Newbie questions, would appreciate any input

[neighborator]

Hi everyone.

I'm interested in producing my own fishing lures and want to mill my own aluminum molds (for pouring plastic worms and lead jigs). Here's the dealio, I do not have any experience with CNC mills. I do have a background in Autocad. Is there a low cost, small CNC mill for "hobbyists" to produce these molds that I can utilize my Autocad skills or learn other similar programs? I've attached some examples, Any thoughts?

[awerby]

It's small but quite rigid and relatively inexpensive. It has a 10,000 RPM spindle, so the small cutters you'll need to use to cut these molds will be able to work at a reasonable feedrate with good torque. Aluminum isn't a problem for it; it can cut steel too.

You'll need some CAM software; I'd suggest downloading DeskProto to start with, once you get your mill. This will allow you to quickly generate toolpaths from your AutoCAD files (saved as STL or DXF) and try them out before having to buy anything else (except tooling). It's pretty simple to use, so you won't be intimidated by the difficulty of understanding the program.

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com