It all began in Border’s Book, I was looking for book on robots and ran across Geoff Williams’ book CNC Robotics: Build Your Own Workshop Bot. Robots suddenly took a distant second.
The first 3-axis router took about 2-years from idea to cutting the first part. [See attached photograph.] Along the way I’ve learned MACH3, two CAD programs, and two g-code conversion programs, and accumulated an encyclopedia of errors. I still have all 10 fingers and all 10 toes. My mind: Gone long ago.
With increasing experience, and the resulting higher expectations, it soon became obvious that a 3-axis machine with a cutting area of 19-inches by 16-inches by 2.5-inches was not going to meet the needs of furniture making, even though currently that is limited to a variety of boxes: jewelry; storage; boxes for antique weapons; and urns. My designs avoid as many right angles and straight lines as possible; the number and complexity of the jigs necessary is ridiculous.
After six-months researching [CNCzone played a HUGE part] and then searching for a new CNC machine ended when I found ShopDroids [http://www.needfulthings.net/host/nosleep/index.html]. After some emails back and forth, I ordered a custom-made Droid with a cutting area of 4-feet by 7-feet; it will have 4 axes [X,Y,Z, plus a rotary axis]. The seller is a CNCzone regular: tulsaturbo. The emails I have received, and the parts I subsequently received, reflect positively on his intelligence, experience, courtesy, and attention to detail; a cool guy!
In analyzing the errors made with the first machine, the major source of the errors was lack of planning, which lead to the extended period of time it took to build the machine. This time I designed, analyzed, and planned [CAD drawings, written notes, and spreadsheets], and then analyzed the design, the analysis, and the resulting plans.
The one operational source of the extended build time for the first machine was that parts were not there when needed. This time everything is in one small pile, literally, as can be seen in the attached photograph. All the ShopDroid rails and trucks; all the electronics; the steppers motors; the 8020 aluminum for the base [and the 424 nut and bolts sets to assemble it .. counted ‘em BEFORE the order went in!]; the router [PC 690] and the Super PID to control it; all the other bolts; and all the tools. The computer MACH3 will be on is setup, running and ready; and the monitor, keyboard and mouse are ready as well.
Metalworking is a big unknown to me [still], so this time I lined up a machinist BEFORE I started. He works for a friend on mine who is a specialty manufacturer of high-performance automobiles. The attached photograph shows the capacity available to me.
I expect to be done in early March.