I've built this machine 100 different times in my head!!!

[Iwant1]

Finally I get the courage to join the forum and start making threads after 2 yeas of first stumbling onto it. When I first got the craze to build my own router, I got so wrapped around the idea I was going to build this incredible machine, which most of my friends don't even know what it is, I started ordering parts without any plans drawn.

So my list of components I have are,
3 sy60sth88-3008bf motors
3 pm752 drivers
breakout board
20mm supported round rail for the x and y axis at 1200mm and 800mm respectively
15mm profiled rail and slides for the z axis at 550mm long
4 1605 ballscrews with nuts and mounts
a 50v minebea psu from ebay, but will eventually build my own.

All this was bought 2 years ago from Zapp and Chai, so now I have to reverse engineer my router to fit these items. I have made some detailed drawings of how I would like my machine to look, but would like some input on a few things.




Ok, as you can see I've been trawling all the build logs and tried to incorporate what I think would be best for my build.

The gantry sides and whole z axis will be made from Ecocast 20mm x 200mm wide ali plate.
The rear plate to the gantry will be 10mm thick which I hope will be sufficient.
The Z axis will have rails on the front plate and slides in the back plate.
All axis will be connected with screws using pulleys and currently at a 1:1 ratio just to get the machine moving.
The frame, which is very similar to Jonathan's, will be made from 50mm steel box section and 50mm x 100mm for the top supporting rail. I'm planing for some adjustability so will be welding the whole bottom section but will use plates and bolts for the top RHS on to which the 20mm suported x axis rails will be resting on. I won't be using any welding on this top section to avoid warping. The actual cutting bed will be height adjustable too.

A few questions I have will be described with illustrations.




The Z axis I have uses 15mm NSK profiled rails and slides. The problem here is that the total height from the bottom of the rail to the top of the slide is 16mm. The ballscrew mounts which is in between the 2 plates is 43mm thick, so I have to add 30mm of material in between the plates. I would like to know is it best to have this extra spacer added to the rails side, or the slides side. Both variations are shown in the top drawings.

Next:


This type of x axis ball nut mount looks the easiest and neatest from my side, but is it strong enough for pushing the whole gantry. It is made using 20mm plate and has 2 functions, as a nut mount and also to hole the gantry side square to the bearing plate.

Lastly:


I will be using 50mm ali boxing to support the y axis rails onto, but I'm unsure if the wall thickness is enough to drill, tap and hold screws from the top, and also from the back for the 10mm plate. This box section will be held onto the gantry side plates using registering blocks screwed onto the gantry sides and then a threaded rod right the way through the ali box section from gantry side to gantry side. As I've drawn above I could if its very necessary, make a strip of 10mm ali plate into a nut plate, if I can call it that. It will have holes drilled and tapped in the exact position to match the holes on the supported round rails. This way I could make the holes in the ali box section slightly larger and have some adjustability to get the rails aligned with each other.

Thanks for being patient and reading this long boring thread.

Adil