[electro5]

So I purchased an older Vision 2448 engraver without the controller for next to nothing. I've got enough stuff laying around here to replace the steppers and control it with a Gecko G540.

The thing I'm not sure about is if it would be possible to mount a 1.5 kw spindle on it. It's one of the typical 80mm ones from China.

I'm not mechanical enough to know how much of a load the THK bearings can take with the spindle mounted where the engraving spindle is now. It uses supported linear rails that are mounted horizontally rather than vertically like I normally see them on build pictures here.

Alternatively, I could just keep the engraving spindle in there. They make a conversion kit to allow it to use collets and standard tooling instead of the long top load engraving tools. Would that spindle be powerful enough to do any real work?

While the components don't seem overly heavy duty, the machine is very well made. I feel like it has some use for wood cutting but was hoping to actually do the smart thing for once and see if anyone here had any thoughts before I start drilling holes in it to mount the spindle.

Thanks

[aminear]

I have converted my engraver, similar to this one. I would recommend just changing your spindle to a collet system. If you remove the existing one, measure the existing hole. Buy a collet holder and bearings to fit into existing location. You may have to machine a vbelt pulley to attach to your collet holder. I would recommend ER11 collet holder, this will accomodate upto 1/4" bits.