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  1. #1
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    Sep 2014
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    Default CNC-Carving X6-1500GT Built and working :) Now what?!?!

    I said it was going to stay in the box until the new shed was approved and built, but that may not be to January. Who can resist leaving a new toy in a box?

    So I had to assemble it. Its sitting upon 2 saw horses right now. I loaded win XP onto a laptop, loaded up mach3, loaded up the cnc carving demo and after a couple of attempts I managed to route out the demo piece!! Yay. all to easy. Considering the little amount of dollars outlaid compared to the shark I cant say I am unhappy with the results so far.

    Now its up an going, any tips on where to start learning as noob? Anyone in Brissie want to make use of it in return for a few lessons? I think for the first step I might download some free plans and just have a go at routing out some stuff with scrap timber. Any pointers to websites with some basic stuff would be greatly appreciated.

    At this point, only have the supplied 6mm end mill bits, so also need pointers to tooling that I should look at buying.

    Anyway, new toy joy, so many questions, thanks in advance.

    Andy.

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  3. #2
    Join Date
    Nov 2008
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    Congrats Paero.

    Unless your sawhorses are really robust I'd make a dedicated workbench for it pretty quickly. Last thing you want is for somebody to knock it off, or for a fast direction change to cause the entire machine to rock off the horses. I knocked up a quick one for my mill with some 70x35 structural pine and some thick mdf for a top. doesn't have to be anything flash, although check out some of Rod's for some inspiration. He does some seriously droolworthy stuff.

    What have you got in the way of software for it? You'll want a CAD package of some description, and some cam software.

    A good starting point might be to make some jigs and fixtures for your new beasty. Its a good way to learn your way around the process.

    I made a spoil board out of MDF that has a lot of hold down points embedded into the bottom of it. This gives me plenty of options for clamping a workpiece down. I've also got 6 points in the top that allow me to put a bolt down into the T slots, which allows me to bolt the entire spoil board securely. The idea behind the spoil board is that it reduces the chance of damage to your machine if you accidentaly cut all the way through a piece and keep going out the other side (i.e into your machine's top).

    Its pretty simple to make. The cad was just creating the hex shape for the 1/4" nut, with a 6.2mm hole (for the bolt) in the middle. the cam operations were a pocket for the hex shaped hole and a profile (inside) for the 6.2mm hole. I use a 3.15mm end mill, so the profile operation actually clears out the centre hole nicely. This hole goes all the way through to the other side (I had another piece of mdf underneath to prevent damage), but the pocket is only deep enough that the nut will sit a couple of mm down from the surface. I made the pockets 6mm deep, but it'd depend on what your using as a spoil board - mine was 12mm thick MDF.

    The cam was set up to do 10 pockets, 50mm apart moving up the Y axis, then back to the start and do the 6.2mm hole. With the spoil board face down in the machine I lined up the spindle with where I wanted it to start (normally over a slot) and hit go. Once a line is done, move the spindle over to the next spot and hit go. Once I finished working my way across I unbolted the spoil board, slid it forward and bolted it back down. I then ran another lot of 4 pockets on the end of the each of the lines, but you may not need to do that depending on how far back your spindle goes on your machine. for mine I wanted clamp down capability the full length of the table.

    After everything was completed I unbolted again, and then pushed a 1/4" nut into each of the pockets. It was a tight fit, and needed to be pulled in with a bolt from the other side and I added a bit of CA glue to each to ensure the nut stays in place. The 70 nuts took a little while to put in, but it would have been much quicker if I'd thought to use a cordless drill to spin the bolts earlier. Once it was dry it was put back on the cnc machine (nut side down) and squared up to the front edge of the machine before being bolted down. Next time I'll probably add another line of nuts, just to give me more clamping options for pieces under 90mm wide.

    Its working much better than my old spoilboard setup (hold down options were too far apart from almost everything I did). basically I just drop the workpiece on the table and then put 1/4" bolts or screws through hold down blocks and into the spoilboard. takes maybe a minute and your good to go.

    Another source of project ideas might be the Aspire website. Their monthly projects are normally pretty cool. Its also worth checking youtube. I quite like cncnutz's channel, as he often walks through all the steps for his projects. He also has some simple hold down blocks and a bunch of other workshop projects. His channel is here
    The aspire tutorials are well worth a look through as well - definately worth checking out even if you don't use their software. Vectric's channel is here . Woodman12s channel is worth a look too: here

  4. #3
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    I picked up some timber today for a bench. Will start work on that one tomorrow. Who is this Rod you speak of? Is it rodm of this forum? If so, I might have to stalk his posts and see what lies within!

    WRT Cad/cam software, I have nothing just yet. Got to spill my guts here, I am an electrical engineer so my experience with cad software has all been protel/altium which is useless for CNC! At this stage I will probably keep it simple, maybe shoot for the vectric stuff. Long term is to get familiar with sketchup and/or freecad. I am pretty handy with inkscape and adobe illistrator which I guess is ok for 2d stuff. Not sure how you make it drive the z axis yet but I am sure I will figure that out in good time.

    I am running the what I suspect is a pirated copy of mach 3 that comes with the cnc. I was going to buy a legit copy last night till i spotted mach 4. Emailed them about an upgrade path to mach 4 but there is nothing, so I might just hold out till mach 4 is officially released.

    One thing I will need to look at is earthing. I get a tingle from the main control box which hints to me that its floating and not earthed. Not sure if the spindle motor has an earth connected either, if not I will add one to that also.

    Good point about jigs etc. Sounds like an excellent starting point. I am on call the next 2 weeks so I cant go anywhere, so I should be able to get some solid time in to play with the CNC. Also going into semi retirement soon (at the tender age of 37) due to a downturn in work, so will have plenty of time on my hands soon. Cant say I am unhappy about though, working 2-3 days a week suites me just fine, for a little while at least!

    BTW, do you have a pic of that spoil board?

  5. #4
    Join Date
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    Nicely done Andy, new toys are always good

    The thing that IMO would be one of the best things is to wrap your head around the CAD/CAM software. It's a bit of a learning curve to design on the screen, while keeping in mind the real world machining. Generally speaking, the machine only does what it's told to, so you can easily mess up the coding and carve a new groove in your table. (Hey, don't I know it!) It's easy enough to draw a vector, but a different kettle of fish getting a usable and safe machine code from that vector.
    I use Autocad for complex designs and Aspire for simple ones and generating the machine code for all my 2.5D stuff, plus Rhino for 3D designs and code. If you know how to run Protel, you'll breeze learning something like Autocad and Aspire. I'm sure there's older versions of Autocad around that would be much cheaper than the latest (What's it up to now? $10k?)

    I started off with CamBam - a good little program that's really cheap for starting off with. You can design with it and generate codes, so it does all the stuff you'll need to start off so I can recommend that. I don't use it now because it only generates G-code and I need G-code for one machine and HP-GL for another.

    Jigs/clamps/brackets/etc are a good way to get started - I think one of the first things I made were a set of aluminium finger clamps that I still use every day. Easy things that make your CNC'ing simple are the way to go.
    Another thing I can't live without is my Z-axis zero plate for Mach3.

    When Mach3 is running a code (ie: the machine is cutting) don't mess with the computer... don't even change screens - there's a good chance that you'll miss steps because of the way the computer works.

    Last tip - do LOTS of air shots to start with

    Hope all this helps!

  6. #5
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    So what do people think of Sketchup?? Pretty easy learning curve so far. Already figured out how to do centreboards for my boat (which is one of the driving reasons for getting a CNC router).

    Couple of hours work and I got this, a NACA 0012 foil, 350mm wide and 1800mm deep. I am almost done building one now, shame the CNC and myself were not ready weeks ago!! How does one go about getting that into gcode and working out toolpaths etc?


  7. #6
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    sorry, no pic of the spoil board just yet - i'll take one tomorrow though and post it. I'm procrastinating at the moment and she who must be obeyed will cotton on if I grab a camera and head out to my workshop. Its pretty uninteresting though - it just looks like a mdf sheet with a bunch of holes in it, and some grooves where I screwed up already.

    hmm.. for making a profile shape like that I'd consider using something like meshcam maybe? http://www.grzsoftware.com/ (demo video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PRa7Az-IjY)

    somebody with more experience might chip in.

    You could probably use some of the vectric software to make it too.

    its going to be a 3d part whichever way. One thing you need to consider (generally) is how it fits in your block of wood / material, how your going to clamp that down while its being carved and how your going to align everything on the other side.

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