[Cody Lammer] built a sweet CNC router. But as always, when you build a “thing”, you inevitably figure out how to build a better “thing” in the process, so here we are with Cody’s CNC machine v2.0. And it looks like CNC v1.0 was no slouch, so there’s no shortage of custom milled aluminum here.
The standout detail of this build is that almost all of the drive electronics and logic are hidden inside the gantry itself, making cabling a lot less of a nightmare than it usually is. While doing this was impossible in the past, because everything was just so bulky, he manages to get an ESP32 and the stepper drivers onto a small enough board that it can move along with the parts that it controls. FluidNC handles the G-Code interpretation side of things, along with providing a handy WiFi interface. This also allows him to implement a nice jog wheel and a very handy separate position and status indicator LCD on the gantry itself.
When you’re making your second CNC, you have not only the benefit of hindsight, but once you’ve cut all the parts you need, you also have a z-axis to steal and just bolt on. [Cody] mentions wanting a new z-axis with more travel – don’t we all! – but getting the machine up and running is the first priority. It’s cool to have that flexibility.
All in all, this is a very clean build, and it looks like a great improvement over the old machine. Of course, that’s the beauty of machine tools: they are the tools that you need to make the next tool you need. Want more on that subject? [Give Quinn Dunki’s machining series a read].
That’s a link to a video, which itself has no link to the project. It would be really nice to have more info. Is there any repo of real information on this somewhere?
From what I can gather from the author’s website (and most importantly, from what is missing there), it looks like just a show of what the author can do, with no intention to publish/share his design.
It’s a CNC machine based on very carefully selected extruded aluminum profiles with relatively high-quality linear motion guides with small work envelope and some really interesting drive motor configurations. If you were to take notes while watching the video, you would learn more about the design of this machine than Cody could ever possibly put on his webpage.
Looks like https://github.com/eclsnowman/LienCNC-V2
I was going to make some remark along the lines of “fully support thy rails”, but then I notice the shape of the linear rails in the y axis caps. Looks like a nice router
If anyone is looking to build their own CNC I recommend Openbuilds as a resource. They have quite a few community developed designs. Good place to look around for something that fits your use case.
That looks nice, but I’d be uncomfortable with the controls being on the gantry – or indeed anywhere within the space the machine moves. That feels like a recipe for disaster.
I must have missed that, I only saw controls on a pendant. But, there might be times when it makes sense. Certainly there’s a case for an e-stop to be right next to the action (if you get your silk machinist’s scarf caught on the spindle, you don’t want to have to reach around the frame to stop it).
Manual / setup controls are on pendant as usual. That’s just an extra readout on the machine that shows its state.
Indeed the pendant is a particularly sweet one: http://wiki.fluidnc.com/en/hardware/official/M5Dial_Pendant
I mean, the real-world control is the computer of course. And I’m sure there’s a hard-wired emergency stop where it belongs.
But I do think that it’s a neat realization that you can simplify things by putting the motor control in the same place you put the motors, instead of that big box that sits underneath.
It would be awesome to be able to see plans, even if they were to be purchased.