depending on what was being cut. Obviously a sheet with two pantry sides and a back produces much lest dust than something with a lot of small components.

Automated slide of at the end of each sheet cut, this clears the table for a quick blow down and loading the next sheet and cutfile, then getting the machine cutting again. Cut components are then labelled and cleared from the outfeed table while the machine cuts the new sheet, and generally can be edged as well if the software has ordered the sheets properly .

[Brendon5374]

Hi Malb,

thank you for the info. The work you were doing would require a lot more than we would need. We do put through more sheets than just 2400X1200s, but that is by far the majority of our work and we don't make up packs for others. Larger cuts generally don't need much work and can go through on a panel saw. I can't remember the last wordrobe/pantry I did over 2300mm. But for a door we would also need a 35mm bit for the blum hinge, I'm thinking. I think I would need 4-5 bits according to what you are saying (not sure about the pencil), but I was looking at a few machines on ebay and machine4u under 20K and never found the word "autochanger".

[malb]

The Procam uses the 3/8 compression bit (finish cutting bit) to make the 35mm holes for hinge cups, plunges in at the centre of the cup hole and does a fancy spiral routine leaving a perfect 35mm cup hole in about 10 seconds total time.

I specifically mentioned auto tool changing because a single tool machine pretty much leaves you to a single type of task, cutting or drilling or profiling etc. It is not really practical to change bits manually midway through a job as you need to to remove the existing bit, dismantle and clean the collet assembly properly, fit the next bit and secure, then accurately reset the depth zero for the bit and return to the job. Take a minimum of 5mins per change manually vs 20 seconds with an autochanger, as the bits are all mounted in toolholders, and depth zero for each stored in the system memory. Machine simply elevates the tool rack, returns the current tool to it's place, retreats slightly and moves to the next tool and loads it. The tool rack drops back as the machine goes to the start position for the new tool in the program.

I don't know what you need the machine to be doing for you, so replied outlining what my former boss expected and received from his machine. We also had a panel saw used mainly for trimming semi finished components if a design error had occurred, a Blum hinge borer, used for doors that were bought in, and a drill press and a lot of jigging that had been used to drill pin holes and screw holes, that was used once in my 2 years there. The CNC covered about 98% of all cutting and machining needs.

Here is a link to to a second hand unit with a 3600 bed, but otherwise the same as the unit I was operating. Not trying to upsell or anything like that, just discussing what can be done with the right machinery.

[Brendon5374]

Yes Malb, totally understand where you are coming from, and it has been an education. You can only say what you know about. Nice machine, but 30K is a number too far, and that sounds standard. You never know at auctions, though.

With a machine you describe there is no problem. With a budget under 20K after hearing you, I have to think about what I will get and is it worth it. Say 6 768mm X 590mm side panels for carcasses fits one 8by4 sheet. Four of the panels have adjustable shelves so you need the 5mm holes down the sides. Top and bottoms on the next sheet have the 3mm screw holes as well as the backs. So that is one change for each sheet sheet without an autochanger. Is that right? And working like that in a small work shop (250 sqm) with 3 guys , I'm wondering if that is a big help. There is also occasional - but when it is on its very very time consuming - hand routering of timber. Plain channels sometimes with chamfering, never anything complicated.

This is one I was looking at
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/CNC-Route...item20ed35f21b