DIY Router Table, Australian Made

[10syle]

well it is very agricultural and a work in progress, but around 7 months after I started,
I did my first machining with my home built CNC router.



I tried to source local parts as much as possible (even though it was often more expensive,
and probably originated overseas anyway...)All steel and Aluminium sourced locally,
linear rails are hardened and ground solid rod.

I managed to find parts off an old pick and place machine, and used some of it for the gantry,
which is the black aluminium section with small linear rails top and bottom,
which was bolted to a structural aluminium c section.


Spindle is a milwaukee straight grinder, which I chose because it is only 1.3kg,
has adjustable speed from 10,000rpm to 30,000rpm, and was on sale.

Breakout board is from cnc4pc and I am still a little hesitant to connect any AC
to the onboard relay for the time being.........

anyway have a look let me know what you think.
there will be plenty of improvements to come.

[mikie]

10SYEL,

That is a great machine. Where abouts are you?
Also, can you provide some detail around how you have connected the outer pulleys on your X-axis. I am making a similar machine and am interested in how you stopped the flex when you tightened the pulley system.

I would love to see more angles of your machine too if possible - with close up's.

/M

[10syle]

Thanks mate,
Im actually still working on things like the belt flex, Its probably to the stage now where I can use it to make some of the parts, I just have to use slow feedrates because there is a bit of flex in a few areas, the drive shaft for the belt Is only 8mm in diameter... on the to do list! I will have to put up some more pics soon,
Cheeers,
ps im in adelaide

[mikie]

I know what you mean by shaft flex.
I used 1/2" on my shafts and I get flex under belt tension.
I re-machined a 20mm shaft to 1/2" where needed and left the remainder at 20mm. This helped a lot with reducing the flex, but i still get flex.

I like your idea of having the end pulleys disconnected from each other. I think i will make up an end plate that mimics yours. I have some 1/2" silver steel which will do well for that, replacing the mild steel currently used.

Yes, more pics please when you get a chance.

Just for your ref, attached is a pic of my unit as it is today:

PS: I was given this link which shows a neat solution for using belt drive. I have been considering scrapping my current thought on the belt drive. It would take a bit of machining and time to make a copy of these units, but given the video output, it looks like a worth while venture

http://www.bell-everman.com/ServoBelt.wmv

/M