Quote Originally Posted by JAZZCNC View Post
Mike I agree with the others completely that 2 ballscrews is much much better and prefered. . .BUT . . . I do know from experience with pritty much the same size machine it will handle wood, even hard woods no problem. Yes you won't be able to be has aggressive as if you had twin screws regards DOC etc but it will do the job ok. It will cut Ali but very light duty with shallow cuts.
You will need to widen the distance between bearings, more the better, and make the gantry as stiff as possible. The gantry width on the pics I've shown is 220mm with 240mm of actual bearing spread because it use's profiled rails not round and the bearings are slightly longer than the mounting pads so effectively 240mm wide gantry.

If you can stretch to twin screws then it's a no brainer just do it.!. . . but if not then I recommend you design the end plates for twin screw upgrade in future. The machine I showed in the pics is done this way. . . .Simplizzzzz.
JazzCNC - this is a brillant suggestion :tup: !!! Improve what I have but design in an upgrade path so that the existing investment is not totally lost!!!. A question springs to mind for everyone - in a twin ballscrew setup with 2 motors on the X-Axis (and I presume 2 stepper drivers) how do you ensure equal power output and speed to avoid crabbing the gantry? The Solsylva solution uses a single motor and belts so you don't get the problem.

Now that you guys have planted the seed of doubt in my mind :confused:, I will work up a twin screw solution as you've all suggested and do the numbers to see if my budget and timelines can take it !!!

Thanks All for your patience and interest

Mike