OmioCNC report

[markyparky]

1) both. It's a reasonable set up that is capable of machining everything you wish, but the build is a pile of Chinese crap. Be prepared for lots of pulling things apart, redrilling and retapping holes where things don't line up and they've just been forced in, hammering everything into shape and lots of pulling your hair out wondering about why someone forced that tap in that hole not only off centre but also at a ridiculous angle. This part is far more painful than it sounds, believe me. But once you've dragged yourself through it it's done and good to go and you're better prepared to do it all again a week later when you find out there's something you missed and have to pull it all apart again.

2) not a direct answer, but make the most of your email correspondence while you still can and make sure any questions are asked now, because once that buy button has been pushed and the cash lands in their bank you will never hear from them again.

I don't regret buying it one bit, it's done everything I've asked of it and recently that's probably more than it's comfortable with (some big parts in ali). That said I am now looking at rebuilding the framework into something more sturdy, but without having this machine in the first place I would have neither the knowledge or the tools to accomplish that, so whichever way you look at it it's been a good buy for me.

Unless you go down the DIY route I don't think you can do any better for the price.


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Thanks for your honest and quick response. Like probably everything from china - it is pretty good make until a PRC worker touch it with hands. As you say drilled off center, funny angle tapped holes is a good example. So I probably know what to expect. I am sure that every single one they ship is original :-) But good to know that Omio is the case too. Maybe I won't be that disappointed when I eventually buy one. Or better say unbox one.

Your point re 2) is fair enough. Get as much as possible before buy is probably good idea. But to touch the topic once more again would you mind to have a look into your paypal account and confirm which account you transferred the money to? I can keep asking and they can keep replying for ages. What I an trying to avoid is the scenario that happened to some cnc hobbyists in my country. They were communicating with some seller for quite some time (someone would need to keep me honest here but I believe the seller was Omio) and the seller was responding with reasonable English, had some phone calls together. Guys sent the money and never got the goods. It ended up with unpleasant experience where somebody cracked in to sellers mailbox and was communicating with guys and provided their own invoice. the guys never got their money back. That sucks...

[Mmpie]

I paid via bank transfer, and credit where it's due it arrived pretty damn quickly. Although I have this idea that my machine was the one the new guy put together and was such a wreck it just sat in the corner until I came along.

There are a couple of sellers with similar names I think. It might have been another.

Mine shipped with a faulty PSU and a linear bearing carriage that was getting stuck. They never replied to me when I asked for support or replacement parts and left me to find and fix any errors by myself to the tune of around £100. One of my ballscrews is too big as well which has caused it to bend at one end, but that doesn't seem to be causing any issue.

That's about the extent of my experience with them.


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[extent]

if you're just trying to get the mechanicals and are going to do all your own electronics I don't know if it's really worth it. You're paying a bit of a premium for the Omio "turnkey" and their frame isn't really different from anyone elses. I think if I were doing that I'd have a look around at any other one with linear rails and see if I could find it for cheaper, unless you're already getting a great deal from them.

[markyparky]

I paid via bank transfer, and credit where it's due it arrived pretty damn quickly. Although I have this idea that my machine was the one the new guy put together and was such a wreck it just sat in the corner until I came along.

There are a couple of sellers with similar names I think. It might have been another.

Mine shipped with a faulty PSU and a linear bearing carriage that was getting stuck. They never replied to me when I asked for support or replacement parts and left me to find and fix any errors by myself to the tune of around £100. One of my ballscrews is too big as well which has caused it to bend at one end, but that doesn't seem to be causing any issue.

That's about the extent of my experience with them.


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Fair enough, thanks. What you mean by several sellers with similar name? I am only aware of https://www.omiocnc.com/. I already have a PSU, spindle, VFD and other stuff from my previous attempt for a DIY build which I canceled for now due to lack of time and machinery close enough to build my own router @ at least similar quality as Omio is. Realistically I'd end up with pretty much the same crap for same money. Maybe even more expensive. This way I can start making some chips, find where weaknesses are and think about improvements. Ie I don't like the way how the Y ball screw is installed. I'll probably replace that front and back plate with custom one where I'll fit 2 ball screws (driven by one motor) properly installed in FK/FF bearing houses. Well I have already tested all of my electronics and stuff on a different hobby machine I have and it's just fine after some decent tuning or finding a good Mach3 config. So there is only space for an error in mechanical assembly and rail blocks. I doubt it is real HIWIN but is it at least "hiwin like" rail and block(s)?

Also anyone else around who bought from them and paid via paypal? Sorry to bother with that but I kind of person that don't decide easily and would like to have at least some level of guarantee that I am not sending my $$ to some scam. Already bought tons of stuff from china and some packages never arrived (maybe never shipped even?) but this is first one for some noticeable money.

Cheers all.

[markyparky]

if you're just trying to get the mechanicals and are going to do all your own electronics I don't know if it's really worth it. You're paying a bit of a premium for the Omio "turnkey" and their frame isn't really different from anyone elses. I think if I were doing that I'd have a look around at any other one with linear rails and see if I could find it for cheaper, unless you're already getting a great deal from them.

Well I have all of the electronics and stuff already tuned in setup I like. I am not doing it to save some money. Honestly saying the electronics I have is fairly similar to what they offer. VFD and spindle is the same story. With all these components they offer as a "turnkey" you might or might not be lucky. Keep me honest but if it's the unlucky case you never get any proper support from them. Not even mention any warranty replacement. The price is some 1300 plus DHL shipping which I'd need to pay in either case.
Of course I was looking around and found only a frame for cheaper but it was always supported rod on Y axis and the rest on unsupported rods :-( They seems to be the only seller. Are you aware of different offering that has linear rails? Do do tell me please :-)

[Mmpie]

You're not going to be putting these ballscrews into fk/bk type bearing supports unless you have a lathe, they're not machined correctly for it. If you were gearing for a diy build I would absolutely recommend pushing ahead with it if you have the nous. Buy some aluminium extrusion, it won't be perfect, but once you have a machine you can buy some more extrusion and use it to mill keys in for your rails and then you will have a better machine. The framework on the OMIO is very flimsy, the gantry is 20mm t slot, the y rails are on similar, the gantry arms and z plates are 15mm. At this point having bought all your electronics the only thing you really have to gain from buying and OMIO is the fact it's already built and that it does have milled surfaces for the rails. Beyond that you are going to build a better frame for less cost.

It looks like the OMIO have moved to hiwin. Mine has 'THK' on it,but having replaced the faulty bearing with a genuine THL and holding both in my hands I can tell you without any shadow of a doubt it's not genuine THK gear. Edit: not to say that the copies are 'bad' (other than the faulty one obviously) I haven't had any problem at all from my linear guides, oh and apart from one that arrived a couple of ball bearings short, you can just tell in the refinement of the finished product.


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[RCaffin]

Blimey.
I knew some of the Chinese stuff was dodgy, but I did not realise it was THAT dodgy! I have been educated.

Cheers
Roger

[Mmpie]

Blimey.
I knew some of the Chinese stuff was dodgy, but I did not realise it was THAT dodgy! I have been educated.

Cheers
Roger

Ok, I've not actually measured the rails or bearings for run out, but I have milled flat faces on parts in most places along my bed, and those I've checked are flat to within 0.02mm and a part I made yesterday after checking and adjusting spindle tram was actually 0.00 swept with an indicator on a granite surface plate and 0.02 size wise in X and Y. I'm assuming this is how the errors in the rails would manifest themselves by introducing peaks and troughs in parts? And maybe/certainly they'll wear faster.

If nothing else, they're made to a better standard than the rest of the machine.

Assuming your reply was a jovial sarcastic reference to my post about the rails.

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[doogle]

Hi all, sorry to butt in... I posted elsewhere but this might be the best place to ask.
I'm looking at getting a X4-800L-USB... but I have the option of getting a 2-bearing 1500W water-cooled spindle. Is this a better option than going for the 4-bearing 800W water-cooled spindle? Does fewer bearings mean greater TIR? Is the extra power of the 1500W spindle not actually useful on a machine of this size?
Apparently the machine will cope with it fine, and it's not much more cost to go for the 1500W. I'm planning to use the machine for plastics, aluminium and hopefully a bit of steel. I'd go for the X6-2200L-USB, but I just don't have the room unfortunately.
Cheers!

[javanree]

You want more bearings, not less. And I personally on my X4 find the 800W more than enough. It's not rigid enough for steel and in aluminium with a 6mm cutter you'll never need the 800W. Mine is an aircooled, as I didn't like the idea of mixing chinese quality mechanics/electrics and conductive fluids...
So far with around 60-80 hours I'm still happy, the noise from the air cooling is nothing compared to the cutter noise, only minor downside of aircooled is that you get a little bit more dust being blown up.

The only advantage of a bigger spindle might be that you get ER16 or even ER20 collets instead of ER11...

[doogle]

Thanks for the response javanree.

Yeah it made sense that more bearings would be better... but I haven't really been able to find anything that states exactly 'why'. My guess is lifetime and TIR improvements, but that's just a guess.
But either way, once I found out that the 1500W has fewer bearings than the 800W it did make me reconsider... and then it came down to whether - on this machine - the extra power of the 1500W would be worth it. They're both ER11, so no advantage there.. I'd need the 2200W spindle for a bigger collet, which isn't an option.

That's a shame about steel... I think I'll still give it a go and see what happens though. They claim it'll manage on the website, but I don't know how much that means anything.

Cheers

[Mmpie]

Is there a difference in RPM between the 800w and 1500w? For aluminium and hard plastics the 800w might actually be a better choice if it spins slower, offering torque at lower speeds. I have the 2.2kw and it really doesn't like spinning below 10k rpm, which makes using some tools with aluminium more difficult, such as drills etc.

If they're the same rpm I would say go with the 1500kw. Others on here who understand the electrics will be able to give you a proper answer though, so hold on before pulling the trigger.


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[doogle]

Thanks for the response Mmpie. They're both max rpm of 24000... but do you mean the speed at which they achieve their rated power? I don't know if that's different between the two spindles.
I was wondering about performance at lower rpms though, and how that might affect me. That's interesting to know about lower rpms on the 2.2kW spindle though. Although from what I've read, these spindles are just not meant for drilling in the same way the spindle on a mill would be.

I suspect I'm making a mistake in thinking (/hoping) of the X4-800L as just a smaller X6-2200L... obviously the spindle and steppers are lower powered on the X4... but it's sounding like the difference in mass (and maybe even other construction factors) might affect things to the point where 800W is enough, and whichever spindle I have I'll have a significantly more difficult time with aluminium and steel than on the X6. Hmm.. I'm starting to think that maybe having the X6 (well, X6 in an enclosure) dominating my small home office might just be the solution!

[Mmpie]

There isn't really any mass in these machines, if the X4 has profile rails and a smaller framework it could actually be a more capable machine. If both are 24k rpm I would definitely go for the 1.5kw option as it should I believe have more oomph at lower revs.

The spindle can 'drill' perfectly fine. It's once you get to around 8mm diameter or so, they want to be spinning quite slow, and the spindle just doesn't have enough torque at lower rpms to push the drill through at a matching feed rate, so you either have to kill the feed or increase the RPM. I choose the first option, but both make a horrible noise and I'm sure aren't very good for the spindle or the drill bit or the nicest hole. 6mm and below it will drill perfectly well no problem.

I don't think stepper power is an issue, they're specced to move the machine. Unless you plan on recycling them for a bigger beefier build or adding considerable mass there would be nothing really to gain from higher powered ones IMO. Maybe a bit of speed.


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[doogle]

if the X4 has profile rails and a smaller framework

Profile rails and linear guides are just two names for the same thing, right? It has those. What do you mean by smaller framework?... Just that it's a smaller machine?

If both are 24k rpm I would definitely go for the 1.5kw option as it should I believe have more oomph at lower revs.

The torque at lower rpm was the reason I asked about the option of upgrading the spindle in the first place. But then the fact that the 1500W spindle has fewer bearings made me wonder if that was the right approach. I guess it comes down to the tradeoff between torque and number of bearings, and which aspect is likely to be more important. In your opinion do you think the extra power of the 1500 spindle is worth it at the cost of fewer bearings? Then again I really haven't been able to find anything concrete on the practical difference between 2 and 4 bearings in a spindle, so I have no idea how much of a difference it'll make.

I'm sure aren't very good for the spindle

That's pretty much what I was referring to with my previous statement, rather than whether they can drill... but then that's just what I've read, so I don't have any experience to back me up. But yeah, these spindles do seem like they can be coaxed into doing various things they're not designed for. Maybe not tapping though.

I'm going to stick with the stock steppers so I only mentioned them for the comparison between the 2 machines. In terms of speed, I'm probably more likely to see an improvement there by switching to a different controller and/or drivers. Something I'll consider down the line, but the more turnkey approach works for me for now (rewiring and sorting out grounding and also building an enclosure is enough for me to deal with at first).

Cheers

[Mmpie]

Without looking I would assume OMIO use the same extrusions just cut to different lengths across all their machines, obviously the same gear in a smaller set up is going to be mor rigid. The profile rails (fixed square type) are the big improvement on this as you know so if the X4 have them and the working area is enough then it's a good choice.

Having read a lot of machine building threads over the past few weeks I have seen a lot of very knowledgable people have purposefully chosen to use the 1.5kw spindle. If there is a drawback to it it wasn't enough to put these people off. If you intend to work with aluminium and hard plastics I think the extra power will be of far more benefit to you.

Worst case the spindle needs replacing, the spindles on their own aren't particularly expensive at all and you can just plug a new one in. You get the 800w and find you need more power then you have to buy a new vfd and spindle as well as probably set it all up properly and get it to talk to Mach.

Just my 2p's worth.


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[RCaffin]

Assuming your reply was a jovial sarcastic reference to my post about the rails.
Mainly a reference to the tilted off-centre poorly-tapped holes.

Cheers
Roger

[Mmpie]

Assuming your reply was a jovial sarcastic reference to my post about the rails.
Mainly a reference to the tilted off-centre poorly-tapped holes.

Cheers
Roger

It was my day off and I had just woken up. For some reason I had thought you'd quoted my post about the rails in your reply.

Just thought I'd clear that one up


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[javanree]

My X4-800 came with a VFD which could also handle the 1.5kW spindle , I doubt anything needs to be changed, just plug n play. From all the pictures and movies, I've seen the control box for X4 and X6 contains pretty much the same.
Both spindles can't go much below 6000 rpm and then already torque is lacking. In reality I never go much below 10k rpm for milling.

I've never encountered a lack of HP on my machine with the 800W spindle, with a 6mm mill I can plough through MFD just fine. It's usually the lack of stiffness of the frame that's limiting me, not the spindle.
The reasons I chose for the 800W spindle : I didn't want watercooling, I wanted the 4 bearing model due to better runout numbers and since I wouldn't use the extra power I'd just be moving more mass, limiting my rapids and acceleration and perhaps causing more sagging of the bridge (which is flimsy)
Unfortunately the poor steppers are now what's limiting me most...

[doogle]

Mmpie:

Yeah I'd seen a 1.5Kw spindle described as the sweet spot between 800w and 2.2Kw.
As you say, I'll have the option of changing spindles later if needed. But as javanree said, it seems the VFD delivered with the 800w is rated for 1.5kw anyway. The diameters are different... but starting off with a larger mount might be handy (maybe).

javanree:

Ah, so it is the case that the higher number of bearings means less runout? That's kind of what I was looking for... ie. what the difference in number of bearings makes in practice. I've seen conflicting statements elsewhere that when someone says '2 bearing spindle' that actually means 3 bearings (suggesting the matched pair is counted as one bearing)... so not sure whether the 1.5kw is really 2 bearings or 3.
I've been looking at various videos of people cutting aluminium on smaller routers with both 800w and 1.5kw spindles... but since there are so many other variables that I'm not sure how useful that is. Have you been relatively happy with your machines performance with cutting aluminium?
Do you think you'll upgrade the steppers? Have you upgraded the controller or drivers?