[ericclinedinst]

So I got this thing all built this past fall and winter and am having great issues finding the patience to get it all trammed/squared/calibrated.

Here are the pics as it stands

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My build was clean and straightforward but doing all the final touches is seeming to be never ending. I bought one of the protram indicators from Edge Technologies hoping that tramming would be easier. Definitely not so.

What's a good process for tramming this thing? Squaring the gantry?

Should I take a skim layer off first then tram to that or what?

[bonesbr549]

I'm in the middle of my build, and I can't speak to calibrating yet, but I can to squaring. I will say it does take a bit of patience. I also got the leg kit, and I put it all together, but none of it final tight.

I especially left the cross members loose and checked it corner to corner. I was within a 1 to 1.5 mm across 9'. I juggled and wiggled till I got that corner to corner dead on. I then tighened them up and checked again. I then leveled it all. While I"m not to calibration yet, I will be close soon. When I run the gantry down, it seems to be dead on,

I bet, I loosened and tightened 20 times to get it perfect.

Good luck and don't give up!

[ericclinedinst]

So tomorrow I am going to surface my spoilboard. I have this bit Buy Freud 16-108 Mortising Router Bit 1/2" SH 1-1/4" D 1/2" CL at Woodcraft.com

Any input on feed/speed? From what I can tell from the chip load calculator here https://www.vortextool.com/images/chipLoadChart.pdf

from what I can figure, I need to either go 600ipm at 12000 rpm or 400ipm at 8000 rpm.

Can the pro4896 handle these speeds?

What about stepover?

Pros... please help!

[ger21]

Those Vortex chiploads are really for high quality spiral bits, and targeted at industrial machines with ±10HP spindles.

Now, since you're only removing a small amount of material, you can actually run with a pretty high chip load.

But since it's your first time, I'd probably run it at about 10,000 rpm and 250-300ipm. You could program it for 500ipm and start with the feedrate override at 50%, and increase the override if you feel compfrotable with it.

I'd normally say to use a 1" stepover with that bit, but if the spindle is way out of tram, a smaller stepover will give you a smoother surface to work with.

[ericclinedinst]

Perfect. Thanks for the response. I'm using a 2.2kw spindle. As for tramming after I surface the board I assume I can use the protram unit I got from edge technologies on top of a piece of glass to get it all squared up and then resurface?

Will this remove any of the ridges? Or am I going about this all wrong?

Also read on this bit that I need to do a ramp in? I'm going to do a pocketing tool path in aspire. Removing 0.0125 material. How long of a ramp etc should I be using?

[ger21]

As for tramming after I surface the board I assume I can use the protram unit I got from edge technologies on top of a piece of glass to get it all squared up and then resurface?

Sounds like that should work, as long as the glass if flat.

If it's trammed well, you won't have any ridges after re-surfacing.

For such a shallow depth, a ramp length of 1.5-2" is fine. Assuming your ramping from the surface, and not the rapid height.

[kjk2002]

I had a terrible time tramming my machine because tightening the bolts on the mount always threw out the adjustment - then I realized that the bearings on the Z were not properly adjusted. Once I got them done, tramming went smoothly.

[ericclinedinst]

Well here are the results of surfacing. This was at 10,000 rpm 300 ipm with 80% (1 inch stepover as recommended)

I don't think I had the ramp in exactly right because it slowed down a lot to make that happen. I am attaching screenshots of all the results. Also attaching a picture if how my tool is set and the machining settings I used for the pocket.

GER21. What do I do next?

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[ger21]

I would do it again with a 30% stepover, then use your glass and tram the spindle.

[ericclinedinst]

Why the smaller stepover?

I also feel like I'm not ramping properly and what about the "plunge speed"?

[ger21]

Do the smaller stepover before tramming to get a little smoother surface.
Plunge rate should be close to full feedrate when ramping.

[ericclinedinst]

Ok. I did this one conventional is that ok or is climb better? How much should I take off this pass?

[ericclinedinst]

Ger did exactly what you said. But I put the tramming tool in the spindle before hand and saw that I was about 0.002 out of tram on the long axis. So I bought a set of Harbor Freight feeler gauges and used the 0,002 one in between the router mount and the z axis. This seems to have made my tramming perfect! What do you think? I took 0.008 off this time around instead of 0.0125

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Thanks so much for your help!! I honestly couldn't have done this without you.

I have had other cncrouters before but this is now the best one I've ever had. My spoilboard has never had a finish on it like this does. I am super pumped!!!

How much do I owe you??

[ger21]

Looks pretty good.
Now, in the future, you can use the 80% stepover again.

On our 5x12 machine at work, I skim .005 if it's not too bad, or .01 when it's worse.