Just a peek at what I am working on now?

The Project I am woking on now.  150 watt turns a concrete block into glass!  Definitely a favorite!

Nice work Werner (nice toys as well  )

I am looking forward to seeing some more pictures of the laser you are constructing - nice piece of kit.

Tweakie.

nb. I echo the thanks to Hood for his endless help and support to us all.

Looks good Garry!  I could take a few more pics for you next week.  As much as I love my 3x5 Router there are many things I would do differently.  I used a German made linear rail system you will see.  The aluminum extrusion linear rails where very pricey but have held up very well  over about 17 years of heavy use. I often machine aluminum and it does a very respectable job of it.  Thanks Tweakie I promise I will post pics of the laser project when I get a little further along.  I have just about everything for it now from casters to laser tube.  Garry do you have a thread with more detail on your project?

Garry do you have a thread with more detail on your project?

Yes, but it's a long way from being finished.

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/cnc_wood_router_project_log/138890-z%B2.html

Hey Gerry, I have spent hours reading you posts.  You have done some great work!!  I too love to design in 3D  (Solidworks) before cutting anything.  I have been down the path you are you are going and would highly recommend a valve to select one or the other dust collection hose.  4" hose works great for 3hp routers.  You will find a huge improvement.  Otherwise I assure you will end up with piles of saw dust you still need to vacuum up by hand.   One other thing I have found to be a huge improvement is the water cooled VFD motors in that they are so quiet and most importantly will not blow dust out of the collector shoe by the cooling air from a conventional router.  One thing I have often thought about is having the gate valve open/close with a link to the up/down action of the router.  Just some ideas Buddy! Keep up the great work!  And thanks for the Screenset!

Werner

Here you go Gerry more pics.

More Pics

More Pics

Gerry I bet you never thought that you could use your wood cnc router to cnc plasma cut 1/2" steel plate with just a simple attachment.
Cleaning the water tank is the only work involved.
I built a cnc router/engraver that I have used for years and yes I can even machine 1” aluminum and even steel with beautiful results as you can see in the video!! I have had a Hypertherm 1000 that I have had a lot of fun using- a very well built machine. It is a rather small machine really but will cut ½” steel plate with a very slow feed rate. I have built a very simple way to convert my cnc router to a cnc plasma complete with water bath in about 20 min. and back to cnc router in less than 5 min. not including clean-up of the plasma tank. That takes about 30 min. the way I do it. I built the hole thing in a weekend. There are two main components to construct. The first is an extension arm that mounts in place of my Portacable 3 ¼ hp router. The second is a water bath built from expanded pvc foam board. I tried the system out cutting a couple of large “C” plates from some 1/2 mild steel plate. Wow they turned out beautiful!! I had the feed rate turned down pretty low but even at that it only took about 10 min. to cut each, I made two. The cost to build the system minus the plasma machine was around $300. One thing is for sure I don’t think it could be any easier to set up than this. Hope you like video.

http://www.myspace.com/video/vid/2026423991