Hi guys
Here are a couple more pics to show that progress is being made. I was able to use the mill at work to make my Z-axis plate.... AKA swiss cheese. With 4 bearings for the Z and 4 on the back for the X plus all the mounting holes for the Z axis motor and X axis ball nut it took me quite a while to get them all done. The large hole you can see is something that was pre existing in chunk of ally I'm scrounged
I am planning a fairly ambitious dust guard for the X axis ball screw which consists of a flexible sheet that is fixed to the gantry and is diverted around the ball nut by 4 rollers similar to what is used in air cylinders that have side access to the piston. The back of the flexible sheet has two rows of foam tape that are forced into the grooves of the 8020 extrusion and form a seal. Bit hard to make out in the pics but it works in CAD so how hard will it to make in real
I also did all the mounting holes for the bearing rails in the U channel Z axis.
Prep'd and undercoated the steel base and will have the last bits welded by my son this weekend so should have nice pic of it built and in its final yellow paint job soon.
Cheers
Mark