Dear Sir, I really appreciate your work and genius ideas. Thank you for sharing knowledge with us. You need to put one pot on pipe output to protect material chips to come into the water pump and choke it. Or much better two pots, one larger and one smaller fitted inside each one, so coolant will over spill from larger into smaller pot, so it will reduce chance for chips to come inside the water pump. Also, I like to use pump from washing machine, it is much better for this project, more durable and also have larger inside diameters. Thank you again for your work !
Yes, using a settling basin is a common way of removing particles from a fluid. I had that in mind, too, but with a filter the design is more compact. With the foam filter, the chips are kept away from the pump. Especially with metal chips, my filter works very good (at least during the few test runs I have made so far). Plastics chips are more tricky to handle because of their low density. An advandage of using a tank to seperate particles is that the machine is much more easy to clean after work, bacause all the chips are in the tank rather than in the bowl of my machine. I'll keep that in mind for future improvements. Thanks fo sharing your thoughts!
Sorry, but I don't use closed source spyware named Windows. You can get Linux for free and install it on your PC and it's definitely the better choice for robotics, machine control and simply any type of computing. For example Ubuntu is no bad choice for a beginner: www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
Hi, I greatly appreciate your videos, like the approach (home made) behind them. I have a bit off topic question(s) I'm building my own cnc and at some parts I'd like to use 4 relatively small steppers (nema23 270oz) from the same driver (MA860H) if possible Further more I'd need that 2 out of 4 would be easily changeable from running along or against the other two. So if two would run clock wise then the other two would run counter clockwise or clockwise if that's what I need. Would this be possible by simple rewiring the two? Reason behind is that I'd like to use these 4 motors for turning the base plate being the 4th axis or in different application the two pairs would run against each other moving a (different) base plate in a linear motion creating an extended Y axis. I'd like the cnc to be easily changeable from a 3 axis for flat cutting to a 5 axis for carving. Thanks for reading.
Both have their pros and cons: DC motors with encoders (closed loop) don't loos steps. You can even power off the machine and have a quiet night. It will continue working where it was as long as the Arduino (and so the sensors) are still powered through USB. Biplar stepper motors are brushless motors, thus there is (almost) no wear on the mechanics.
I suggest using orange oil in the oil, it is generally water soluble. Environmentally friendly yes and also bio degradable. Also plain vegetable oil mixed with water may work. Grape seed oil is also a good choice.
Orange oil is popular for degreasing things. However it is fairly viscous. VS grapseed oil is thicker, it has the consistency of 40w gear oil. I suspect grapseed oil can be amulsed by your pump fairly easily.
When you try other lubricants, please measure the temperature of both the bit and the ambient temperature of the coolant after some time cutting. I'd like to see what high pressure air aimed directly at the bit would do for temperature drop and cleaning of the bit, I know that adds additional complexity and risk to your design though.
Using high pressure air will spread the chips in my workshop without an additional vacuum exhaustion. I will implement something like that later on my machine. It's good for woodworking. No bad idea, but I must get an adequate temperature sensor (pyrometer) for the readings.
great video :-) seeing that you are cutting very different materials with this machine I was wondering if you could talk a bit about spindle speeds and feed rates for the different materials in one of your next videos?
Next thing to do is working on the software so that I can fine tune the feed rate. Currently it is a very rough adjustment. If that works, I will of course talk about parameters of machining.
Wouldn't you get a better finish by using a cutter with more flutes than just two? Also, about the software, the less-than-ideal state of which you've mentioned: have you ever considered using something like LinuxCNC? I found it pretty efficient and easy to work with. Could be more practical than having to write an optimized program from the ground up!
Yes, the more flutes, the smoother the finish - as long as all machine parameters are correctly adjusted and the mechanics is (widely) free from backlash. A two flutes milling cutter is a good allrounder. I won't write a CNC program from scratch, but adapt my machine to LinuxCNC or other open source software. It's all about making my CNC process G-code by writing a new Arduino sketch.
The thing is, LinuxCNC is a motion controller, it provides the motor control signals almost directly, in the form of motor direction and step signals. That's pretty much what made me try it, I didn't need to write a G-code processor/interpreter. I made a simple stepper driver around a Microchip PIC because that's what I had at hand, but for stepper motors, even using good old 74-series up/down counters with preload would have been sufficient. Your Arduino code already has enough to interface with LinuxCNC. It just needs to make your DC motors look like steppers to the computer. Unless, of course, you really want to write a G-code processor for the Arduino for "academical" reasons, which I also understand, haha. Und übrigens: frohe Weihnachten! :)
Thanks for the hint! I still did not find time to have a look at CNC software. The one I have written does what I want my machines to do. However people are asking for G-code functionality or interfacing with CNC software and I try to fulfill whishes, especially on Christmas ;-) Dir auch ein frohes Fest!
Yes, there is nothing better than quality tools. In long term use they are cheaper than the cheap tools... That feed rate calculator is a nice utility. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Sorry, but I don't use closed source spyware named Windows. You can get Linux for free and install it on your PC and it's definitely the better choice for robotics, machine control and simply any type of computing. For example Ubuntu is no bad choice for a beginner: www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
Make organic emulsified oil cutting fluid. Just dump some oil in there with your soapy water, and alcohol. The alcohol is a de-foaming agent. It lowers the surface tension of the liquid. That recipe is what makes "milk". Your cutting fluid will look like skim milk. Rub some between your fingers, to feel it. It should feel slick, and slimy. If not add some more oil.
+HomoFaciens the de-foaming component is the trickiest. Alcohol may not be the best, but it is the most accessible. I'll give you another pro tip, try not to use scented soap. Because no scent seems to come across right in this concoction. I used liquid dish detergent, and it worked, but it did not have a pleasant odor to it. More unpleasant really. Some kind of bargain powder detergent may be best?
You don't need such a high concentration to make the fluid flammable, but yes, the fumes might catch fire... Another yes, soap isn't soap - there is a lot to be considered. Another thanks for sharing your knowledge.
+HomoFaciens the real magic is the fact that you can get oil and water to mix. So you have a lubricating coolant that is also somewhat rust inhibitive too. You still have to clean the coolant up off metal though. But it won't rust metal quite as quickly as when there is no oil in it.
Back in the 1980's we still used either turpentine or denatured white spirit as coolant (though it was forbidden) when cutting aluminium. It produces a very good surface if your cutting speed and feed is set correctly. In the good old days milk was also used as coolant, but it required a lot of cleaning... so it is not recommended.
It's the first time I heard about using milk. Turpentine and spirit are inflamable, thus I'd like to avoid those coolants. Maybe if the software allows to fine tune the machine parametert I will give it a try. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
You are very welcome. You can find the formulas etc. in Tabellenbuch Metall from Europa Lehrmittel. I remember that book from the 1980's where I used it a lot as reference in the workshop.
Milk is organic emulsified coolant. You get it by mixing oil in water. Which you can do with detergent. Who says oil and water don't mix? But you also need a defoaming agent. Alcohol works.
@Paul: Well nowadays milk could mean an emulsion, but in the good old days it was milk, just as lard and slugs (snails) were used to grease wagon wheels. A suitable (not ideal) emulsion can be made by mixing two-stroke oil and water in equal measure and shake it hard.
If you know how to handle lasers, you can turn nearly any CNC into a laser engraver. If you don't kno how to handle lasers, keep your hands off. I have no plans turning my CNCs into laser engravers in the near future. There is more I'd like to teach first.
First I have to make this 3 axis machine run reliably. Adding axes means adding backlash and complexity. Creating a quality machine having 5 axes is no easy task.
muhnd kalil Of course it is, because 5 axis CNC machines already exist. The question is how precise such a machine will be and you can't answer that question until you have build it...
Dear Sir, I really appreciate your work and genius ideas. Thank you for sharing knowledge with us. You need to put one pot on pipe output to protect material chips to come into the water pump and choke it. Or much better two pots, one larger and one smaller fitted inside each one, so coolant will over spill from larger into smaller pot, so it will reduce chance for chips to come inside the water pump. Also, I like to use pump from washing machine, it is much better for this project, more durable and also have larger inside diameters. Thank you again for your work !
Yes, using a settling basin is a common way of removing particles from a fluid. I had that in mind, too, but with a filter the design is more compact.
With the foam filter, the chips are kept away from the pump. Especially with metal chips, my filter works very good (at least during the few test runs I have made so far). Plastics chips are more tricky to handle because of their low density.
An advandage of using a tank to seperate particles is that the machine is much more easy to clean after work, bacause all the chips are in the tank rather than in the bowl of my machine. I'll keep that in mind for future improvements.
Thanks fo sharing your thoughts!
восхищаюсь проделанной работой. так держать!
Thanks for your great effort if possible cnc control program for windows
Is it possible to use sifting program with this machine Thank you
Sorry, but I don't use closed source spyware named Windows. You can get Linux for free and install it on your PC and it's definitely the better choice for robotics, machine control and simply any type of computing.
For example Ubuntu is no bad choice for a beginner:
www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
Thanks for sharing! It's really inspiring and interesting :)
Hi,
I greatly appreciate your videos, like the approach (home made) behind them.
I have a bit off topic question(s)
I'm building my own cnc and at some parts I'd like to use 4 relatively small steppers (nema23 270oz) from the same driver (MA860H) if possible
Further more I'd need that 2 out of 4 would be easily changeable from running along or against the other two. So if two would run clock wise then the other two would run counter clockwise or clockwise if that's what I need. Would this be possible by simple rewiring the two?
Reason behind is that I'd like to use these 4 motors for turning the base plate being the 4th axis or in different application the two pairs would run against each other moving a (different) base plate in a linear motion creating an extended Y axis. I'd like the cnc to be easily changeable from a 3 axis for flat cutting to a 5 axis for carving. Thanks for reading.
If you have a 2 phase bipolar stepper motor (4 wires) you can swapp the direction of rotation by simply swapping the two wires of one phase.
I was hoping for something like this, thanks!
What do you think are better for CNC machine:- Stepper motors or DC motors with rotary encoders.
Both have their pros and cons:
DC motors with encoders (closed loop) don't loos steps. You can even power off the machine and have a quiet night. It will continue working where it was as long as the Arduino (and so the sensors) are still powered through USB.
Biplar stepper motors are brushless motors, thus there is (almost) no wear on the mechanics.
I suggest using orange oil in the oil, it is generally water soluble. Environmentally friendly yes and also bio degradable. Also plain vegetable oil mixed with water may work. Grape seed oil is also a good choice.
I never used orange oil or grape seed oil. Sounds like it is worth a try.
Thanks for sharing!
Orange oil is popular for degreasing things. However it is fairly viscous. VS grapseed oil is thicker, it has the consistency of 40w gear oil. I suspect grapseed oil can be amulsed by your pump fairly easily.
You can use regular motor oil.
Happy new year!
When you try other lubricants, please measure the temperature of both the bit and the ambient temperature of the coolant after some time cutting. I'd like to see what high pressure air aimed directly at the bit would do for temperature drop and cleaning of the bit, I know that adds additional complexity and risk to your design though.
Using high pressure air will spread the chips in my workshop without an additional vacuum exhaustion. I will implement something like that later on my machine. It's good for woodworking.
No bad idea, but I must get an adequate temperature sensor (pyrometer) for the readings.
Thanks.
great video :-) seeing that you are cutting very different materials with this machine I was wondering if you could talk a bit about spindle speeds and feed rates for the different materials in one of your next videos?
Next thing to do is working on the software so that I can fine tune the feed rate. Currently it is a very rough adjustment.
If that works, I will of course talk about parameters of machining.
This is really cool work.
Literally ;-)
:D **Drum fill**
Badoom tish.
Wouldn't you get a better finish by using a cutter with more flutes than just two?
Also, about the software, the less-than-ideal state of which you've mentioned: have you ever considered using something like LinuxCNC? I found it pretty efficient and easy to work with. Could be more practical than having to write an optimized program from the ground up!
Yes, the more flutes, the smoother the finish - as long as all machine parameters are correctly adjusted and the mechanics is (widely) free from backlash. A two flutes milling cutter is a good allrounder.
I won't write a CNC program from scratch, but adapt my machine to LinuxCNC or other open source software. It's all about making my CNC process G-code by writing a new Arduino sketch.
The thing is, LinuxCNC is a motion controller, it provides the motor control signals almost directly, in the form of motor direction and step signals. That's pretty much what made me try it, I didn't need to write a G-code processor/interpreter. I made a simple stepper driver around a Microchip PIC because that's what I had at hand, but for stepper motors, even using good old 74-series up/down counters with preload would have been sufficient.
Your Arduino code already has enough to interface with LinuxCNC. It just needs to make your DC motors look like steppers to the computer.
Unless, of course, you really want to write a G-code processor for the Arduino for "academical" reasons, which I also understand, haha.
Und übrigens: frohe Weihnachten! :)
Thanks for the hint! I still did not find time to have a look at CNC software. The one I have written does what I want my machines to do. However people are asking for G-code functionality or interfacing with CNC software and I try to fulfill whishes, especially on Christmas ;-)
Dir auch ein frohes Fest!
I think whatever coolant you need a bit higher pressure jet to evacuate the chips
...another paramter to be adjusted. I'll implement that as an option in the software.
Curious to see what would happen with a half decent cutter. How much would it cost to get a decent cutter like a sandvik?
The cutter I am using isn't the cheapest. It's not that bad, but there is nothing better than quality tools.
Yes, there is nothing better than quality tools. In long term use they are cheaper than the cheap tools...
That feed rate calculator is a nice utility. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Thanks for your great effort if possible cnc control program for windows
Is it possible to use sifting program with this machine Thank you
Sorry, but I don't use closed source spyware named Windows. You can get Linux for free and install it on your PC and it's definitely the better choice for robotics, machine control and simply any type of computing.
For example Ubuntu is no bad choice for a beginner:
www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
Make organic emulsified oil cutting fluid. Just dump some oil in there with your soapy water, and alcohol. The alcohol is a de-foaming agent. It lowers the surface tension of the liquid. That recipe is what makes "milk". Your cutting fluid will look like skim milk. Rub some between your fingers, to feel it. It should feel slick, and slimy. If not add some more oil.
Thanks for sharing your formula. Using alcohol as de-foaming agent is a good hint. It will also stop the growth of microorganisms in the emulsion.
+HomoFaciens the de-foaming component is the trickiest. Alcohol may not be the best, but it is the most accessible. I'll give you another pro tip, try not to use scented soap. Because no scent seems to come across right in this concoction. I used liquid dish detergent, and it worked, but it did not have a pleasant odor to it. More unpleasant really. Some kind of bargain powder detergent may be best?
You don't need such a high concentration to make the fluid flammable, but yes, the fumes might catch fire...
Another yes, soap isn't soap - there is a lot to be considered. Another thanks for sharing your knowledge.
+HomoFaciens the real magic is the fact that you can get oil and water to mix. So you have a lubricating coolant that is also somewhat rust inhibitive too. You still have to clean the coolant up off metal though. But it won't rust metal quite as quickly as when there is no oil in it.
Back in the 1980's we still used either turpentine or denatured white spirit as coolant (though it was forbidden) when cutting aluminium. It produces a very good surface if your cutting speed and feed is set correctly. In the good old days milk was also used as coolant, but it required a lot of cleaning... so it is not recommended.
It's the first time I heard about using milk. Turpentine and spirit are inflamable, thus I'd like to avoid those coolants. Maybe if the software allows to fine tune the machine parametert I will give it a try.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
You are very welcome. You can find the formulas etc. in Tabellenbuch Metall from Europa Lehrmittel. I remember that book from the 1980's where I used it a lot as reference in the workshop.
...da werde ich mal nach Googeln. Thanks!
Milk is organic emulsified coolant. You get it by mixing oil in water. Which you can do with detergent. Who says oil and water don't mix? But you also need a defoaming agent. Alcohol works.
@Paul: Well nowadays milk could mean an emulsion, but in the good old days it was milk, just as lard and slugs (snails) were used to grease wagon wheels. A suitable (not ideal) emulsion can be made by mixing two-stroke oil and water in equal measure and shake it hard.
What about making a laser engraver CNC?
If you know how to handle lasers, you can turn nearly any CNC into a laser engraver. If you don't kno how to handle lasers, keep your hands off. I have no plans turning my CNCs into laser engravers in the near future. There is more I'd like to teach first.
Thanks for share.
can you make 5axis cnc?
First I have to make this 3 axis machine run reliably. Adding axes means adding backlash and complexity. Creating a quality machine having 5 axes is no easy task.
HomoFaciens but it possible right?
muhnd kalil
Of course it is, because 5 axis CNC machines already exist. The question is how precise such a machine will be and you can't answer that question until you have build it...
5:12 SPÜLI :D
Werbung mache mir awwer net - so lange nix bezahlt wird ;-)