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[quote=“DanielAlderman, post:40, topic:19205”]
If you have a metal lathe this is possible, if not then it gets hard as the same problem will still be there with the new mount.
[/quote] unfortunately I don’t have a lathe so I’m just being carful about adjusting them.
I think the x axis could use a redesign as well and have been thinking about it. If you did split the two pieces and mount the router in the middle you would loose some of the y axis up front but if it meant a much stiffer gantry then I’d be OK with that.
So far no matter how it is done it requires a redesign of the structure.
Right now the 611 mount is stuck out there far enough without adequate bracing that there is enough leverage to cause deflection relative to speed/feed/material.
Most wood does not present much of an issue if the stiffening mods are done.
Aluminum is different because of push off that the XC was never built for.
I cut aluminum (light cuts and for spot drilling holes) and it does do the job. That said the XC is not a high end CNC and never makes that claim.
I like it as it does what I want it to do, it does, however, require tweaking and calibration often.
With the steel plate mod, on a smaller machine with a completely new z-axis, my mini-x-carve does shocking things with aluminum and brass. This weekend, in the middle of a carve, I accidentally it the Auto Zero button in Mach 3. Plunged my bit and about .01 of my collet into and through the aluminum block. And the finish was beautiful. The bit was fine. Truthfully, I am afraid to push this machine to its limits. My cutting area is 11 x 17". Here is the z-axis. I removed the aluminum mounting plate and attached the John Scherer’s makita mount. Then bolted this to the cast z-axis carriage:
My 2 cents:
I have been playing around with GWizard trying to figure it out as well and get a better feel for feed and speed settings. (I was having issues that I thought were due to bit deflection or the gantry twisting due to excessive load)
What it turns out is bit deflection is more a factor of depth of cut and the stick out of the bit.
The longer the bit the more of a lever it is? The deeper the cut the more force applied? So cutting shallower can have a greater effect than changing your feed.
Now I have not figured out how this effect the forces on the gantry and it twisting but I am going with the assumption that they are similar.
About 10 years ago I got into hobby CNC. I did ok with wax but every time I tried to do aluminum I broke bits and had disastrous fails with my machine.
At the time I was at a loss. Now, thanks to this forum and better info on the internet I think I know what my issue were.
I though my bits breaking were do to too much stress on the bit so I would cut slower. This was a mistake with aluminum. It was reducing the bit deflection but causing too much heat and chip build up.
The chips would pile up around the bit, heat and melt. Welding the bit to the work piece and things would break (sometimes spectacularly)
It looks like this might be starting to happen in your older video. Especially with all the aluminum residue built up on your bit.
Apparently, according to GWizard (for 6061 aluminum), the trick is to cut shallow and fast.
I mean shallow, really shallow, 0.002 inch for a 1/8" bit and fast, between 25 to 40 in/min
(This is for a couture cut at full bit thickness)
This should still reduced the bit deflection but should make a lot less chips per pass, making it easier for them to clear. From what I understand this is a tricky thing to balance as you need a certain amount of chips flying to help pull away some of the heat?
I have yet to take on aluminum again myself because it was such a disaster before. Eventually I will work up to it but I want to master other materials first.
Can you post pictures of your machine with this? It looks nice and would pretty much eliminate deflection and play.
That really shortens up the mounting.
Here is the only picture I have. There is another thread on how the machine itself was assembled below, but those are old and when I used a stamped metal z that I abandoned.
Here is the base. - this is old - now using x-carve x-axis plates instead of the older style. The key here is to make sure your base is dead square. This base MAKES the maker slide square and solid. Also, a lower center of gravity increases the stability of the x and z axes. I can only mill 1/2" thick material unless I carve a deeper pocket into the base. But - this machine is dedicated to metal. It now has forced air/coolant and shelf liner protective hoodies over the v-wheels.
Okay I know it has been a while since I posted anything here but it has been to damn cold and I’ve been to busy to spend a reasonable amount of time playing with my x-carve, that is until this weekend. I have finished all the mods I wanted to do and I’m using a band new end mill. the biggest problem I would say I was having was that my waste board was shockingly out of level. I’m talking about a quarter of an inch in some spots. You will notice in the video I did away with those dumb clamps, screws from here on out.
I know I’m not breaking any speed records in the video but I was being cautious because i’m still unsure of how fast I can go and how deep.
Its been so long since I started this I don’t even remember what I needed to mill aluminum for in the first place haha.
Make the Y rails a bit longer to compensate.
Turn the Z gantry 90% so the Z lead screw to minimize spread of the rails.
I think that would be worth looking into.
