Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “The Best CNC Router for 2018: The CNC Routerparts Benchtop”.
So, in our digital fabrication shootout, we don’t score the cnc machines, quite as rigidly as we do with the 3d printers, but over the course of the shootout. This machine really stood out as the favorite among the cnc machines yeah. Absolutely we’re still working on better guides of how we’re going to be testing cnc’s, it’s our third year doing cnc’s, but there’s definitely the ones that you know you ask everyone who’s testing them everybody who’s working on it. You know if you had to choose one cnc out of the entire shootout, which one would you pick and without a question.
This was the one. There were plenty of others that we liked, but this is the one that if you had to pick one everyone wanted. So this is the cnc router parts, bench top machine and um.
Overall, it’s got a footprint. It’S got a machined footprint of 41 by 41 inches with a cutting area of what about 24 by 24., it’s pretty close to it yeah yeah, and so, while the package is small, uh, the rigidity and quality of this machine is is professional level yeah. Absolutely. This is when you have a product, that’s sized to something that will fit on a benchtop and that’s the kind of workspace that you have, but you are ready to go into full production and you need a production ready machine.
This is the kind of machine that you’re going to want to look at, but for all the quality in the machine to power. This machine, you don’t necessarily need to have like 220 volts. The controller itself runs on 110 and you have a number of spindle options available to you right. The spindle that we’re using is the dewalt 618 two and a quarter horsepower spindle. So you’ve got a lot of power just in that spindle, but you do have other options.
One of the things about cnc router parts themselves is everything is expandable upgradeable and options that you choose. You can’t actually go to their website right now and say i want the one that’s in the shootout. You need to choose the options to actually pick and build this machine, and that’s one of the things that’s a little bit confusing about the way they sell their machines is that it is kind of options overload right, yeah, we we’ve been kind of poking them.
A little bit that that it would be nice if if they had a bundled together, i want this kind of thing and it’s something that they might be working on. But really there are advantages of being able to choose whatever you want. So, while the footprint of this machine is relatively small, you’re, getting a really really professional drive system, you’re not going to have any belts, this is all driven by ball. Screws right belts are great, but belts will stretch over time. The ball screws are more accurate and have a lot longer lasting power to them. So if you’re working eight hours a day on a professional level, these ball screws will hold up a lot longer all right.
Let’S talk about software for a second, this is a mach 3 driven machine and of course, you can use whatever software you want for your design and your tool path generation. They do recommend using fusion 360. fusion 360 vcarve, both great ways to generate the actual g-code. For the machine mach 3, as the g-code sender, to get g-code to the machine, mach 3 has a little bit of a learning curve. It really is, you know, a professional and g-code sender, so there’s a lot of options, buttons different things in there that can get a little confusing. With a little bit of patience.
You can get it down pretty quickly. Yeah, just definitely take your time with the software get familiar with it when you’re sending your tool pass for the first time. It’S usually a good idea to do a dry run without a bit in the in the spindle, so you can just make sure that your tool paths are exactly the way you set them up to be and they’re running the way you need yeah for sure, as You’Re getting used to any cnc machine out there make sure to start out with dry runs. It’S just a way to make sure that you’re not breaking bits and ruining materials which can get pricey quickly, yeah. So, overall, if you’re looking for professional quality results – and you don’t have the space or don’t need the space of a full eight by four size machine, this is definitely the one to keep an eye out for yeah. Absolutely we really loved it. We’Ve been been using. It it’s a great machine.
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