Happy new year guys.

Well ive been busy doing jobs on the house, although ive also been busy insulating my workshop to try and reduce the chances of rust on my machines. During the christmas holidays i did my first test on the CNC by drawing a circle in a square in cambam, and then getting it to mill it out. It went well although i think i had the feeds and speeds super conservative. So now ive got the tricky task of picking out software for the machine, so if anyone has any recommendations before i spend out money that would be appreciated. I have tried mach 4 although alot of people dont appear to like it much still. One of the things i was unsure of was the motor tuning graph in mach where you setup the acceleration.

On a side note, i have treated myself to a new toy.



Its a WM18. I want to keep it manual, although i would like to build a power feed for the y and z axis using stepper motors, drives and a micro controller. Ive seen a few install a stepper onto the z axis, although i would like to retain the hand wheel on the side. Ive got DROs to install also.


valdis034, Ill measure it up at the weekend and let you know. I must admit it is tight with all the kit ive put into it, but it was self inflicted as i did not want a big cab.