I think most machinist want a cnc but for good reason and myth they are scared

[jumps4]

these are my reasons and my opinion
I was scared i was going to waste money i really didnt have on a machine that would be below standard and to complicated to learn.
so i started researching and found these problems for home cnc
1. there is no standard for the terms used by the manufactures of parts, the writers of software and just about every aspect of the building of your own cnc. I'm a auto mechanic and could not imagine a spark plug being called something else because another company made it. so for me to read most any literature on cnc i needed a list of terms and definitions to figure out each sentence. and that list is for just that manufacture. thats a lot of lists
2. ok it's killing our economy but without the chinese only the fortune 500 companies can do this and that brings us to translation. this guy in china reads chinese well but does not understand how the sentence translates into a readable english or any language for that matter to form a sentence so lets just pic an english word and put it down. no matter how you read it "cintered canine and crushed paste of yellow zest" is not a "hotdog with mustard"
3. wiring. just about anyone mechanical can modify the machine and do a good job , make it accurate with low cost ballscrews because cnc compensates for backlash automaticly when set up properly. the fact is wiring a cnc is as easy as playing with batterys , lightbulbs and switches like you probably did as a kid. here is the catch anyone can connect wire a to terminal b as per the instructions. nope the breakout board instructions say connect a wire from step+ on the breakout board to step+ on the motor controller. what is the controller i have a driver and it does not have the word step on it anywhere. it says pulse. your thinking magic smoke. the fact is the driver is the controller and step and pulse mean the same thing. so wiring now is a nightmare for the same reason as item 1. terms and standards.
4 learning the cad and cam programs and their cost. you are not nasa you need a cad software that draws circles squares rectangles ect where you want, then the size you want them, and saves in a dxf format. thats free online everywhere i use emachine shop it is so simple you draw the box and up at the top you say the box is here in x and y and it is this high and that wide thats it. drop a circle on the end delete the unneeded lines an you have a bullet. cam software same thing you want simple and low to no cost. are you really needing a software that cuts 5 axis in full blown 3d i cant even think 5 axis yet.
i have a bunch of free programs all limited but when you have them all you can do almost everything.
unless you want to just make scrap you wont write complete programs to finish a complex part in unending steps you very quickly pick the cut from the drawing and tell it the cutter size left right or on center, depth per pass and total depth. run it. thats good pick the next pocket corner and
continue. It is faster than reading prints mounting rotory tables and turning cranks and it dont get tired. It's working, your on the lathe making something else.
just my opinion and i guess you can tell i like cnc or anything i can make behave with my pc
if i could just mount steppers on my wife what a life this would be.
What Do You Think
steve

 

[brt]

I'm with you on most of this. I couldn't build a CNC mill, so I bought one. But now with the mill, I can CNC-fy the lathe, so I got a manual one.
Re: software: i tried simple (GoogSketch, Rhino, a few Open Source tools). But they were just too limiting. It ended up between SolidWorks and Pro-E. I went with SW because of the $100/yr student license. Now trying to tackle the CAM part of the equation.

 

[jfcayron]

Aside from all the very good and valid reasons given here, my point of view is I want to learn how to do it by hand before I try to automate.
In other words I want to "feel" what my CNC program will be doing.

My full time job (that severely gets in the way of machining :lmao is in computer software. And believe it or not, there is a similar approach to be given to beginners.
There are too many things you can let be generated for you and that will lead to inefficiency or worse.

But I totally agree that CNC is great for a lot of things and especially for short production runs. I will get there someday, just not yet.

 

[woodguy]

I didn't start out wanting CNC on my mill. What I wanted was a nice DRO and power feeds on all axes. I got the DRO and it was a game changer. When I started looking into power feeds I realized that I could CNC the Mill and use it in either manual mode or CNC mode and the cost would not be much more than ordinary power feeds.

CNC is a lot of fun and opens up so many possibilities. Now I guess I'll sell the DRO - at the moment I still have it mounted on the mill - it was handy for calibrating the steppers.

 

[jumps4]

" When I started looking into power feeds I realized that I could CNC the Mill and use it in either manual mode or CNC mode and the cost would not be much more than ordinary power feeds."

thank you there is a really good savings point i forgot. the tooling required to just do the simple things cnc does.
think about having to machine a hole, 3.25 " in diameter, in the center of a 14" long 10" wide piece then thread the hole. then thread a cap for the hole. i can do it with a cnc mill with little to no thought or setup
may take a while on a small machine but it will get done. thats going to be hard with my hand crank mill and 9" lathe.
steve

 

[SamIAm]

if i could just mount steppers on my wife what a life this would be.
What Do You Think
steve

Love this one... think it would end up being disastrous! but still I like the idea.

Funny thing. Im no machinist. but my first machine other than a drill press etc... was a cnc'd mini mill
then the lathe.

I had no idea how to do anything. looking back I should have start with a lathe. imho. but it is what it is.
now I spend my time machining stuff up on the lathe. when I need something more complex then I move to the cnc mill.

As far as the code. I find it pretty easy (Im a pc person and coding comes easy to me). The software is pretty challenging though
because every vendor has their way of looking at a solution to a problem. I have found c4mb4m to be pretty good for the $
in apt of aspects. easy to use, offers importing options. easily customizable etc...

2cents.
Sam

 

[clearcaseman]

Agreed with #4 being the big one. I have a cnc router and I am not able to use it to anywhere near its full potential. I learned cad on a program called casemate which it 2.5 axis. then took time to learn sketchup only to find out it doesn't use anything standard in its own formatting. I liken 3d multi axis to a conversation Spock had with Kirk in Wrath of Kahn about space combat and Kahn being at a disadvantage since he thought laterally and in the future they were taught space combat in all 3 axis.

these are my reasons and my opinion
I was scared i was going to waste money i really didnt have on a machine that would be below standard and to complicated to learn.
so i started researching and found these problems for home cnc
1. there is no standard for the terms used by the manufactures of parts, the writers of software and just about every aspect of the building of your own cnc. I'm a auto mechanic and could not imagine a spark plug being called something else because another company made it. so for me to read most any literature on cnc i needed a list of terms and definitions to figure out each sentence. and that list is for just that manufacture. thats a lot of lists
2. ok it's killing our economy but without the chinese only the fortune 500 companies can do this and that brings us to translation. this guy in china reads chinese well but does not understand how the sentence translates into a readable english or any language for that matter to form a sentence so lets just pic an english word and put it down. no matter how you read it "cintered canine and crushed paste of yellow zest" is not a "hotdog with mustard"
3. wiring. just about anyone mechanical can modify the machine and do a good job , make it accurate with low cost ballscrews because cnc compensates for backlash automaticly when set up properly. the fact is wiring a cnc is as easy as playing with batterys , lightbulbs and switches like you probably did as a kid. here is the catch anyone can connect wire a to terminal b as per the instructions. nope the breakout board instructions say connect a wire from step+ on the breakout board to step+ on the motor controller. what is the controller i have a driver and it does not have the word step on it anywhere. it says pulse. your thinking magic smoke. the fact is the driver is the controller and step and pulse mean the same thing. so wiring now is a nightmare for the same reason as item 1. terms and standards.
4 learning the cad and cam programs and their cost. you are not nasa you need a cad software that draws circles squares rectangles ect where you want, then the size you want them, and saves in a dxf format. thats free online everywhere i use emachine shop it is so simple you draw the box and up at the top you say the box is here in x and y and it is this high and that wide thats it. drop a circle on the end delete the unneeded lines an you have a bullet. cam software same thing you want simple and low to no cost. are you really needing a software that cuts 5 axis in full blown 3d i cant even think 5 axis yet.
i have a bunch of free programs all limited but when you have them all you can do almost everything.
unless you want to just make scrap you wont write complete programs to finish a complex part in unending steps you very quickly pick the cut from the drawing and tell it the cutter size left right or on center, depth per pass and total depth. run it. thats good pick the next pocket corner and
continue. It is faster than reading prints mounting rotory tables and turning cranks and it dont get tired. It's working, your on the lathe making something else.
just my opinion and i guess you can tell i like cnc or anything i can make behave with my pc
if i could just mount steppers on my wife what a life this would be.
What Do You Think
steve

 

[DaveSohlstrom]

I too thought CNC would be to difficult to learn. When the guys at SeemeCNC.com introduced there low cost 3D printer I bought one. Once I had it in the shop and started working with it I could see that CNC was not as difficult as I had thought it was. I now have it converted to a mini CNC router and doing a lot of work with it. I am also working on a design for a much larger CNC router that will clear a 18X24" table area. 3D printer will only do 8X8"

Dave

 

[xalky]

Cost is/was mainly the issue for me. Technical issues usually don't scare me away....but maybe they should. ;-) I got into building my cnc plasma cutter knowing the mechanical end of it was gonna be a cinch for me, but I really had no idea how tedious the software end of it was gonna be for me. I have a lot of respect for the people that design the software to run these things. The mechanical aspect is really childs play next to the software in my mind, but maybe that's because I have all this mechanical ability and really no software knowledge to speak of.

Marcel

 

[JPigg55]

Cost is/was mainly the issue for me. Technical issues usually don't scare me away....but maybe they should. ;-) I got into building my cnc plasma cutter knowing the mechanical end of it was gonna be a cinch for me, but I really had no idea how tedious the software end of it was gonna be for me. I have a lot of respect for the people that design the software to run these things. The mechanical aspect is really childs play next to the software in my mind, but maybe that's because I have all this mechanical ability and really no software knowledge to speak of.

Marcel

Same thing goes for me.
Growing up on a small farm working on equipment, the mechanical stuff comes easy. Also, as pointed out in an earlier post, most mechanical parts are based on a standard of some sorts.
Even electrical isn't too much of a pain since everything is pretty much standardized, but roll into the world of electronics......nothing seems to be standardized.
Yes, at its root everything boils down to 1's & 0's, but what makes up the 1's & 0's is different with almost every program out there. Seems everything in the programming work is a never ending VHS vs Betamax battle. Learn this method, but it won't translate to this other one (which is the new standard for now until something newer comes along) so one is forced to relearn.
I'd love to learn CAD & CAM for the possibility of going CNC later on, but I'm 50 years old and didn't grow up with computers. I've learned some basic stuff through trial and error because of necessity for job related programs, but I didn't have to worry about crashing a couple thousand dollar home machine because I goofed.
Programmers use a different language that makes perfect sense to them, but is just greek to me and I don't speak greek. I've done countless searches and made inquiries on a miriad of different forums with little or no results. Simple things like those tossed around in this thread discussing various programs and their limitations. What limitations ??? Everyone seems to think "Well that's common knowledge". Well, it may be to those who have learned and used it, but to me.....no idea what you're talking about.
I run a nuclear power plant and have/could explain fission, fusion, thermodynamics, power factors, VARS, house curves, load line, neutron poisons, and on and on and on..., but most would just look at me with a blank stare because they have no understanding of the terminology or frame of reference to associate it to.
I wish there was a class close by that was convenient for me to attend with my goofy work schedule, but there isn't. Thus, I'm relying on the internet and books to try and figure it out on my own with most things I've found assuming that you have some base knowledge and understanding of how it all works to begin with. Nothing I've found explaind to the level a complete beginner can understnad.
If I've missed something available out there that would help me out, please let me know.