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Hello all I am 22 years of age and been in CNC and machining for about 4 years now and also an engineering student.
I am slowly building my business with equipment
- miller dvi2 welder
- oxy torch
- drill press
- band saw
Please give me advice or anything on what I can do to get ahead in this field.
I am exhausting myself on ideas to make a product.
Please let me know
thanks a lot.
Maybe its time for a cnc mill/router. What better way to bring those newly engineered ideas to life( or should I say protoype).
Dan
I would say that cnc is the next logical step toward having machines that would greatly increase usability and production. CNC is the present and future of manufacturing and prototyping. CNC will not only speed things up for you, but will give you valuable skill sets in order to expand things in the future.
It takes time to simply wrap your mind around the various softwares that you might need to run cnc's, but once accomplished, it basically becomes simple.
I found this to be the case on all but the lathe. The lathe for me is more difficult, because I can't just make a flat drawing and expect a cam program to follow those lines. This is where I am trying to learn more now.
However a lathe can be run just as easily in manual mode for prototyping. CNC only becomes productive when you have quantities of a product to produce.
A mill on the other hand, works great to start with in cnc for prototyping. A good one can interpolate holes for you, which is difficult in manual mode, but can still be done with the right tooling. A router is much the same, but less rigid usually and allows cutting of larger materials.
You already have a torch, so I think logically the next step for you would be a 4 x 4 machine under it. That will give you something to start learning cnc and software on. A plasma or oxy torch machine can also be made less rigid than a router and can use smaller motors and parts because there are no real cutting forces induced on such a machine.
Personally I can up with a product first. I was unable to meet demand using hand tools and thought that cnc would help. It does, but I'm still not able to meet demand in a timely manner. I have had a lead time of from 3 and now to 8 weeks. CNC did allow me to increase accuracy and increase production about 3 times what I was producing by hand.
If all I had to do was just build the product, then I could make many more of these. However when you run a garage business, there are many hats that must be worn. Some weeks actual production is only about half of what I do. The business is still growing though.
Good luck with your endeavors. I would suggest you just start with an oxy cnc cutter first. This will get your feet wet and get you started on the software side of things. I don't think I would cnc anything else though unless you have a product in mind. The machines you build once you have something in mind would then be what you need to accomplish the job.
Sounds like you have a start. One thing is if you plan on getting a place to put eveything figure out what size you think you need and then DOUBLE IT. I believe the CNC can be the way, but with the cost of the equipment, what I did was got myself a lathe and a milling machine and then when the work started to come in went for the CNC lathe and mill.It allowed me to put a large chunk of cash down so the payments wernt over the top. I still have both of them and use them to qualify or do second opps when the cnc is running. Something else to think about....
Good luck to you.
Stan Novak
Century Machining
58 Century St
Brewer Maine 04412
[email protected]
I am a CNC programmer currently and know how to run them. Just they are so costly. My other tools were around 2,000 or so and just took a few months of saving. But 80,000+ for a nice CNC and I dont even have work for it??
Please help me on that one.
Quote:
Originally Posted by snovak240
I could get old manual mills and lathes cheap these days. I also know how to rebuild them. But the technology is going away from these.
I do agree that CNC is in fact the way to go. But it took a little time to get my CNC lathe and mill, both of which came from a university that up graded. I am up in Maine and it is expensive to move them up here. Keep your ear to the ground and deals will come. If you get the work and dont have the equipment to run it on, TRY to find another shop in your area that has eqipment to run it on. It is a risky way to do it, but it may get you started. Take your time no one is doing too much in today economy... Seems like they are all waiting to see what tomarrow will bring??? A fool and his money are quickly parted.