Need general advice regarding powering a CNC, International router and DIY suppliers

[adamdyson]

I'm in the early stages of either wanting to build or purchase a CNC machine for routing wood, acrylic and aluminium. Personally I can't think of anything better than building my own, but I'm a realist and understand it may be better purchasing something more rigid with a steel frame (even if it's from China), as apposed to bolting one together with Aluminium extrusion etc.

Firstly can anyone offer any advice on DIY vs purchasing something from China? One of the things I like most about the DIY approach is being able to choose your own parts. For instance I'd probably purchase a Mach4 ethernet controller and use Hybrid steppers, whereas the machines from China tend to come with cheap components and older hardware. So I'm not sure if its worth purchasing a machine that I'll have to spend more money on upgrading the hardware. I wonder if any of these Chinese companies sell just the chassis, gantry etc?

Another question, can someone enlighten me as to what phase power is actually needed to run a CNC effectively? I realise it's likely dependant on the size of the machine and the components within it, but I'll be operating the CNC from my home garage which is limited to single phase (240v) so I'm not sure what my options are. I'm currently renting so having 3 phase installed to the house is not an option. I came across these blokes selling phase converters (phasechanger.com) which may be an option (not sure how much they cost) if 3 phase is necessary. While on the subject of power, what makes a machine require 3 phase? Is it the servo/stepper motors?

It makes me wonder when I see machines like this listed on Alibaba,

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Chea...990089051.html

The description says it's a 6090 running on 3 Phase. I'm not sure why it would require 3 phase when the machine below is a similar size and can run off 240 volts.Are machines made to run on 3 phase for the fact that it's more efficient and cheaper to run?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/wood...760127154.html

Cheers

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[awerby]

3 phase power is usually just required to run the spindles. 3-phase spindles work much better than routers intended for intermittent use by hand. You can power them with an inverter, or VFD (variable frequency drive). You can find VFDs that will accept 240 single phase and output 3-phase; you need to oversize them, though, since there's some loss in translation.

I'd say you're right about building versus buying, especially if you're only considering buying a router sight-unseen from China. But some of the parts that come from there are of good quality - the problem is figuring out which are and which are not.