[landmark]

I'm considering building a pipe cutter and I am trying to decide on which type of drive systems to use.

Friction drive: This would be two long parallel shafts with rubber drive wheels mounted on them every two feet or so. The shfts would be both driven with the same belt drive with a 620 stepper. The pipe would be set on the shafts and then rotate when the shafts are turned. The big advantage of this system is that the pipe will rotate the same speed no matter what it's diameter and it is easy to load. Downside is that it can slip.

Rotary table: This would use the a 10-12" rotary table and a adjustable stand with wheels to suport the free end. This will provide a solid connection to the pipe but loading is more difficult. And it will be more of a challange to get the speed right. I'm using candcnc blade runner electronics and I think they have some ways to adjust for the diameters, but I'm not sure.

I'm looking for advice from anyone who has used one. The friction drive will be cheaper to make and I like the ease of loading. One way I could reduce slipping would be to have a section of roller chain that is stretched over the pipe and is used to hold the pipe down with spring tension, this way I would be using more than just the pipes weight to hold it to the drive wheels.

Any thoughts?
thanks

[4R8]

I believe the "friction" drive to be the better option for the reasons you describe.
If the entire length is driven then slipping won't be an issue. Unless someone plays funny buggers and grabs the stock to check?
You couldn't do square or rectangular sections in this method with making additional components like adapters that slip over the stock to give it a round profile to enable it to roll, which would be placed at strategic positions along the stock.
I don't believe you'll even need that many contact point on the supports. 3-4 over a full length of pipe/tube (depending on wall thickness/rigidity) would be plenty.

[landmark]

I'm not too concerned about square stock. Seems like that would be best done on the slats. I build and sell cnc plasma tables and i'm just trying to come up with the best pipe cutting addon that wont cost a fortune and will be the most useful. I think I'm leaning towards this design at the moment. Now I just need to find some large low cost drive wheels that can be mounted on 1" bar.