Back in 2000 when I was making the MIA Micro-FLIGHT Palm Size Helicopter Kits before any company was offering rc helis in that size and later I started offering the MIA Carbon and G10 fiber upgrade frames for similar palm size helis from E-Flite Blade and Walkera I made a water bed for cutting fragile carbon fiber parts. This video brings back those memories. Basically the same idea, made a frame from aluminum and plexiglass, sealed the enclosure very well with marine silicon caulk and ran a water pump. Bear in mind I was cutting hundreds of parts and my CNC was and still is 4x the Stepcraft, a custom machine with water pump an filters to both circulate the water and filter the carbon particles. It was much better than cutting dry, in fact the only way to cut carbon plate clean and safe. Being an efficiency nut I tried to recycle the water, but it could not be left standing for days , as it build up bacteria quickly. So the water had to be changed consistently. I did not use tape to hold the parts, I used screw on clamps that were built into the base of the tub and sealed to keep the water from leaking through the base. I stopped cutting carbon and offering upgrades made from such because it is nasty process, even cutting with water. For DIY hobbyists, great, but when you try that as a business and have to do it every day, it is a different story. I use to be on the CNC forums back in 2000 and I think I posted a few photos of my machine and tub. Great memories, had to get really creative and a lot of experimenting back in those years because no one was giving plans to build a tub or giving these cutting carbon "cleanly" secrets away back then. There was one image I found around 2003, and it was from a Chinese made CNC machine designed to cut tile an it looked like the tub was designed part of the machine table, so it was more permanent. If you go to my YT Channel and browse over the Blade and Walkera Upgrades I made you can see some of the frames upgrades that were cut from carbon and other materials wet.
Really enjoyed the video. A great insight for a new comer to the CNC world. My interest is specifically for cutting carbon parts for quads etc. I'm sure there is a market out there for 'CNC for beginner videos'.
btw one idea to this is to add a pump and reservoir that recycles the water and keeps it clean throughout plus you wont need to clean out the dirty water after your part is finished. i'm thinking of so many ideas now haha
You've saved me hours (days?) ! I think a small fish tank circulator with a filter will help with clarity The parts in my work can be drilled with locating points and clamped down to allow faster work. The question was more a matter of feasibility before choosing a cnc machine.
You could make some kind of holder for a coffee filter or something and then have the pump discharge into the filter that would drain into a container for recirculation. Throw the coffee filter away after each use?
great idea about milling under water! i usually cut aluminum carbon fiber fiberglass and steel and all the chips get everywhere. ill try the water method
To make one of these things yourself is challenging. But something tells me you will do alright ;-) Don't forget to make a build video. O, don't forget to check out Estlcam. You can connect the Arduino directly to the the stepper controllers. Works very nice.
+Joop Brokking I have a grbl motor controller shield for arduino, and I spent quite a bit of time becoming familiar with qcad last year, so I'd like to connect those two 'ends' together if I can. All the parts are here and I can't wait to get started but have no space to do it just now, and many other videos to make first :)
+Joop Brokking okay I checked out Estlcam - wow, exactly what I need! I did not pay much attention when you where using it in your videos, because the buttons on the left gave me the impression that it was a simple cad program, but of course I can just load my existing .dxf files, nice. Using the qcad/cam plugin and pycam together I eventually managed to get the toolpath with offset that I wanted but it was a lot of work, whereas Estlcam makes it very easy. It also lets you manually set the order of paths, and insert holding tabs, and the resulting sequence of cuts is more efficient too! And it's cheaper... I'll definitely be buying it, thanks for the tip!
Thanks for the compliments. I now use a diamond profile cutter and it works even better. The new bath that I made has higher side walls as you can see here: ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
Add a drain and run it into a sump/barrel/tank. Then you can have a constant flow of clear water to capture the CF dust. Once it has settled for a day or two, use a pond pump and run the standing water in the barrel through a 1 micron whole house filter for re-use. By letting the water stand and particulates settle to the bottom you will not be wasting your filters. Eventually there will be a pile of sludge to be disposed of. Funny how Stepcraft hawks their water bath, but says nothing about managing the dirty water.
Something very similar what you talk about can be found over in my channel. I bought a Millright Mega V when their Kickstarter opened last Sept. I bought it specifically because it's design lends itself to working over or in a water basin. My basin has a drain with adjustable water height and I use an aquarium "polishing" pad to catch the majority of the debris as the water cycles. Also Bannana Science has a water shield that screws onto the Dewalt DWP 611 router. Never had much luck with carpet tape and coroplast spoil board. I use 3D printed Tslot hold downs for bolting my carbon fiber down. My feed rates were significantly higher by having a rigid fixturing versus the capet tape/spoil board method. This was after working with 1.5 through 3mm end mills.
maybe an additional upgrade: water drain & feeder ? and optional filter? i dont know if its possible because of the fiber particles. maybe they will clog it. anyway i really like your videos! well explained and a nice calm voice :)
Thanks for the compliments! The carbon fiber particles are very abrasive. So they mess up everything they get in contact with. For now I leave it as is because it works very well.
A solution to your black water problem would be to have an inlet and outlet to the bath and change the water as the work is taking place or use a traditional coolant pipe and circulate the used fluid with your vacuum pump leaving the bath empty and allowing the coolant nozzle directed on the cutter to wash away the debris as it cuts, the pump may not last long due the abrasive nature of the fine carbon fibre. Just though I would mention as I feel your pain not being able to see through the fluid.
Great video, Joop! How would you compare this woven carbon fiber to 3D printing carbon fiber composites, if you have any experience with them. Just wondering because I'll probably will be 3D printing my MHQ2 hovership frame in carbon fiber.
Hi, I don't have any experience with 3D printed carbon fiber. I personally stay away from 3D printers because of the deforming in higher temperatures. Leave the material in a hot car on a sunny day and it starts to get soft. But maybe the current materials are much better.
+Joop Brokking There is a huge range of materials available now. I have seen you can even get PEEK filament. Not much chance of that going soft in your car!
I have worked with both of these. As tempting as the carbon fiber filament sounds it really only adds stiffness and not strength. With most 3D printer the carbon fiber has to be ground up to small fibers to mix with the plastic and go through the extruder. When you chop the fibers you loose the tensile strength which is where the strength is. I had really good results milling urethane foam and aircraft plywood and then using epoxy and covering that with Kevlar and vacuum bagging it. You can still can build your own custom parts but you get a much better strength to weight. Carbon would work well too but it blocks radio signals. Kevlar is harder to work with, not quite as strong but super durable. The arm I made for my quad weighed one ounce and I could hang a 15 pound weight off the end, 240x it's own weight.
hey, great video thanks.. just wondering what spindle your using? i'm looking at getting a stepcraft machine and was tempted to get their 500w spindle. but now i've seen this i'm tempted to get a dremel or something.. what thickness material can you cut??
I'm looking to cut carbon from my own quad projects. Do you think this machine is good enough to cut 3mm carbon pieces? I am looking at the 420 myself.
If you have a good spindle motor and cutting tool you can use this for 3mm carbon fiber. I used it with 2mm without any problems: ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
If you have a good spindle motor and cutting tool you can use this for 3mm carbon fiber. I used it with 2mm without any problems: ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
Joop Brokking is it just the base version for the 420 or did you need to buy the parallel interface as well (so it works with Arduino Uno)? I'm thinking of getting one and want to make sure I get everything i need to start.
Yes, I bought the LPT version so I could easily connect it to the Arduino. You might be interested in my Stepcraft 420 build page: www.brokking.net/stepcraft_main.html
When milling larger pieces I sometime drain some water with a wet vacuum cleaner and replace it with clean water during the process. But in most cases it's not necessary.
Corbon fiber is a real pain to cut. In the water bath I use 20mm/min for my own projects. It takes some time to make the parts but the results are really clean.
What if I have to cut 5mm? 20mm/min, multiple depths 1mm. I'll try it. Thanks for the suggestion. I also used the wrong carpet tape. It got loose because the water dissolved it.
For 5mm try 20mm/min in 2 passes of 2.5mm. Also try 5mm at once and see what works best. It mostly depends on the quality of the machine you are using.
Wow I just saw stepcraft's suggestion to use freakin MAGNETS to secure the stock plate. Their comments are disabled so leaving this here. btw at these feeds you can use cheap 0.8 mm router bits from China. They last ages and allow for finer details in your design
![First Attempt at Machining Carbon Fiber - Light Duty Utility Knife [#173]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/ijq3YgwElPA/mqdefault.jpg)
Back in 2000 when I was making the MIA Micro-FLIGHT Palm Size Helicopter Kits before any company was offering rc helis in that size and later I started offering the MIA Carbon and G10 fiber upgrade frames for similar palm size helis from E-Flite Blade and Walkera I made a water bed for cutting fragile carbon fiber parts. This video brings back those memories. Basically the same idea, made a frame from aluminum and plexiglass, sealed the enclosure very well with marine silicon caulk and ran a water pump. Bear in mind I was cutting hundreds of parts and my CNC was and still is 4x the Stepcraft, a custom machine with water pump an filters to both circulate the water and filter the carbon particles. It was much better than cutting dry, in fact the only way to cut carbon plate clean and safe. Being an efficiency nut I tried to recycle the water, but it could not be left standing for days , as it build up bacteria quickly. So the water had to be changed consistently. I did not use tape to hold the parts, I used screw on clamps that were built into the base of the tub and sealed to keep the water from leaking through the base. I stopped cutting carbon and offering upgrades made from such because it is nasty process, even cutting with water. For DIY hobbyists, great, but when you try that as a business and have to do it every day, it is a different story.
I use to be on the CNC forums back in 2000 and I think I posted a few photos of my machine and tub. Great memories, had to get really creative and a lot of experimenting back in those years because no one was giving plans to build a tub or giving these cutting carbon "cleanly" secrets away back then. There was one image I found around 2003, and it was from a Chinese made CNC machine designed to cut tile an it looked like the tub was designed part of the machine table, so it was more permanent. If you go to my YT Channel and browse over the Blade and Walkera Upgrades I made you can see some of the frames upgrades that were cut from carbon and other materials wet.
Really enjoyed the video. A great insight for a new comer to the CNC world. My interest is specifically for cutting carbon parts for quads etc. I'm sure there is a market out there for 'CNC for beginner videos'.
btw one idea to this is to add a pump and reservoir that recycles the water and keeps it clean throughout plus you wont need to clean out the dirty water after your part is finished. i'm thinking of so many ideas now haha
You've saved me hours (days?) !
I think a small fish tank circulator with a filter will help with clarity
The parts in my work can be drilled with locating points and clamped down to allow faster work. The question was more a matter of feasibility before choosing a cnc machine.
You could make some kind of holder for a coffee filter or something and then have the pump discharge into the filter that would drain into a container for recirculation. Throw the coffee filter away after each use?
I's really clever to machine the carbon fiber in a water bath, I didn't think of that.
You deserve your thumbs up ;)
SUPERB video! Clear presentation. You need to make more CNC videos, my friend! You should put the endmill you used in the description. ;)
great idea about milling under water! i usually cut aluminum carbon fiber fiberglass and steel and all the chips get everywhere. ill try the water method
Very nice! I have some parts already to make a little CNC machine, I want to try plywood and hopefully FR4 too.
To make one of these things yourself is challenging. But something tells me you will do alright ;-) Don't forget to make a build video.
O, don't forget to check out Estlcam. You can connect the Arduino directly to the the stepper controllers. Works very nice.
+Joop Brokking I have a grbl motor controller shield for arduino, and I spent quite a bit of time becoming familiar with qcad last year, so I'd like to connect those two 'ends' together if I can. All the parts are here and I can't wait to get started but have no space to do it just now, and many other videos to make first :)
Estlcam will make a perfect connection between the grbl shield and the qcad .DXF files.
+Joop Brokking okay I checked out Estlcam - wow, exactly what I need! I did not pay much attention when you where using it in your videos, because the buttons on the left gave me the impression that it was a simple cad program, but of course I can just load my existing .dxf files, nice. Using the qcad/cam plugin and pycam together I eventually managed to get the toolpath with offset that I wanted but it was a lot of work, whereas Estlcam makes it very easy. It also lets you manually set the order of paths, and insert holding tabs, and the resulting sequence of cuts is more efficient too! And it's cheaper... I'll definitely be buying it, thanks for the tip!
Good content! Have you found any good source for cheap good carbon fiber sheets?
a downcut bit could help with splashing, as well.
Another really useful video thanks. Perhaps a splash-guard around the cutter? Sort of a wet version of a dust collector??
Thanks for the compliments. I now use a diamond profile cutter and it works even better. The new bath that I made has higher side walls as you can see here:
ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
Add a drain and run it into a sump/barrel/tank. Then you can have a constant flow of clear water to capture the CF dust. Once it has settled for a day or two, use a pond pump and run the standing water in the barrel through a 1 micron whole house filter for re-use. By letting the water stand and particulates settle to the bottom you will not be wasting your filters. Eventually there will be a pile of sludge to be disposed of.
Funny how Stepcraft hawks their water bath, but says nothing about managing the dirty water.
Something very similar what you talk about can be found over in my channel. I bought a Millright Mega V when their Kickstarter opened last Sept. I bought it specifically because it's design lends itself to working over or in a water basin.
My basin has a drain with adjustable water height and I use an aquarium "polishing" pad to catch the majority of the debris as the water cycles.
Also Bannana Science has a water shield that screws onto the Dewalt DWP 611 router.
Never had much luck with carpet tape and coroplast spoil board.
I use 3D printed Tslot hold downs for bolting my carbon fiber down. My feed rates were significantly higher by having a rigid fixturing versus the capet tape/spoil board method.
This was after working with 1.5 through 3mm end mills.
Hello Joop, great video, nice idea.
What are your plans for preventing corrosion on the rotary tool? Just drying out and lubricating afterwards?
I use a little grease to protect the head of the spindle. Works very well.
Thanks!
maybe an additional upgrade: water drain & feeder ?
and optional filter? i dont know if its possible because of the fiber particles. maybe they will clog it.
anyway i really like your videos! well explained and a nice calm voice :)
Thanks for the compliments! The carbon fiber particles are very abrasive. So they mess up everything they get in contact with. For now I leave it as is because it works very well.
How do you dispose of wastewater?
A solution to your black water problem would be to have an inlet and outlet to the bath and change the water as the work is taking place or use a traditional coolant pipe and circulate the used fluid with your vacuum pump leaving the bath empty and allowing the coolant nozzle directed on the cutter to wash away the debris as it cuts, the pump may not last long due the abrasive nature of the fine carbon fibre. Just though I would mention as I feel your pain not being able to see through the fluid.
Great video. I enjoyed your narration.
Have you tried a cutter that pushes the work down to the table instead of trying to lift it off?
Great video, Joop! How would you compare this woven carbon fiber to 3D printing carbon fiber composites, if you have any experience with them. Just wondering because I'll probably will be 3D printing my MHQ2 hovership frame in carbon fiber.
Hi, I don't have any experience with 3D printed carbon fiber. I personally stay away from 3D printers because of the deforming in higher temperatures. Leave the material in a hot car on a sunny day and it starts to get soft. But maybe the current materials are much better.
+Joop Brokking There is a huge range of materials available now. I have seen you can even get PEEK filament. Not much chance of that going soft in your car!
I have worked with both of these. As tempting as the carbon fiber filament sounds it really only adds stiffness and not strength. With most 3D printer the carbon fiber has to be ground up to small fibers to mix with the plastic and go through the extruder. When you chop the fibers you loose the tensile strength which is where the strength is.
I had really good results milling urethane foam and aircraft plywood and then using epoxy and covering that with Kevlar and vacuum bagging it. You can still can build your own custom parts but you get a much better strength to weight. Carbon would work well too but it blocks radio signals. Kevlar is harder to work with, not quite as strong but super durable. The arm I made for my quad weighed one ounce and I could hang a 15 pound weight off the end, 240x it's own weight.
This is not true of the Markforged 3D printers. We have one and the CF is laid into the print as one continuous thread.
Can i use dremel 300 120-130watt to cut carbon fiber? And if i can what rpm and speed i have to choose ?
If you want to go through tonnes of bits and take ages
Nice video and idea. Do you know name of your double sided tape, or do you think every double sided tape should work under the water? Thanks :-)
It's used to secure carpets and should be available in your local diy shop.
Not better buy on ali uc100 adapter and printing over mach3?
What sacrificial material do you use, thanks😊
hey, great video thanks.. just wondering what spindle your using? i'm looking at getting a stepcraft machine and was tempted to get their 500w spindle. but now i've seen this i'm tempted to get a dremel or something.. what thickness material can you cut??
Please check this website: www.brokking.net/stepcraft_main.html
Great original research thank you.
what specific bit is that? tough finding a 1/8 1/4 chip bit for FC. Thank you.
I'm looking to cut carbon from my own quad projects. Do you think this machine is good enough to cut 3mm carbon pieces? I am looking at the 420 myself.
If you have a good spindle motor and cutting tool you can use this for 3mm carbon fiber. I used it with 2mm without any problems:
ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
If you have a good spindle motor and cutting tool you can use this for 3mm carbon fiber. I used it with 2mm without any problems:
ua-cam.com/video/8A23UG0VPpo/v-deo.html
Joop Brokking is it just the base version for the 420 or did you need to buy the parallel interface as well (so it works with Arduino Uno)? I'm thinking of getting one and want to make sure I get everything i need to start.
Yes, I bought the LPT version so I could easily connect it to the Arduino.
You might be interested in my Stepcraft 420 build page:
www.brokking.net/stepcraft_main.html
will be purchasing soon thank you so much.
Hi. Im looking at purchasing the stepcraft 840. I'm a newbie but want to do some wood jobs on it. Grow into machine. Would you recommend the machine?
Yes, the 420 still gives me very good and reliable results. You can read my build blog here: www.brokking.net/stepcraft_main.html
Do you take orders for custom parts
One drop washable medium accepts the surface tension so that the water stays calm.
I tried it but it did not work for me. The 3mm end mill kept scooping water through it's flutes.
Great video thank you
Have you thought about using a small pump and a filter to recirculate and clean the water? Just saying...
When milling larger pieces I sometime drain some water with a wet vacuum cleaner and replace it with clean water during the process. But in most cases it's not necessary.
What speed did you cut this 100mm/min? Carbon thickness? single pass? Just cut some 2mm today @ 300mm/min and failed.
Corbon fiber is a real pain to cut. In the water bath I use 20mm/min for my own projects. It takes some time to make the parts but the results are really clean.
What if I have to cut 5mm? 20mm/min, multiple depths 1mm. I'll try it. Thanks for the suggestion. I also used the wrong carpet tape. It got loose because the water dissolved it.
For 5mm try 20mm/min in 2 passes of 2.5mm. Also try 5mm at once and see what works best. It mostly depends on the quality of the machine you are using.
i so your video, fantastic, but i have a question, how i can program the arduino uno ?????
The Arduino is programmed with the Arduino IDE that you can download here: www.arduino.cc/en/Main/Software
perfect, thanks so much but i have another question, i have arduino uno clone, the process is the same?
Good idea , thank!
I enjoyed this video :-)
What kind of end mill are you using?
Check this page: www.brokking.net/article_milling_carbon_fiber.html
Wow I just saw stepcraft's suggestion to use freakin MAGNETS to secure the stock plate. Their comments are disabled so leaving this here. btw at these feeds you can use cheap 0.8 mm router bits from China. They last ages and allow for finer details in your design
hi what was the material used as a sacrificial piece
3:16 Depron
+Joop Brokking thank you very much..
very nice
I would give you 2 likes if I could.