We’re not talking about bending your plates. This has nothing (almost) to do with the material or thickness. We’re talking about the impact of taller plates on rotating your base extrusion. Think of the effect breaker bar has a wrench handle. I am sure it will be just fine as it is. This was only a suggestion to take better advantage of those beautiful plates. Just something to consider. Shields are pretty too and can add support to the y-axis and your taller plates as long as they are there.
Now that’s where I’m curious about them, because I have a solid base that has entirely removed the extrusions. It’d add a lot more stiffness, given that it won’t be able to rotate at all.
Right. Me too. Gonna make some just like Beta’s. Mine is solid but I could use the extra height. I can carve a maximumum of 1/2" think material right now.
Yeah, adding some height would be really nice. The massively thick wasteboards make the thing really, really solid, but they’ve taken up a fair bit of my Z axis. I have only about two inches worth left, using a bit of any significant length.
I see what you mean now. I hadn’t thought of that before. I think it’s a good idea to make the base more solid. The extrusions on the bottom don’t see to add a whole lot to anything.
That’s my setup right now, I think I am going to increase the height of the end blocks at some point to add additional stiffness, but at the moment it seems solid as can be. Definitely a whole heck of a lot less flexible than the original extrusions and wasteboard setup. If I added taller plates, I’d just make bigger blocks to compensate for the additional height.
I did away with them altogether and integrated everything. This is like a rock. BUT - again, I am limited to half inch material unless I carve a pocket out. This machine is exclusively for metals so it hasn’t been an issue, but it cuts so much better and faster than my big machine, I would like to use it for 3d and v-carves as well.
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That looks so cool! I think I’ll end up doing something similar if the deflection is still an issue after some more changes to my current setup.
Man, that is one SOLID looking little unit! For metals, yeah, I’d bet that works awesome.
I need to add some braces for the Y-rails on mine, just for good measure. I’ll pick up the new power cord tonight so I can actually crank it up and give it a shot in the new installation.
When i decide to make plates like this i plan on making gussets to wrap the corner to stiffen things up
I think corner gussets are important because that center filling might eventually decide to deform. Or, I might cut a bit ole pocket out of it. Or, drill and cut so many holes in it that it becomes swiss cheese. It was not easy cutting that piece PERFECTLY square and I am sure it isn’t perfect, but I could not measure any imperfection so it IS this machine’s square reference and everything around it is tightened down to it. My gussets look tiny and insubstantial in retrospect.
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After fastening the bottom of the bracket to the aluminum bed the whole setup has been much stiffer. I tapped the existing holes in the bed with a 10-32 thread and added longer fasteners to secure the plate to the bed.
Thanks for the advice.
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Man, that’s a good-looking setup! Well done!
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Thanks! It’s great to be able to make improvements to the machine by using the machine to make the new parts. The little thing is building itself up there.
It’s really cool, isn’t it? There’s something neat about a tool making improvements for itself. Kind of the same with a lot of 3D printers, you start with a basic frame, then you print the rest of the components using the tool itself!