Anyone know of someone with a CNC router?

[Jeremy Harris]

I had hoped to have my home-made CNC router built by now, but I've been too busy to put it all together and then learn how to drive it.  It's first job was going to be making an oak house sign for the new house.  I have the design drawn up in CAD, and also have a selection of oak boards, so I'm looking for someone who can rout out the design for me.

 

The sign is about 500mm x 200mm, and includes text and a simple line graphic, that I'm hoping should be fairly easy to cut with a vee routing bit.  All I can find online are people who make complete custom house signs, and they are expensive, as they include hand finishing, sealing etc, all stuff I'm happy to do myself.

 

Does anyone know of someone with a small CNC router that could do this job for a reasonable fee, please?

[Russell griffiths]

Blue peter style 

one I made earlier 

[Russell griffiths]

I did this one by hand freestyle 

if you fancy doing it yourself I could point you in the right direction for the correct bits, and the better type of router

 

if you haven’t got the time or inclination, I can’t help sorry. 

@JSHarris

[Jeremy Harris]

Very many thanks, but I don't think my routing skills are up to that quality!  I have the design sketched out, and having seen a CNC router working I'm sure it wouldn't take long to do.  I probably have enough oak to do two or three, so could cope with one being screwed up.  This is the design:

 

[MikeSharp01]

I can do it if you want Jeremy. 

 

Edited June 23, 2018 by MikeSharp01

[Jeremy Harris]

12 minutes ago, MikeSharp01 said:

I can do it if you want Jeremy. 

 

 

 

That's exceptionally good of you, Mike.  What sort of file is best?  Would a DXF be OK?

 

I'll sort out the bits of oak and PM you.

 

[MikeSharp01]

The picture you gave is fine for the fly, the machine will scan it, and for the text just let me know the font.

[MikeSharp01]

Here is a celebration breadboard I did this week but cocked up the clamping and on the last cut it moved, pain in the butt, its 295 diameter, - will do another shortly. (The 130 is their total lifespan)

[Jeremy Harris]

The font is Lucida Calligraphy, approximately 180pt, or around 50mm high for the capital "M".  I have the artwork as a pen and ink line drawing that my sister did for me that I've scanned and can either send a JPG or a print at the right scale.  I think I've enough 20mm thick oak to make at least three blanks, but need to check, and it'll be a few days until I'm able to sort if out, as we're away for my mother's funeral much of next week.

 

Thanks again.

[MikeSharp01]

Ok PM me when you are ready to send the oak over and we will take it from there.

[Jeremy Harris]

6 minutes ago, MikeSharp01 said:

Ok PM me when you are ready to send the oak over and we will take it from there.

 

 

Wilco, thanks again.

[Cpd]

Great SKILLS gentleman ! Wow really impressed and inspired, I have a lovely makita palm router that I would like to use to do something along these lines, @Russell griffiths What machine did you use and can I get the bits for my router ?  

[Onoff]

2 hours ago, MikeSharp01 said:

I can do it if you want Jeremy. 

 

 

Did you make your own machine or just have access to one?

[Jeremy Harris]

For info, I have all the parts to build a CNC router, but like many other projects it's been on hold whilst the house was being built.  All the parts are stored over at the new house, but I can dig them out and take photos if anyone is interested.  I was lucky, in that I picked up a super accurate Z axis assembly from a local lab scrap sale, and made a spindle, using an 8mm shaft diameter large diameter brushless DC model aircraft motor, adding an additional bearing to take the cutter loads and replacing the 8mm shaft with an 8mm shaft diameter ER11 collet chuck, like this: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/C8-ER11A-100L-8mm-Collet-Chuck-Holder-Extension-Rod-Straight-Shank-CNC-Milling/201894678514?epid=769118241&hash=item2f01dc4ff2:g:9fkAAOSwSypY9Ilr

 

Although the Z axis is more or less complete, and I have all the extrusions, rails, lead screws and nuts, stepper motors etc for the rest of the build, there's a few weeks work to get the machine built, plus a few more weeks whilst I go up the CNC learning curve.  When finished it should have a cutting area of around 800mm x 800mm, with about 150mm of Z axis travel.

[MikeSharp01]

I have access to one - I spend a day a week on it. It belongs to a very old friend who cannot use it any longer so I go and help him out. 

[Construction Channel]

the way this thread has gone is exactly why this forum is great, 

 

If only I was clever enough to ask first before I start hacking things up myself  

[PeterW]

I have a small one built of wood - cuts around 300 x 300 and 100mm of Z travel. 

 

Made of 4x1 and skate board bearings it’s surprisingly accurate. Downside is the cheapo Chinese driver sometimes skips so I tend to do stuff a section at a time. 

[SteamyTea]

1 hour ago, PeterW said:

I have a small one built of wood - cuts around 300 x 300 and 100mm of Z travel. 

Do you have plans for it, sounds like a fun project.

[PeterW]

Will see if I can find them - was off the net and dead easy to build. 

[Onoff]

47 minutes ago, PeterW said:

Will see if I can find them - was off the net and dead easy to build. 

 

Was it here?

 

http://www.cncroutersource.com/cnc-router-plans.html

[PeterW]

No it was a Solsylva set of plans - don’t seem to be on the web anymore. 

[Jeremy Harris]

Just to close this off, by chance I was talking to a neighbour who happened to have a 4ft x 4ft home made CNC router in his workshop.  So. rather than take up @MikeSharp01s kind offer, I decided to have a go myself, under the guidance of my neighbour, who clearly had a fair bit of experience of driving the software.  I laminated up some of our left-over oak skirting boards, that were 120mm x 20mm, to make a double thickness board, with the joins offset and the grain as best matched as I could make it on the joins.  I ran my router down each pair of boards to be edge glued just to make sure I got a tight joint.

 

When epoxied together I ended up with a board about 40mm thick, 500mm long and 240mm high.  We started off by playing around with the mayfly design to make it easier to route out - took a couple of ours of fiddling to simplify it and make it looks reasonable.  Next, we took a thin skim of both side of the sign (it's double sided) to make sure it was dead flat.  The routing out of the text and mayfly was pretty simple after that, we ran a test on a bit of MDF, which looked OK, then went for it with the oak.

 

It came out pretty well, and I stained the oak with a dark oak wood stain, then sanded the flat surfaces to remove most of the stain, leaving the routed out bits much darker.  Two coats of clear exterior finish and it looks like this, ready to go up on the gallows post I managed to get concreted in on Monday:

 

 

 

[MikeSharp01]

Looks great @JSHarris they are great machines aren't they. 

[Jeremy Harris]

8 minutes ago, MikeSharp01 said:

Looks great @JSHarris they are great machines aren't they. 

 

 

Thanks, I'm pretty pleased with it as a first effort, albeit with a lot of help.  It's made me all the more determined to assemble all the parts I have for the one I was planning to build - that stalled when  we started building the house, but I have all the parts to make the frame, gantry, all the linear rails and bearings, even the stepper motors and lead screws, and a part built brushless motor driven spindle, with an ER15 collet.

[Ferdinand]

Looks good.