Saskatoon TechWorks Forum

I know I just missed the last meeting, but I just came across this site today. I am interested in meeting some of you and seeing what this club has to offer. I posted in the "Introduce Yourself" thread and I am just wanting to learn more about Mach3 and DIY CNC machine building. I have a few high precision servo drives that I want to reconfigure into a CNC milling station to be run off of Granite Device drives and Mach3. It will be built mostly to be used for lexan and the odd wood part, but if I can design it stiff enough I would like to do some light aluminum work as well.

This is one of the axis' I have.

Ooh, ballscrews. Fancy!

We're having a project night tomorrow (tuesday), you're welcome to pop by and meet the gang. Our next monthly meeting will be october 11th.

We have a couple CNC guys in the group. Thesaxmachine has a CNC-converted Sherline mini-mill, and I've got a small homebrew CNC router (working on a larger one). I'd be happy to answer any questions you've got about CNC basics or about mach3, and I'm sure Sax would as well.

Yes and they have a Heidenhain linear encoder that is accurate to 1 micron! My machining process will eat into that precision a bit, but that's fine by me!

I may be free tonight (all depends on how my wife is feeling), what time is the meet? 220- 20th Street Studio D right? Near Boomtown Outfitters (I haven't been on 20th in a while)? Is there a secret knock?

I think officially it starts at 7. Boomtown isn't around anymore, but it's on the block where Boomtown used to be. I'll post a sign with a phone number you can call to get let in.

Linear encoder with 1um, that is fancy!

Sounds good. I'll be by around 7pm as long as my wife is doing okay.

Odemia they came off a decommissioned x-ray machine used for inspecting PCB's. I managed to get through two machines and salvage six axis'. I'm guessing they aren't cheap!

Was really nice meeting some of you and I have done some very preliminary design work for laying out a CNC mill. It will be designed stiff enough that I will be able to machine aluminum, my biggest concern I will have is plugging the flutes on the mill without any cutting fluid/coolant.

Some people suggest a jet of compressed air to keep the kerf clear of chips. You could give that a try.

So this project is temporarily on hold, thanks for all the info rsilk and allowing me to check out your CNC machine! This is on hold as I bought a CNC plasma table and should have it running by the new year. THEN I can begin the fab work for building this CNC machine! I found a servo driver that will work with the linear scales and servo motors:

http://www.granitedevices.fi/index.php? ... rive-vsd-e

It's about $300/axis, but the drivers will work with Mach3 so it's nice to know there is support for it locally here in S'toon!

Also I've been MIA for a bit as we just had a baby girl a bit over a month ago.

did you buy the one off of kijiji saskatoon?