Newbie- Fist CNC, Need guidance

[rcpilot82]

Well, today has been a buisy day. All of the steppers are wired, limit and home switches are mounted and just need final termination. Mach 3 is set up and ready to roll. So I went into Mastercam x3, wrote a quick program, and sent it to mach3. powered up the hobby cnc board, all 3 steppers came online, moment of truth.....cycle start..Holy crap it WORKS!!! Now all thats left to do is the cold air setup, and spindle on/off electronics. This has been a great experience so far and it's awsome to see all 3 axis moving together under thier own power! I'll post some pics tomorrow.

[rcpilot82]

well, I ran into a problem here. I am having issues with my home/limit switches! check out here for the link to the thread; http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showth...338#post540338
anyone got any ideas? IM SOOO CLOSE!!

[rcpilot82]

UPDATE! Limit switch problem resolved! the final piece left to fabricate on this puppy before having some fun is the relay boards to turn the spindle, cold air, and vaccum off and on. collets and tooling are on the way also.

[rcpilot82]

well I finally got to run some parts off the cnc! I started out by cutting a plain foamy (indoor RC aircraft) which went well. I was so excited I didn't get any pictures of that. I then kicked it up a few notches and re-designed an existing foamy so that it would be lighter by milling out pockets in the airframe. I did get pictures of those, so here they are!

[rcpilot82]

Well I am getting the bugs worked out of my router and figured I would make some "upgrade" parts to stiffen up the z axis and to clean up my stepper mounts. I had a bunch of 3/4" acrillic laying around from old car stereo installs and figured it would be great for my parts. these are the first parts that I have run off this machine with NO problems at all. Now I have to find time to finish drilling and tapping some holes and put em on. so here a few pics of the parts fresh off the router.

[rcpilot82]

Here is another version of the foamy that i also cut out this week.

[bkboggy]

What bit did you use to cut the foam with?

[rcpilot82]

I used a .25 4flute cent.cutting end mill for the pockets, and a .0625 2 flute cent.cutting end mill for the rest.

[.xXACEXx.]

nice parts !

good to get to use the machine huh? on the 17th you were having problems and now you are making parts

good job!

[bkboggy]

Wish I knew how to weld. That machine looks awesome.

[rcpilot82]

Thanks for the kind words guys. xXaceXx, I am still having the issue with the limit switches but have turned them off for the moment untill I can sit down and go through it step by step. I am really having fun with the router, now I need to make some stuff to sell to make it pay for itself!

[abomb55076]

Looks like alot of fun, I remember finally finishing my machine and being able to cut the first part, It was so exciting! Great job!