[jaru-eri]

I see this router is sold on ebay for about 1300 usd. Is this a good deal for a router like this, and is the quality ok?

eBay - New & used electronics, cars, apparel, collectibles, sporting goods & more at low prices

[port_huon]

I bought one of these about 3 weeks ago. Unused so far as I'm house sitting and have no where I can set it up. Once I get a place of my own and get it installed, I'll let you know how it goes.

Construction seems solid and it was well packed and arrived without damage. Not sure about the quality of the stepper drivers but I've got a Gecko G540 in case it's needed.
Needless to say there's no documentation to speak off

If you want any info that doesn'y involve me starting it, let me know.

[LamprosPat]

Hello everyone. I am building 6040. I am glad to be part of the community. What I want to ask is where do you guys put your drivers? up to the machine or you make a box? vibrations affect the driver's output? I suppose most of you have the chinese control box. mine is with an offline PLC 500khz. you will find it at aliexpress. I am looking for some live youtube tutorial for it as well if you have something in mind it should really help. I am running cw5045 x3 nema23 425 48v 12.5

Regards,
Lampros

[fox3d]

i have put them in the computer case. so cables are going directly to the cnc.
less boces and more space.

[direwolf]

Anymore comments on these machines? Price looks ok.

[Alekoy]

I bought one, and it works!

after reading about other people with the 6040, and the 3040 (basically the same, but smaller),
the other users have had problems with the control-box, and the VFD's manual, so I decided to ask the seller if he would sell the machine without the control-box and VFD, And he did.

I ordered a Gecko G540 , and I already had a decent Danfoss VFD with a understandable manual.

The machine arrived in two boxes, one with the table, and one with the gantry, spindle, steppers and wires etc.

Now everything is working perfectly, and setup went smooth with very few issues.

There are however a few points that is bad with the machine:
no home/limit-switches
the table is not perfectly flat over the whole area
the cable-chain has not got space for all your cables and hoses (if you go for a water cooled spindle, like me)

[Foogl]

Alekoy, may I ask you, who was the seller you bought your machine from?
I asked several of them and none is willing to sell it without controller / spindle.

Thanks!

[aarggh]

Alekoy, may I ask you, who was the seller you bought your machine from?
I asked several of them and none is willing to sell it without controller / spindle.

Thanks!

Do you already have a VFD/spindle? If not, I'd get it with them as it would only be an incremental cost when buying the machine, and while they aren't top of the line, they are cheap and work. These machines for the price are generally very good, and apart from the mandatory replacement of the controller with a G540, only need some minor tweaking and adjustments really. performance of the one I have is very nice. Funnily enough the alu table is better and more robust than the one on my larger Jinan JCut 6090. Go figure!

cheers,
Ian

[Foogl]

Thanks Ian. What I'm trying to do is to get 6040 with 1.5kW spindle and complete it with my G540. Unfortunately, sets on ebay has 0.8kW spindles + el cheapo controllers and so far there was nobody willing / able to deliver me different configuration. So again, can you tell me, who did you buy your machine from?

[aarggh]

I got mine from "lovehappyshopping", but these guys -

amonstar | eBay

- appear to be about the cheapest currently. Almost all of them also sell the 1.5kw spindle/vfd sets, so you could ask to upgrade the one on the machine, but it's quite possible that these generally are turnkey sales so I wouldn't be surprised if they wouldn't be able to. Failing that, you could buy a 1.5kw set, and just swap them over yourself, but having said that, the 0.8kw is a surprisingly capable and powerful spindle, and may well do you fine for most work. And given that the cost component of the 0.8kw spindle and vfd would be a very small part of the cost of the overall machine, I would think it handy to just have around for when you build 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc, machine! Shame the controller that comes supplied isn't of any use though!

One thing I forgot though, is one of the first things you'll need to make if you buy the 1.5kw set as well, is an 80mm spindle mount! That was actually what I did myself!

For the money, these are awesome machines, and seeing as you've already got a G540, you're home and hosed!

cheers,
Ian

[Alekoy]

The seller I bought from was Tool-zoom, I contacted them on ebay, but the buying itself was outside ebay, and the payment was done on paypal.

Arrived in Norway in less than a week, shipped by DHL.

Now that I have used the machine a little, I would say that the little 0,8kw spindle is sufficient, I've milled alu, MDF and 3mm sheet metal and the spindle has done its work without any hesitation. BUT if the 1,5kw spindle does not cost a whole lot extra, I probably would buy that (bigger is almost always better)

[aarggh]

I've got the 0.8kw, 1.5kw, and 2.2kw spindles, and as i'm very mindful of the cost of running these things for extended periods, I personally find the 1.5kw to be the sweet spot for power usage, grunt, and performance.

The 0.8kw is more than adequate for most use, and is especially suited for mundane and repetitive stuff that's fairly easily machined, while the 1.5kw is really great for plowing through lots of aluminium machining. The 2.2kw I haven't found really offers that much of a performance boost over the 1.5kw for my needs currently, so all general stuff is done with the 0.8kw, and heavy machining with the 1.5kw.

I am planning a cnc machine next year or so, specifically for machining aluminium with flood coolant, and I'm setting aside the 2.2kw for that purpose as it will be fairly hard work, but the grunt would just be wasted on lighter stuff IMHO. Here in OZ our utility bills are going through the roof, so running costs are more and more a real concern.

cheers,
Ian

[Foogl]

For the money, these are awesome machines, and seeing as you've already got a G540, you're home and hosed!

Sooo, my two boxes with 6040 arrived. You hooked me up Ian!

Looks like no damage on the way. Packaging was absolutely fantastic, bubble wrap, PU foam, foil ... would take me a week to pack it like that.
Frame looks nice and sturdy (and heavy), spindle looks really good, movements all nice and smooth, servos are fine (270oz), VFD is acceptable. But man! Wires and controller are absolute crap (expected). No shielding, no grounding, nothing. I didn't even have balls to start that blue box up. I'm going to visit McMaster-Carr tomorrow (it is absolute joy to live 5 miles from this wonder-store) for new cables and I will hook it up with my new G540 right a way. Cannot wait.

Thanks for the good tip!

[aarggh]

Wires and controller are absolute crap (expected). No shielding, no grounding, nothing. I didn't even have balls to start that blue box up. I'm going to visit McMaster-Carr tomorrow (it is absolute joy to live 5 miles from this wonder-store) for new cables and I will hook it up with my new G540 right a way. Cannot wait.

Thanks for the good tip!

Great! They really are good value, you'll probably find the table will be very slightly out over some of it, but no big deal to shim or adjust that. I didn't find mine to out enough to worry me for what I was doing with it. Good idea to not touch the supplied controller, otherwise you might reasonably think it's worth "having a look at", after all, just how bad could it be? And before you know it, you've lost a week and it still doesn't work!

The g540's are a real treat, they have a rock solid reputation for a good reason, they really are that good!

I'd recommend checking over the cabling though, and make sure all the connectors are solid, and start mapping out the A-/A+ and B-/B+ from the controller (assuming it's wired right, if it's not, doesn't matter as you'll soon work it out) to make it easier for the G540 hookup.

cheers,
Ian

[port_huon]

I finally been able to get mine set up, at least as far as the controller would let me - dead X axis.
Rather than try to chase down the seller to get a replacement, I'm just going to build a new box with a G540. Got the power supply, connectors, switches etc yesterday and should have the cable tomorrow.
I did have to take the hardware apart as it was out of alignment, probably due to a couple of weeks in the back of the van. No binding on any axis but the ballscrews could use some grease - if there were grease nipples installed.
Once I get movement under G540 control, then I'll tackle the VFD.

Has anyone worked out the best place to fit limit/home switches?

[Rodtp]

A I wanted to play with Photocarve,I bought a 3040Z (small version of 6040) as my Syil is too slow and the head to heavy for the rapid up and down moves. I ordered it from lovehappyshopping. Arrived with the vertical axis shaft end 1/4" and 3/8" top plate badly bent, before it was packaged as no significant damage to packaging. Replacement ballnut and screw arrived quickly. After such an impact, I dismantled the whole machine to check for damage. There was none and the machine is a wonderfully simple but very robust bit of kit. It would be a simple job to use the mill the make a duplicate or larger model of itself. Having read the posts about the control box, I wondered how it was going to perform. However it was pretty ok, fairly accurate on positioning checks. Dont forget the cheeky way to get power to the opto isolated parallel port skt. It needs 5v stolen from the computer's USB. Saucy sods.
The Y axis ballnut has a grease nipple screwed in, the others have screwed port, but no nipple and would need to be dismantled to get at the nipple if one is fitted.

[rffrda_p]

hey guys,
I've been looking at getting one of these machines as well, I hope to be using it for building some automotive models like these:



Uploaded with ImageShack.us



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

What do you guys reckon, obviously the depth would need to be modified (the largest I can find is 120mm which might even work) but would a machine like the 6090 be able to pull it off? I'll only be milling foam or mdf.

[aarggh]

Really nice machining on those parts! Is that a Batmobile?

For your question on whether a 6090 would do, I can say that mine, which is pretty much representative of the generic 6090 class machines, would have no trouble at all. I can get around 175mm-180mm under my gantry, so the only limiting factor is the length of the cutter.

Obviously a longer cutter will give you deeper cuts, but tool deflection then becomes an issue, for foam this wouldn't be so much of an issue, but I could see it being a problem with MDF, as you'd need to increase the diameter of the cutter, as you increase the depth of cut, or the density of the material being machining. Spindle speed and feed rate also becomes critical as your "chatter" will increase. The longest cutter I've used is a 120mm ball nsoe, and haven't had any problems, although I did dial the speed and feed rate down a bit to reduce the chatter and deflection.

But in short, no you shouldn't have a problem at all just so long as you take the above issues into consideration.

cheers,
Ian

[rffrda_p]

Thanks for the reply Ian!, I also took a look at you blog and now all I'm worried about is import costs and finding a good supplier.

I guess you could call it a very futuristic batmobile but no its a concept car model for automotive design at university. Which is what my machine will be busy making.

So if you can fit 180mm under the gantry, how much can you fit under the drill bit at its highest point? (I know this depends on the length of the bit so lets say 60mm) I'm just trying to find the maximum cutting height as I will most likely buy a machine very similar to yours but probably a desktop version so I can move easily when my flatmates kick me out for making too much noise and mess with it..lol

[thatotherguy]

A I wanted to play with Photocarve,I bought a 3040Z (small version of 6040) as my Syil is too slow and the head to heavy for the rapid up and down moves. I ordered it from lovehappyshopping. Arrived with the vertical axis shaft end 1/4" and 3/8" top plate badly bent, before it was packaged as no significant damage to packaging. Replacement ballnut and screw arrived quickly. After such an impact, I dismantled the whole machine to check for damage. There was none and the machine is a wonderfully simple but very robust bit of kit. It would be a simple job to use the mill the make a duplicate or larger model of itself. Having read the posts about the control box, I wondered how it was going to perform. However it was pretty ok, fairly accurate on positioning checks. Dont forget the cheeky way to get power to the opto isolated parallel port skt. It needs 5v stolen from the computer's USB. Saucy sods.
The Y axis ballnut has a grease nipple screwed in, the others have screwed port, but no nipple and would need to be dismantled to get at the nipple if one is fitted.

I purchased the same machine which should arrive in a few days. How did the machine workout for you?

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