A3 Marchant Dice Kit

[neo]

PART1 : More money than sense!
I appreciate this is not quite the same as building your own, but I didn't feel I could commit myself to months of planning and building. So I spent months trawling the various forums for info and then decided to buy a ready made CNC. (I went for a Kit as it was slightly cheaper). I was quite surprised at how much they cost and how few are available at this end of the market I was even more surprised to see there was more available outside the UK than homegrown.
Nonetheless I thought a UK company would be better for aftersales support..........


Here's my 'build log' of my recent CNC in kit form purchase.
I know its a not a true DIY build, it was just a case of bolting prepared parts together. :heehee:
Not rocket science, although there's no plans, check list or parts list supplied. So if there's a part missing (which there was several) its difficult to work out what's missing, what it looks like or indeed what it's called to report it. you end up describing it in your terms not what the company calls it, which can lead to misunderstanding to say the least!

I really was surprised at paying out so much money not to even get a check list.
I can go to Comet and buy a product for a few pounds and get an instruction manual in every language, and you often get a parts list or exploded view of the item included.
You do feel a bit p***** off when you eventually work out its not all there.!!

Anyway back to the build...
Without any reference material, it's therefore a case of looking at the parts, placing them together, more looking at parts, no idea which part to start with, bolting a couple of parts together only to realise its back to front and you have to undo it and start again. the sequence is probably 2nd nature to those in the know but not for a first timer.
Now I pride myself on having a excellent tool selection sockets, spanners, drivers, allen keys etc etc, however,the next 'problem' was discovering you need a longer allen key than standard to put two deep box aluminium sections together. so a quick trip to the hardware store to buy one for 45p and £1.00 to park!

Once again you can buy flat pack furniture for hundreds of pounds and have single use allen keys and spanners to put together your purchase, it's the little things like this which makes it a better experience. unfortunately going out to buy one allen key just made me more p***** off! for the price I paid this is something which could have easily been included.

That a side, after a couple of false starts, it started to come together. my 15yr old helped i.e I told him to tighten the screws 'here' and 'there' and we made fair progress through the sequence.

To be fair there are only two complete parts to build: the lower Y axis and the upper x,z axis parts.
i quess they can be built in any order and then you just bolt the two sections together. I started with the x, z axis parts, then put them to one side whilst i built the y axis base. when It came to putting the two together, you realise how heavy and awkward its all become, turning it on its side to locate screws etc then came the next problem, there were no special nuts to join the two parts together. I checked the packaging several times, I wrongly assumed they were a sort of nyloc nut, once again a check list would have identified their abscense and an exploded diagram would have shed the light on the fact they were of a special shape and design.

I had to wait a week for the 'missing parts' to arrive before I could bolt the two parts together......

Part 2 to follow.........

Neo

[ptjw7uk]

I wish you well with your endevour.
On the subject of tools to do the job I will regail you with something I or my work mates just could not understand.
iIn the 1970 when I was working for a research organiseation we had ordered a new PerkinElmer Atomic Absorption spectrometer which was duly delevered in a special packing case from the USA. We looked at this box and cauldnt quite see how one was supposed to gain entry so we left it for the engineer to open. He duly arrived and produce a 2ft long special driver to fit through the top of the box and unscrew the fixing screws. When the box lid was removed he showed us that inside was the very same driver and he said that he and others could not explain why it was inside the box. I still have that driver and in 30years I have never found a thing that it will fit.
On the allen ket front may I sugest that you invest in some T-handle keys, they will come in very handy.

Peter

[Lee Roberts]

Looking forward to part two here !

[gabi68]

Hi,

I have a one of Kevin unit (mine it is the same like that YouTube link) and what I can tell you is you mad a BIG mistake buying that. I know it is too late... You will find many things will go wrong and also you will find you need to make your own modification to have a working machine.
To start check:
- assembly ball screw housing Y axis.
On mine I found a piece of plastic which it is supposed to work like a nut fixing. After I put all and try to tune machine with Mach that piece came out and Y ball screw was unusable. Speak with Kevin and replacement (I don't know why he didn't put that initially) came next day.
- the end of X ball screw has a screw which supposed to line up the ball screw in bearing
Try not to move the machine to the end of ball screw movement. If you do that that screw will came off and you will need to dismantle entire X axis to fix that. A "quick" fix is to install limit switch on all axis.
- Z axis has the same problems. Do not run the axis till the end of movement linear bearings will be affected.
On mine I found the Z axis with a Proxxon spindle don't reach the surface and I need to "lift up" the T-slot table with some 20 mm aluminium profile's and proper bolts.
About the support - that it is almost NIL. That guy (Kevin) take your money and after that you are on your own. If you have a problem you must send the unit for fixing and you need to pay for shipping and everything.
I don't know if he don't know much about how this machine must be made it (in all stages - design - stress (with Algor or something else) - manufacturing) or he doesn’t care about that.
Anyway if you still have the original packaging box I suggest to send that back for a full refund. Make sure you secure very good what it is inside and pay insurance for package.
I don't have anything with that company but I am an unsatisfied customer which pay a lot of money (with all 1700 GBP mechanical parts only since I have all electronics parts) and still must work and spend more money to have a working machine. I also want to advise people to pay attention when they spend money on this junk.
Have a look on this:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DjBUPQqfu0"]YouTube- eagle pcb emc2[/ame] look at comments and that links to see how good it is that machine.
Sadly I found that after I ordered mine

Good luck
Gabi

[neo]

Thanks for the comments, now you've got me concerned!

I thought it looked fairly robust, it all appears to be well made, everythings rigid, tight and turns smoothly by hand. I've yet to get it going as I'm still trying to source a suitable PC for the shed.

As regards to his support, so far I've had fairly good relations with Kevin, I understand he's been away but he's sorted my initial problem fairly quickly. I've had no reason to phone him to date. I choose Marchant over the others as it was Uk based. I never thought they would n't support me.
I assume they will.....

I do have a minor issue but I assume its being sorted, I was fairly confident that I'd get mine going without any hiccups. (although I have emailed him this weekend to remind him )

I'm prepared to persevere but I'll bear your comments in mind...

Hopefully once its going I can show how good it is!..........or ?

Neo

[irving2008]

Gabi and Neo,

Thanks for your comments so far. Neo, impressed with you efforts so far, look forward to part 2 and on and the eventual running of your kit. Gabi, sorry to hear of your issues, hopefully your previous feedback to MD has been received and Neo won't have so many, and that you've managed to resolve them and got your machine working.

I'm saying this as a gentle reminder that the forum is a place to share information and knowledge and not to slag a supplier off. Its true that MD have had their ups and downs and detractors, but one person's experience may not mirror another's.

A small company like that is unlikely to have the research and development budget or the resources that an Ikea has on producing kits. I can tell you from personal experience that producing a kit that can be assembled out of the box is far more difficult than producing a finished article, and its probably true that their target market isn't the complete novice with no mechanical nous. So one should expect things not to be perfect, and work around them. Nevertheless it isnt unreasonable to get sufficient support to resolve issues.

Thanks for listening

[gabi68]

Hi,

1. I choose to buy my machine assembled not a kit. I decided that to avoid the assembly problems. Problems are almost the same.
2. I was thinking a forum it is made it to help people in their decision's to spend hard earned money. What I am posting it is NOT a negetive feedback for MD. It is my experince with that company and their product.
3. When you launch something in a kit form you must test that very hard and try to make that "stupid proof" almost 100%. If you choose to adopt M$ policy (launch a product and let customers to discover all bugs and after that write some SP-acks or better make another software ;)) you will end up to have a bunch of unhappy customers.
3. Even big company (Ikea) made mistakes. I just bought a coffee table from Ikea and when I try to assemble it I failed. I must spend 3 hours to put some pieces which manufacturer forgot to think about it.
4. I just try to help talking about my experince but after you post it that it is wrong. Sorry for posting my experince....

Good luck

[irving2008]

Hi,

1. I choose to buy my machine assembled not a kit. I decided that to avoid the assembly problems. Problems are almost the same.
2. I was thinking a forum it is made it to help people in their decision's to spend hard earned money. What I am posting it is NOT a negetive feedback for MD. It is my experince with that company and their product.
3. When you launch something in a kit form you must test that very hard and try to make that "stupid proof" almost 100%. If you choose to adopt M$ policy (launch a product and let customers to discover all bugs and after that write some SP-acks or better make another software ;)) you will end up to have a bunch of unhappy customers.
3. Even big company (Ikea) made mistakes. I just bought a coffee table from Ikea and when I try to assemble it I failed. I must spend 3 hours to put some pieces which manufacturer forgot to think about it.
4. I just try to help talking about my experince but after you post it that it is wrong. Sorry for posting my experince....

Good luck

Gabi,

Please dont misunderstand me, posting experiences are fine and thats exactly my point.

I certainly want to ensure that people reading these forums are given information on the pros and cons of a product or supplier. As long as it your experience and you explain what it was, how it was resolved or not then that is fine. There is a fine line between saying 'I had this experience' and 'Dont buy from XYZ, they are a bunch of xxxxxs' without hard unrefutable evidence. I just wanted to deflect any of the latter as we've had some bad experiences already of that on the forum with people slagging off products. Of course I realise sometimes these things are subjective, and one mans design etc.....

It is good to hear of your experience, and the fact that yours wasnt a kit, which wasnt clear to me before, makes it all the more concerning. I'll admit I have had an issue with the company in question myself, which was resolved satisfactorially, although I would have prefered that it didnt happen in the first place. That doesnt make them a bad company necessarily, but I agree once bitten etc... however I did go back another time and had a good experience. I've also had my share of bad experiences from Ikea, yet there are also good experiences and strangely we always seem to go back....

Don't let that stop you from posting, we all have a lot to learn from each other.

regards
Irving...

PS, I know what you mean about M$ but they are big and ugly enough to look after themselves.

[gabi68]

Ok, point taken. I'll agree I post some name's. Belive me I was (still I am) very upset about how THEY try to solve my problems. I already spend a lot of money and I still have to do some modification myself to have that router working.
If it is something which I strongly reccommend to anyone who want to step in CNC area is to read and build his own machine.
I have a CNC router almost ready (90% in design stage - many things to do) but I still having trouble to find a company who want to cut my parts at a resonable price.

RGDS
Gabi

[ptjw7uk]

I do not think all the problems we experience are always the companies fault.
It can be due to our having little or no knowledge to that of the companies who aften assume we, their customers know more than we actually do.
I'm afraid that even doing yourself can be a very slippery slope as there is so much we have to learn and sometimes just do not know what questions to ask. Even if you are supplied with instructions a small lack of understanding can lead to problems which could not be envisioned by more knowledgably people.
It would be nice gabi69 to know where you are situated!

Peter