well im not a total noob, but a noob here. i have posted on a few yahoo groups to little sucess.
a little history about me. in high school i went to a vocational school for half the day to learn the machinest trade. after 2 year i graduated hs and bounced around from selling autoparts to security. this last july i got a job in a small machine/fab shot about 30 min form my house and am loving it(baiscly school of hard knocks style of training :drowning: ) i love it and have lots of questions. i got a great group of guys to work with and am learning lots.

now i was driving my 23 year old rc car when it took off on its own, ran into a wall and broke one of the control arms that cant be orderd any more :( so i thought i wold try to make a homegrown cnc mill and while looking found this place (woot) seems like lots of knowledg here so i think i might put my hat on the rack for a while :)

what i was looking at was thinking of the sieg super x3, or building my own.
so any input you guys have would be awsome. i was thinking about geting some ball screws an stepp moters with microstepp controlor? i want to eventualy do 4 and 5 axis tool changer and spindle speed contorll
i have tried to do some serching on stepp motors but havent found any places that list a sell price with the motor and most have been for industrail use.so i have a few questions to ask

stepp vs servo(i konw the basics what are the real wold + and -)
size of motor to use?(i was thinking of 500-600 oz/in)
places to get such device?(i tried but havent found any to buy from)
buy and conver or build my own?
upgrade to ballscrew or just use the stock ones?
any other words of wisdom is greatly thanked :)

1) places to get things.... always has to be ebay :)

2) as to buying or building.... think about what you'll want to use it for in teh future. If you want a thin, plastic mill, build one, if you want a chunky one that can machine deep cuts in metal, buy and convert.

3)ballscrew add on is based on 2 factors, acuracy and efficiency. If your not worried about accuracy, look at it this way. you can buy a ball screw to use smaller, cheeper motors, or use stock, but buy some bigger motors. Again, what suites your needs.

As to words of wizdom.... Cant give many, never really progressed past desing stage (will be soon though :D).

oh, and if you do want to machine metal, remember coolant (flame2)