When I was researching CNC machines about a two years ago, I read a lot of the build threads and problem posts on here. They were very helpful in making my mind up to purchase a PRO4896. Something you notice is that the posts taper off once people have their machines built and bugs worked out. So in light of that, I'm going to do a one year post-build update of sorts.
MY MACHINE - I purchased the PRO4896 with the NEMA 34 Plug and Play electronics. Initially I used the router mount with a 2HP Hitachi Router. My machine was purchased just before the switch over to linear rails. I did not purchase the leg set, opting to fabricate a wooden base with large laminated timber beams. My base weighs about 400 - 500 pounds I estimate. I purchased a Lenovo Think Pad laptop ($250 on Amazon) to use as a dedicated machine to run Mach 3 . The computer sits on a rolling cart I built that also holds my bits, tools, and misc supplies. I mounted an inexpensive 27" HDTV to an arm on the cart for better, eye-level, visibility. I also purchased a second Think Pad specifically for the design software - Vetric, Mozaik, Fusion, etc.
MY SHOP/BUSINESS - I have a 2500 s.f. cabinet/woodworking shop in a two year old all steel building. It's insulated with gas heat, 3-phase power, and all high intensity LED lighting. We fabricate custom built-in cabinetry, architectural millwork, and interior design elements. Occasionally we will build kitchen cabinets but that is not really our focus as the field is fairly full of cabinet manufactures and we aren't interested in competing. We design some of our products, but usually receive CAD drawings from interior designers we work with. Sometimes we get actual files from them for certain design elements we are going to directly cut out, mostly decorative panels and screens. I have five employees - one office and four shop/field.
SOFTWARE - We purchased MACH 3 and Vectric CUT 2-D with the machine. We upgraded our Vectic software to V-CARVE PRO a few month later. I have played around with Fusion but more so for generating 3-d files for my home 3-d Printer. We are looking into the slicing features currently for some 3 dimensional furniture projects. From what I read the tool paths created by the Vectric or Mozaik programs we use will work better with a CNCRP machine than the Fusion paths, which might require some tinkering (time I don't have)
THE BUILD - Aside from some minor issues, all mistakes on my part, and quickly corrected thanks to quick help from the awesome folks at CNC Router Parts, I had the machine up and running within a month. During the build, CNC Router Parts issued the newer linear rail version of this machine. I was offered an upgrade at an extremely discounted price given my very recent purchase of the older kit, but elected to stick with the v rail version as it was operating fine. I'm still not sure an upgrade is worth while until I notice wear or bearing issues wit the v rail system.
SPOILBOARD - I'm using 3/4" MDF with a non-standard attachment method. I'm sure there are a million reasons why I should be doing it this way, but since I have a wood base with a wood top that the machine is bolted too, I simply drill holes with a forstner bit about 3/8" into the sheet immediately adjacent to the cross rails and use long GRK lag screws to attach. It's a very quick process and haven't had any deflection or stability problems. Technically the spoil board and the frame of the machine aren't directly connected, both being attached to the machine base. I surface the board with an the Amana mini spoil board cutter with replaceable cutters.
WORK HOLD DOWN - I purchased the composite nailer and 1 1/4" nails with the machine. This system while not being anywhere near as good as a vacuum table, is fast and does work. You need to use tabbing.
DUST COLLECTION - My machine is located some distance from the main trunk of my shop dust collection system - a 3hp cyclone - so I opted for an independent dust collection system for this machine. I went with a small General collector with a canister filter. This cleans easy with the crank arm, however, the bag is smaller and fills up fast. The bag is also a pain to change. The filter is problematic - it's easy to clean out the pleats with the cleaning arm, but this can only be done when the machine is not running and the blower has stopped spinning. Large MDF cuts clog the filter and I have to shut down mid-cut to clean and between the shut down and the loss of efficiency during the cut, dust collection isn't very effective at times. I purchased the Kent Dust Shoe. When I upgraded to a spindle I had to purchase a new Kent Shoe. These shoes work great and are easy to remove and replace. Not much visible wear on this after a year. Initially a 4" hose was extended above machine using a few bungees attached to a steel i-beam column of my shop wall. Later, to improve this system I added a steel cable across my shop that runs along the center line of the CNC machine about 10' above the table. The 4" hose is attached to pulleys that run along the cable. This set up allows for very smooth movement of the hose with no potential for impeding machine operation. I intend to change out the small dust collector for a smaller (1 1/2 HP) Jet Cyclone dust collector. This will be easier to empty and will keep filter clear of most clogs. I also recently installed a Holz-her vertical panel saw adjacent to the CNC machine that has a bag dust collection attachment but is also a hassle to empty. I will tie both machines into the newer cyclone.
SPINDLE - As mentioned, I upgraded to the CNC Router Parts Spindle/electronics after using the router for a few months. I'm glad I started with a router as I managed to bend the shaft of the first router. The installation of the spindle was straightforward. I'd would have liked a larger spindle so I could cut at faster speeds, but it has been adequate so far.
MOZAIK CABINET SOFTWARE - I'd thought of using the Vectric software to produce cabinetry components. It's possible to do this, but after looking into Mozaik cabinet design software I decided to try it for three months. It's an yearly subscription type arrangement that works out to about $125 a month. This is still cheaper than most other similar products and with the subscription you aren't stuck with one version of the software as it is updated frequently with improvements and bug fixes. I've had for around a year and there have been many improved features during. Purchasing the yearly subscription comes with two hours of phone training (two one hour sessions) The first helps get the software loaded and set-up for your specific uses, along with a little training. The second is to get the software working with your machine. The initial training session was helpful, the second was not. The person from Mozaik in the second session didn't really listen to my specific integration issues and didn't understand the CNC Router Parts machine and it's limitations. He was a horrible listener and spent at least half the time basically telling me if I wanted to learn more I should pay for a few more training hours. The software they sent me to enable the program to generate G-code for a CNCRP machine didn't work. I had to debug it myself and change a few lines of code myself. They had the z axis set up completely reversed (which cost me a Hitachi router as I bent the shaft of the router) After I fixed this I began to realize that this software is designed for us with a much larger CNC machine. A big problem was that it had options to set the number of passes for pocketing operations, but as I found out later, this feature wasn't active yet (I believe it is now) Pocketing operations for say, RAFIX fasteners were done in one plunge - far too aggressive for a CNCRP machine. I broke a lot of bits due to this flaw. The drawing program works well and produces good drawings for presentation. Setting things up for how you build cabinets is a little awkward - almost too many variables that can be changed in multiple menus. The nesting works well and there are now easy options for recutting specific pieces if needed. Another nice feature is that if you use tabbing, which I do, the machine generates a tool path for cutting out the tabs. I run this last on each sheet and it gently cuts away the tabs - almost vacuum table production. Since Mozaik assumes most users will have a ATC on their machine, the tool path creation is geared more toward that. You can opt out of things for a CNCRP machine where you are changing tooling manually, but saving the individual tool paths can be tedious. Some runs we have can be up to 15 sheets of material. This means saving up to 60 individual tool path files and changing the g-code in Mach 3 after each run. Files would be for - 5mm hole drilling, pockets (dados and rabbets), profile (cutting out pieces), and tab removal (last path on each sheet) Typically we need to change out to 5mm bit for just the shelf hole machining. The trouble is that if you group the remaining paths (that use the same tool) into a single tool path, the program picks the order of operations and for some reasons picks the worst possible arrangement. When I tried this it ran the tab removal paths first. Besides needing the tabs until the very end, once again there was no allowance for a stepped plunge - just a violent one shot thing that could have damaged the machine. With the newer version of Mozaik, it's easy to rearrange the nested sheets and what we tend to do lately is to group things, if possible to keep the actual tool changing to a minimum, since this involves swapping the bit and re-zeroing the z axis each time. We also try to group the cabinet backs onto sheets in order to cut these on our vertical panel saw. The panel saw is very precise and cuts very smooth. I just figured its more economical from a time and tooling standpoint to cut out the backs the old-fashioned way. Also, I can do this while the machine is cutting out the other parts. A nice feature with Mozaik is that you can select machines in the nesting section. If you select "Table Saw" instead of CNC Router, it will nest the parts for optimum cutting on a table saw, or in our case, a vertical panel saw. There are a few other flaws with Mozaik that you need to work around at times. We use 1 1/4 door overlays. As far as I can tell you can't adjust the overlays for the side and top/bottom of doors so if you don't have at least a 2 3/4" face frame rail between, doors will overlap - no feature to catch this automatically. You need to either manually correct the door sizing or adjust the face frame. Every version of the program fixes bugs and awkward features and adds some new ones. They update at least a few times a year with new versions. Despite the steep learning curve, I'd recommend this program for the value and extensive features (once you master all of them) . If we constructed generic kitchen cabinetry we would have fewer glitches, and in fact, Mozaik even has a feature to automatically populate a room with kitchen cabinets. Would save a lot of time if this is all you did.
CABINET CONSTRUCTION - We keep it simple. Cabinet casework is all 3/4" maple plywood (pre-finished if solid doors, un-finished if to be painted) This includes the back panels. There are pros and cons to going with such thick backs. It does make the cabinets much heavier, and costs a little more, but this is outweighed by, stronger construction, more gluing area, elimination of nailers (these look cheap in my opinion), not handling multiple materials, and ease of installation. All casework is fit together with dados. Maple face frames are used, attached with pocket screws and glue. Once cut on the CNC the cabinet components are labeled, using a label printing feature in Mozaik. I originally labeled parts with masking tape and sharpie. After mixing up a few pieces we switched to the printed labels - We place on the edge of the piece so they end up on the back of the cabinet or buried in some dado. Having more information than on a piece of masking tape helps to keep things organized. A nice feature with Mozaik is that you can adjust the scribe on all sides of the cabinet and the back as needed. This allows the use of wide face frame stiles instead of using filler pieces. Cleaner look to your finished products.
OTHER CUTTING - We do a myriad of other fabrication operations using the CNCRP machine. No sign making - mostly interior and exterior architectural details. The newer molding feature on the latest version (I think latest) of V-Carve has been a moneymaker for us - for our own work and for other contractors.
TOOLING - Information on proper tooling was sparse when we first started running our CNCRP machine. What was out there sort of lead me to believe I needed to be using expensive compression bits on everything. After breaking many many bits, I realized that a standard 2-flute bit cuts out 3/4 maple ply fine with nice edges. At $16-17 a bit it's easier to just add one or two to each job and use fresh ones and toss the old. We haven't really hooked up with a tooling rep yet, but have been using either Whiteside or Freud. Most other tooling are Amana bits ordered on-line. We have cut most materials except for metals on the machine - wood, plywood, melamine, mdf, composites, plastic, foam, etc. One material that I'm not a fan of cutting on a CNCRP machine is melamine. It's difficult to secure as it's a slippery material and dulls bits fast. If all you intend to cut is melamine, you might want to get a more powerful machine with a vacuum hold down. We are getting into closet/storage systems more, but are using a hybrid fabrication system - CNCRP machine for hole drilling and other pocketing machining, but all cuts are being done on the Holz-her Panel Saw. The Holz-her has an unique scoring attachment (not a rotating scoring blade) that gives us glass sharp edges that edge band very nicely. It was not possible to get as sharp edges with a router bit.
SUMMING IT UP - Please take this as a "what works for me" with my unique circumstances. Overall I have zero complaints about the CNCRP machines and was probably one of the best moves I made purchasing it. There customer service and commitment to their product is stellar. The Vectric software is great - not sure if I need to upgrade to Aspire, but that is possibly in the future. The Mozaik software had a steep learning curve but at the end of the day, it works for me, and at the end of the day is much less of a financial commitment than KCW or 20/20 or Cabinet vision. Will I upgrade the machine to linear rails? Maybe, but not in a rush. I need a new zeroing plate as I've managed to mangle ours one too many times. They were out last time I checked but will order as soon as new shipment is in. I will be redoing the dust collection to improve efficiency and make changing out dust easier. Other than that I will continue to use the machine. It's hard to figure the number, but if I had to guess, I've cut at least 500 sheets of material in the past year. Only recommendation I have is that I would start out with a router, especially if you are using unfamiliar software Destroying a $100 router is a lot less disconcerting than a $1700 spindle. Also, since Vetric upgrades are reasonable, I would probably start out with Cut 2-d Keep the features limited until you master them, and then had more in V-Carve or Aspire. This worked for me as when I went to V-Carve, learning the new features seemed easier, already knowing the basics. I would be happy to answer any questions. Again, just my one year experience with a CNCRP machine - looking forward to many more.