CNC and electronics

Ice-9

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Hi all, I have been into electronics design for many years now with plenty experience with PCB design. Lately I have been getting into CNC milling/ routing having got hold of a Chinese CNC for hobby. I have made many improvements over the standard systen, anyone else here interested in CNC?
 
Hi all, I have been into electronics design for many years now with plenty experience with PCB design. Lately I have been getting into CNC milling/ routing having got hold of a Chinese CNC for hobby. I have made many improvements over the standard systen, anyone else here interested in CNC?
I have a Bungard CCD which (not recently) I used to route and drill home-made boards although I would like to try building a proper 3-axis one from scratch. Probably with the same sort of aluminium extrusion used on the Bungard.

I don't have the space to do that at the moment :(.
 
nice one did a bit copper board and acid

and Transparent sheet and UV

but CNC milling look amazing
 
nice one did a bit copper board and acid

and Transparent sheet and UV

but CNC milling look amazing
I could, but I've never tried contour isolation routing (actually milling the tracks). I always preferred chemical etching :).
 
I could, but I've never tried contour isolation routing (actually milling the tracks). I always preferred chemical etching :).

I haven't tried making pcb's with the cnc, I mostly use it to mill out all the cut outs and recessing on aluminium guitar pedal enclosures.
The cnc mill itself has been upgraded with a 1k5 water cooled spindle, more powerful steppers and I have built a better quality controller to replace the crap electronics that came with it.
I would love to design and build my own machine, I think the Xzero Raptor is a good design to use as a basis for your own design.
 
Here is a pic of my cnc3040 setup with the modified spindle mount, 1k5 water cooled spindle and upgraded steppers. These mods make the gantry look tiny in comparison :) but it is big enough for what I use it for. I will build my own gantry one day though.

IMG_0192.JPG
 

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I have found that for the cutting I do I don't need to cool the bits. I have tried using coolant/cutting oil from an aerosol but it just means I have to stand by the job all the time and it creates a lot of mess and also increases the noise from the milling.
The spindle water coolant tubes go into that little white bucket at the back of the machine, inside is an aquarium submersible water pump. coolant is distilled water and antifreeze for alloy.
If in the summer months this is not adequate to cool the spindle then the little white bucket is sealed with silicone sealant and can be dropped into a larger bucket with tap water in, I might rig up some type of pc cooling radiator instead.
 
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