How well will a cnc router do for cutting out wooden letters anywhere from 5 inches to 12 inches tall using 1/8 birch wood? I've been studying alot of different plans available for building my own cnc router and would imagine I would want one that has the largest cutting area available so I could program it to cut more than one letter in one process. Can I do this?

I don't mind spending more money for a better machine - what does anyone think about the plans at solsylva.com? Has anyone used these before? There is no surface under the router so I could sit it over the wood I want to cut for the letters.

I'm new one the forum but plan to be an active member and post pictures and progress as I go along.

Thanks,

Warren

Hi Warren, sure you can cut ply with a cnc router. Up to an inch and more. 1/8 is pretty easy with a machine like the solsylva plan but you may also look at the JGRO free router plan which is pretty neat too.

You can cut pretty big with the JGRO router and if you have weak motors, you can still slow it down a bit. For cutting wood, it would not be a problem.

As for the rest, check the classified here, PMINMO.com and ebay for your stuff. Don't buy before you know what you really want and all in all, have fun!

Para

Hi Warren,
Welcome to the forum!
The Solsylva table can easily cut the 1/8" birch letters. The attached image shows a 8" x 10-1/4" letter made of 1/4" birch ply that was cut at 36 IPM with a 1/8" bit in a trim router; the cut was done in one pass and it took less than 3 minutes.
When routing wood pieces at this scale there are virtually so signs of backlash or table flex in the finished product.
It is possible to program your machine so that it cuts the same letter repeatedly but in a different locations, or so it cuts different letters in the same operation cycle. This is done through the software and can be done on most any machine.

We look forward to seeing your progress report!