I have an all steel CNC router, the table is a solid steel sheet, in top of that i made a waste board from a particle board with M8 inserts under arranged in a matrix
That board is well screwed to the steel sheet and fixed in multiple points.
The problem now is the board starts to lift and is no longer flat, beside that if i try to clamp my holders with high torque, screw starts to push the wood up on that area (start to crack), so it don't have the rigidity to hold hard stuff. It may due the weak quality of particle board and the lower thickness of 14mm after surfaicing. It work great for wood and some low DOC aluminium so far, but if i push DOC on aluminium the holders will not have force to secure the piece, and because i don't want to crack the wasteboard puting more force on holders.
So i have two ideias which i like to ask if they are a good way to go or bad ideia.
1) Do a waste board from 20mm 6082-T6, and use threaded holes to secure the pieces in same way of the previous waste board
Problem here will be when do woodworking and bit touch the surface, which almost never happen because i use a Z probe which work verywell and bits almost never touch wasteboard even when i do full thick cut, still that could happen and ruin the bit. So here's my aditional step to improve solve this:
2) In top of 1) have another waste board of wood (Pine or MDF) with same hole configuration, so my M8 screws will screw on aluminium sheet and wood will be there only to protect the aluminium sheet and bits from broke, that way i will have both (better fixture rigidity and the soft wood as waste)
3) Redo waste board in a better wood, mdf or pine?
which approach will be best? Or if you have better ideia i'm open...