I am building a cnc milling machine with ballscrew drives and am trying to find a good solution to prevent dust / chips etc getting into the bearings.
The standard chinese ballscews come with plastic inserts on each end they they will probably only block object larger than 1mm from getting in.
I have added a linear brush like those found on some aluminium doors and windows, with a length which covers fives threads, so there are five passes before the thread enters the ballnut. This does seem fairly effective a wiping dust but I'm not sure if it is the best solution. I also have a metal shield which is fixed over the length of the thread to stop chips and dust falling directly onto it.
It's a general purpose machine on which I will be working both wood and metal and maybe MDF.
This is not something that I see a lot of discussion about , what are the classic solutions for this?
I would look into getting something like the link below. You will need to find out what size you will need, then get one for each side of the moving axis. Roughly 60% of the length of the axis x 2 of the bellows. You want each side to be a little longer than needed so the bellows does not stretch itself, removing the risk of destroying the bellows.
I was going to get them for my machine, then I changed the arrangement of the Ball-screw on my current router and went to a brush type cover.
dust protection : ballscrews
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