First design; borrowed idea; made/making in Canada

[wackocrash5150]

First design and first post here as well. I've built a coupple of 3D printers and an OpenBuilds C-Beam Machine CNC router. Lately I've been thinking that that the C-Beam is just not big enough. I began to think about building a larger one. 4'x8' was my first thought as it'd be great to just slap a piece of MDF or plywood on there and go to town, but that involves a substantial amount of space. So i read something about "indexing" a piece or work so then, a 4'x4' would be just fine.
The design I most liked was the CNCRP PRO4848. At $4100 it's not exactly cheap, and by the time you factor in exchange to CDN$ and shipping across the border, it's not that practical. I tried sourcing 8020inc aluminum here and found a supplier, but they carried mainly the Imperial variants rather than the Metric ones. So I couldn't even try to sweet talk someone at CNCRP for plans as it calls for Metric. So what I decided to do was teach myself to us Fusion360 and make my own, relying heavily on the design that I liked. Here's what I've come up with:

My first CNC Router design

I guess I'm just looking for design feedback and suggestions.

It would be cutting wood and MDF the majority of the time, but it would be nice to have the ability to do some aluminum as well. I got hooked on this design because I've read that it has some decent rigidity. It also uses aluminum slot extrusion which means no welding. ( I am not a welder) I'm thinking a bit of over-designing now will lead to less hassles later on. I have a 2.2kw spindle and Nema34s in mind.

Let me know what you peoples think. Thanks in advance

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[1Jumper10]

You did a pretty good job for being new to fusion 360. I didn't look closely at your design but It looks pretty good and it looks like you are going to use CNCRP components in the key areas? Just one recommendation, use double anchor- counterbore connections or similar to join your extrusions where they meet at right angles. Its the strongest connection method you can use and it pulls your structure into square. As long as your extrusion ends are cut squarely.

[wackocrash5150]

Thanks for the compliment 1Jumper10. There's a guy named Lars Christensen who has a really great YouTube channel with a ton of easy to follow Fusion 360 content so, I would highly credit that to my learning process with it.

Concerning the extrusion joining, I'd initially thought of using "15 Series 8 Hole - Gusseted Inside Corner Bracket" but your suggestion sounds good too. Wonder how I'd pull that off? Some sort of jig I imagine. BTW I should mention that it looks like I would be sourcing the parts from CPI Automation as they are a Canadian 80/20 Inc distributor. They're about 2 hours away from me but in a direction that I could do a few other things on the same trip. If you check on the site, you'll see that it's all Imperial dimensions instead of Metric; So where the PRO4848 calls for 80160 (80mm x 160mm) for the gantry, I'll need to use 3060 (3" x 6"). It's a couple mm smaller so I hope it's ok.

As for using actual CNCRP components; probably as little as conveniently possible if that makes sense. I've heard great things about them but, the less I have to order from south of the border, the easier it is on my wallet. They have the CAD files available on their site for the R&P drive assembly so that's what I dropped in there. I might do it like that, I might whip up something similar; not sure yet. The design that's currently in there I'm not sure about. I might spin the pivot to the front side instead of the back side of the gantry plate. I'm not sure if clearance for the pulley/gear leave enough meat on the front part of it. That was the part that involved the most guesswork when looking at the original design.


PS I'm aware that the linear rails and rack need to be longer on the X-Axis. Here is a pic for those that don't want to click on the Fusion link in the 1st post.

[MajorTendonitis]

I'm in Cranbrook BC , and am in a simular situation to you . Been debating to buy the pro 4848 from cncrouterparts and be done with it , and save some money by building the electronics myself . Wanted to go with a water cooled spindle and Nema34 steppers .

I change my ideas daily , and ideally would like to build my own router table too . Found a place in Vancouver for the extruded aluminum, and various vendors in the US for the electronics . Linear bearings and rack from Colorado etc.
I will be watching your progress with great interest

[handlewanker]

Hi, I see in your design that you have separate R&P drives on each side of the Y axis for the gantry..............this is just an idea I have..... I'm into CNC mills not CNC routers...... mainly just design hypothesis, but I am of the opinion that if one side drive fails for some reason bad things can happen to the gantry as it spans a wide distance and has very little rigidity to resist bending the crossbeam out of wack.

It has been said that the steppers will stall before that happens.

All it takes is a long cross rod with a pinion on each end attached under the gantry and meshed with two racks on the bottom of the side frame rails....... as they are just idlers, and not driven, they will act as slave drives to keep the gantry square to the Y axis in case of failure etc,

They do not drive per se, but if one side stops driving the cross rod with it's meshed pinons will then both drive simultaneously and keep the rig square......just an idea I thought up for cases where separate drives are used and long cross spans are designed.

BTW.....love the Fusion rendition.....been trying to get my head into this CAD as I previously used Cadkey light, a training program for Cadkey, but it takes so much time and memory to remember how the creation occurs.
Ian.

[NIC 77]

BTW I should mention that it looks like I would be sourcing the parts from CPI Automation as they are a Canadian 80/20 Inc distributor. They're about 2 hours away from me but in a direction that I could do a few other things on the same trip.

That's funny. They're about 2 hours away from me too. We might be in the same town. I sent you a Private Message.

[jckstrthmghty]

Maybe consider rovercnc/SNBInc from Canada over here in Ontario. They have a few variants of the OX Openbuilds CNC. A OX, light, and a heavy duty variant. The light and heavy duty use ballscrews rather than belt. Seems to be nice stuff and reasonably priced however my understanding there is a bit more work to assemble as I couldn't find an actual full kit offering. I've purchased from SNBInc for a few years and has been reliable to me. Always answered my emails in a timely manner.

[louieatienza]

Hi, I see in your design that you have separate R&P drives on each side of the Y axis for the gantry..............this is just an idea I have..... I'm into CNC mills not CNC routers...... mainly just design hypothesis, but I am of the opinion that if one side drive fails for some reason bad things can happen to the gantry as it spans a wide distance and has very little rigidity to resist bending the crossbeam out of wack.

It has been said that the steppers will stall before that happens.

All it takes is a long cross rod with a pinion on each end attached under the gantry and meshed with two racks on the bottom of the side frame rails....... as they are just idlers, and not driven, they will act as slave drives to keep the gantry square to the Y axis in case of failure etc,

They do not drive per se, but if one side stops driving the cross rod with it's meshed pinons will then both drive simultaneously and keep the rig square......just an idea I thought up for cases where separate drives are used and long cross spans are designed.

BTW.....love the Fusion rendition.....been trying to get my head into this CAD as I previously used Cadkey light, a training program for Cadkey, but it takes so much time and memory to remember how the creation occurs.
Ian.

Methinks that if you're going to run a jack shaft, there wouldn't be a need for two drive motors... you could either run from one side, or use a 2 shaft motor in the center.

[wackocrash5150]

Maybe consider rovercnc/SNBInc from Canada over here in Ontario. They have a few variants of the OX Openbuilds CNC. A OX, light, and a heavy duty variant. The light and heavy duty use ballscrews rather than belt. Seems to be nice stuff and reasonably priced however my understanding there is a bit more work to assemble as I couldn't find an actual full kit offering. I've purchased from SNBInc for a few years and has been reliable to me. Always answered my emails in a timely manner.

That is actually where I was planning on sourcing the linear rails and rack. Their component prices seems fair, although their plate package prices seem a bit steep; but then again, I'm not entirely familiar with pricing on things like that.

[jckstrthmghty]

That is actually where I was planning on sourcing the linear rails and rack. Their component prices seems fair, although their plate package prices seem a bit steep; but then again, I'm not entirely familiar with pricing on things like that.

I thought the same at first but after some research I believe their prices are warranted. Their z axis assembly seem on par in price and quality with anything out there. The plates themselves are 10mm and if that's not enough 20mm in their HD stuff. Their site says about $3500 CDN for a complete lt kit at 1500x1000. A good price point imo. The HD kit being much more though. Maybe more than twice the cost. They are definitely my lead choice at the moment for a hobby level build. If I was not in Canada CNCRP would probably be my top choice but shipping and duty is a killer.

Anyways hope you get something going soon and share the build here.

[1Jumper10]

Hi, I see in your design that you have separate R&P drives on each side of the Y axis for the gantry..............this is just an idea I have..... I'm into CNC mills not CNC routers...... mainly just design hypothesis, but I am of the opinion that if one side drive fails for some reason bad things can happen to the gantry as it spans a wide distance and has very little rigidity to resist bending the crossbeam out of wack.

It has been said that the steppers will stall before that happens.

All it takes is a long cross rod with a pinion on each end attached under the gantry and meshed with two racks on the bottom of the side frame rails....... as they are just idlers, and not driven, they will act as slave drives to keep the gantry square to the Y axis in case of failure etc,

They do not drive per se, but if one side stops driving the cross rod with it's meshed pinons will then both drive simultaneously and keep the rig square......just an idea I thought up for cases where separate drives are used and long cross spans are designed.

BTW.....love the Fusion rendition.....been trying to get my head into this CAD as I previously used Cadkey light, a training program for Cadkey, but it takes so much time and memory to remember how the creation occurs.
Ian.

If a machine with a dual driven gantry is wired correctly and one motor fails, it should immediately shutdown the whole machine. This drive failure signal should cause the software to stop the machine. A cross drive idler system as described would add complexity unnecessarily in my opinion.

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[sybilsurf]

Regarding the R&P drives. Everyone seems to use the same eccentric pivot, which seems to me way over complex. If I was starting from scratch I'd look to make it much simpler. Seems like a nylon bushing with pre-load would work more than fine....

Ward

[wackocrash5150]

Regarding the R&P drives. Everyone seems to use the same eccentric pivot, which seems to me way over complex. If I was starting from scratch I'd look to make it much simpler. Seems like a nylon bushing with pre-load would work more than fine....

Ward

I'm not sure I follow. Got a pic for example?

If a machine with a dual driven gantry is wired correctly and one motor fails, it should immediately shutdown the whole machine. This drive failure signal should cause the software to stop the machine. A cross drive idler system as described would add complexity unnecessarily in my opinion.


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I'd be interested to see a quick wiring diagram on this. Would it apply to regular steppers and a generic drivers with a parallel breakout board?

[louieatienza]

I'd be interested to see a quick wiring diagram on this. Would it apply to regular steppers and a generic drivers with a parallel breakout board?

I suppose you'd need a stepper drive that has a fault output, then you can use that to drive a relay to kill DC power to the drives.