Got my X-Carve! after finally convincing the wife I needed one, and finished assembly last night. I wanted to cut something right away and decided on a small plaque for my buddy who makes furniture and had a show today. It’s carved out of a 1" piece of “curley” walnut and his logo was filled with dark (not quite black) epoxy. Being as his pieces are made of walnut and he occasionally accents with a piece of brass, I put in a brass bow tie. Ballsie I know, new machine and going to mill out a materiel not even listed in Easel. I set it up as aluminum and left the settings alone. Brass is similar to aluminum in softness but it doesn’t get sticky like aluminum when being cut. Took 3 hours as the brass stock was 1/2" x 2" … but worked great though. After talking with a friend today about it, he said I could’ve upped the depth of each pass due to the spindle speed (it was at .1mm), not positive though due to slight flex I noticed while moving in the x-axis. I need to go give it all a once over inspection now. Super excited about what else I can do.
Does the flex cause you any concern? That is my main concern about buying an X-Carve.
Wow impressive. It looks like a gold bar.
The final product with the inlay looks pretty sweet.
@Zach_Kaplan Thank you!
@PhilJohnson, @AngusMcleod - Thanks for the info! I was sure there was a more specific way to compare them. I went with the fact the scratch as easily with a corner of hard steel and using the very scientific meathod of comparing said scratchs with my finger nail noted it was about the same.
@RobertE.Baker No, not a concern, just something to take note of. Some of it is still fine tuning the machine after assembly as well as learning proper feed speeds, spindle speeds etc. The x-carve is by far and away the best option out there unless you spend double to triple the money. Especially given the forum and community.
Thank you for the info. Your first project looks as though you knew exactly what you were doing and had the experience to back it up. You should be proud. I look forward to seeing future projects from you.
quite the selection of bits you bought from Inventables lol