Reply with QuoteWay cool! Are the UHMW pads bought to fit the 8020 or did you mill these yourself? How well does it slide. I have heard pros and cons on plastic bearings.
Good job.
RipperSoftware
Tiny CNC machine - fun and fast to build...
Hi Guys,
I spent a few days designing and building this machine. It's original purpose was to be used as a pen plotter. I am designing some motion control electronics and software (for personal use) and needed something more than spinning stepper motors to visualize the accuracy of those. So, I spent a day designing a simple and small bed mill style 3 axis machine. It is small, the table size is 8-1/2" x 11" and the Z axis travel is around 3 -1/2".
It took most of two days to build it and, for once, most of the materials I had laying around the shop so I didn't have to spend much to build it. In fact, I spent more on sealer and paint, than the rest of the machine (keeping in mind I am not counting the original costs of the "scraps" used to build it).
It is primarily constructed from MDF, with 8020 extrusions for the ways. Saddles are backed wth UHMW pads. Lead screws are SS 1/4-20 threaded rod - hand picked at the hardware store for straightness. Nuts are Acetal, and mounting hardware is 1/8" aluminum angle. The tiny motors are cute little Nema 17 motors - I suspect they should have enough guts to move a pen, but you just never know
During construction, I realized I built it a bit "heavy" for a pen plotter, so I thought I might as well plan to try it for some light milling (I do some PCB drilling etc.). I have a much larger CNC Router, so I have no "dreams" of this machine being a "heavy cutter". Anyway, I have a pnuematic pencil grinder that is about 5/8" in diameter, so I bored the hole in the headstock to accomodate that as a spindle (when I am not using it as a plotter). Don't know if it will work for milling / drilling, but you just never know, sometimes life throws you a little surprise.
I just thought I would share with you the little machine and to show you that there are other machine configurations besides the oh-so-typical gantry type. Hope you enjoy or perhaps even get some inspiration or ideas.
Chris
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Way cool! Are the UHMW pads bought to fit the 8020 or did you mill these yourself? How well does it slide. I have heard pros and cons on plastic bearings.
Good job.
RipperSoftware
I had some UHMW on hand, so I just milled up the pads. Most of them are very similar in size/shape to the 8020 pads. I would have used theirs if I had them on hand.Originally Posted by rippersoft
There is nothing wrong at all with using UHMW on aluminum extrusions - it is a very slippery interface between the two materials. It is very tolerant of dust and chips - perhaps not so tolerant of solvents etc. For dry cutting machines such as routers and PCB milling/drilling, it is a very good combination.
Don't know what others have said or told you, so I don't know what they are saying is bad about it. Frankly, for a dry cutting machine, like a router or PCB mill, I would take aluminum/UHMW over the "Gas pipe and bearings" combination. I mean let's face it, gas pipe is about as accurate as a baseball bat :-)
Chris
Chris....that's a nice looking little machine...congratulations.....
Looks very pro, job well done. Looks like some of that is cast, you do the casting yourself?
Looks pretty cool, Very well done.
Hi,
Do you have any plans of the machine. The machine is cool. Could you share the plans with us???
Thank you,
Zoltan
Very nicely done..I like uhmw on 8020 myself, my experience follows yours, easy accurate, slippery, bearing. Try a little silicone spray for really free moving. Really much better than the pipe bearing setup which I have used and have partially relaced with uhmw/8020.
Thank you for the ideas.
Carl
Sorry no castings here, this machine is made from MDF. Remember, it's original design purpose is that of a pen plotter.
Chris
I don't know yet. Sometimes these things have a funny way of turning around from a "hey, here are some free plans and have fun building it" into a nightmare of:
Why did you do it that way...
I want to use (insert thing here) instead of (insert thing here)
Can you re-draw the machine in metric for me
Can you tell me where to purchase the brackets
I don't like the colors, can I paint it a different color?
Sorry to sound so nasty about it, experience shows me that often times a good gesture can turn into "freebie hunting feeding frenzy" that ends up being work rather than fun.
I don't know, I will think about it.
Chris
Yes, the silicone spray is "magical"!
I don't mind using the "pipe and bearing" method, as long as Gas pipe isn't used
I agree with you people like to have alot of things handed to them, I provide dwg files for my model 2006 machine, and some people want me to diminsion everything for them. I do not mind sharing but I do not want to spend all my time doing all the detail fork for them, when they should just study the files and make the descisions them self. it really is not that hard.
for the most part most people take the ball and run with it, but there are a few that want everything, and this in itself is not good, because what if something does not work well for them and they do not know how to do a workaround for it they will be stuck and get a bad taste in their mouth about the whole thing.
joe
Joe,
Very cool, this is exactly what my girlfriend asked me to made her this Christmas. Great job.
Steven
Sorry, ment Chris in my post.
Chris, can I get a set of your drawings?
steven
Yes, redraw those plans in metric. And be quick about it. You gotta be kidding me.
Well as long as you’re you have decided to become slave labor for the ingrates of your planet, could you whip me up a set of drawings in Klingon! Qapla!
(pronounced "kap-LA!"), which is a way of wishing people "Success!"
Deeds not words...
VoltsAndBolts runs RC for the builder. http://www.voltsandboltsonline.com/ My Forum
A very neat
That machine is so neat I just want one
Seriously though, I think I will be somewhat inspired from this when I eventually build my own machine since I dont need any huge travels. I know I want to be able to prototype PCBs, and possibly make small stuff out of plastics or wood, and hopefully metal. Im guessing 40x20x10cm travel is more than enough for me, and I might even scale down if that makes the machine more easy/cheaper to build, more robust or much smaller.
Add to that that I dont have any real wood- or metalworking experience, no shop and not a huge collection of tools yet, and I think Ill have an interesting experience.
Aw shucks guys...
Heck, I just might go out and buy a copy of PRO-E and design this machine up in solids - output all the CNC files so that folks can make the components out of billet, or if they prefer, machine the mold cavities and cast their own parts. Then I could easily write all the programs to turn the lead screws and nuts and machine all the brackets too. I was thinking I could create documentation for the build in the following formats:
HTML
MS Word
Corel Ventura
MS Publisher
Printed manual (even mailed to your home free)
IPOD Doc file
Text message for every type of cell phone out there
Broadcast television presentation on 6 different networks
HPGL
DWG
DXF
HPCL
Did I miss anything
(Note, all that said above was in jest)
Chris
Heck, and I was just hoping to be able to obtain a copy of the plans in any format, in any system on numbers (except ancient Hebrew... and I can actually translate that if I really need to). Trying to make this the least amount of work possible for Chris.
I don't need them in Klingon, or in Arabic, I don't need then read to me by EG Marshal (for those of you old enough to remember he was the voiceover for most of the nature videos we were forced to sit through in grade school).
I do not need them
in a house.
I do not need them
with a mouse.
I do not need them
here or there.
I do not need them
anywhere.
I do not need them with green eggs and ham.
Just a simple man looking for the simple plan.
Steve-I-Am
very cool job as far as plans a pic is worth a thousand words no need for plans but maybe a few pics of the drive setups
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