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  • Author Author: ralphjy
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Genmitsu CNC 3018-PRO - becoming useful

ralphjy

I had a minor victory on my road to figuring out how to use my new CNC router.

 

I received the 0.5mm carbide end mills that I bought on Amazon and used one to successfully shorten a proto PCB that I need for my LoRaXes project.  The mill has about 4 mm of cutting depth.  The PCBs that I'm cutting are nominally around 1.6 mm thick.  Not a very impressive looking cutter but it worked.  I increased the spindle speed to 3000 RPM and reduced the feedrate to 80 mm/min and set the cutting depth to 0.15 mm per pass.

 

image

 

Here is the shortened PCB next to one that is uncut:

image

 

The cut edges are very smooth but you can see that they are not quite straight.  Not sure if I can improve that with tweaking or if that's the inherent limitation of an inexpensive router and cheap end mills.  Only time and experience will tell.  Anyway, I'm pretty satisfied with the outcome.  The tool did what I needed it to do. 

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  • Welcome on the CNC world image Do you plan to use it for PCB only or also something else? What kind of model? Some photos? If you need help, just ask.

     

    BTW... Maybe it is worth to open a group on CNC milling techniques, eventually finalized to the electronic design and prototyping support?

     

    Enrico

  • in reply to balearicdynamics

    Hi Enrico,

     

    I did a blog post earlier when I first assembled this printer: Genmitsu CNC 3018-PRO

     

    I got the CNC mill to help with my electronic projects, so I'm hoping to also use it for things like small panels or face plates made out of plastic, acrylic, wood, or aluminum.  Hopefully will improve the quality and appearance of my builds.  There is also a low power (5.5W) laser module available that could be used for engraving (not sure if that is enough power to cleanly cut wood or acrylic).

     

    SainSmart is supposed to have a very active support community for their CNC products, but it's on Facebook and I really dislike Facebook.

     

    I'd support a group on Element14 if others would also like to start one.

     

    Ralph

  • in reply to genebren

    It was a long long time ago, 2009-2010 when I started studying how to make a mill machine. The video below shows the first working prototype.

     

    The controller was a custom board based on Arduino with a series of ULN2003 and 2004 half-bridges and some other components. The spindle (here is shown a primitive test just to see if the principle was working) was controlled by PWM using a DC brushless motor. This can be considered my starting point from where I started playing with motors. When I built the prototype I have also developed – approach then abandoned – a non-standard language in Processing. From the pc a graphical interface was able to draw/engrave a PCB surface starting from the DXF of the layer. Then I evolved, done other choices and done more serious approaches to this problem, working with more standardized and complete software and hardware. But this first project created from scratch hardware, software and mechanics was very useful to go in-depth in the problems and issues that should be solved and considered when approaching a custom design for a PCB router.

  • in reply to balearicdynamics

    Hi Enrico,

     

    There is a Mach3 version of my CNC router that interfaces with USB https://www.sainsmart.com/products/sainsmart-genmitsu-cnc-router-3018-mx3 and I think the control board would be what you need, but I don't think that SainSmart sells it separately.  Maybe you could ask them.  Seems to have a lot of good features.

     

    image

     

    They sell interesting Mach3 USB controllers, but I think that they all require that you add the motor drivers.  You can search their website for Mach3 USB Controllers.  Here's one for example - currently only $59.  https://www.sainsmart.com/products/4-axis-cnc-mach3-usb-motion-controller-card-interface-breakout-board

    image

     

    Ralph

  • in reply to ralphjy

    Thank you, Ralph.

     

    This board probably is oversized for the small CNC I want to build - or, better convert/upcycle - from my 3D laser cutter structure. Instead, this seems very good to abandon the heavy desktop to control my big CNC with the parallel cable. As a matter of fact, this controller seems the solution. I should investigate and ask to the producer. One of the weeks of September I will be in Spain and one of the things I plan to do is just to make a decision with my big CNC.

     

    Thank you a lot.

    Enrico

  • in reply to balearicdynamics

    Hi Enrico (and everyone),

    Here's some ideas, it would be interesting to know what you think, maybe the idea isn't feasible or there are better ways. Also, I don't know what features/connectors are useful.

    I'm currently thinking maybe have an "Interface board" that can connect to external drivers in scenario 1, but can use small stepper PCBs (some off-the-shelf one, to be determined) in scenario 2.

    For scenario 1, the configuration jumpers direct the BBB pins (via buffers) to the RJ45 sockets (are 4 enough?).

    image

    For scenario 2, the jumpers are placed so that the BBB pins for the drivers are routed through the edge connector instead, like a pass-through.

    This way, the same RJ45 can be used for direct motor control in scenario 2. It would result in a low-cost stepper driver carrier board that could be swapped out for a new design if low-cost stepper driver boards need upgrading to more powerful ones. It could be a new open interface : ) so anyone can design carrier boards for their favourite stepper driver chips/boards.

     

    image

    I can't think what connectors could be useful for power.. maybe RJ45 again, but with 4 wires for ground, and 4 for positive. Not sure! All ideas welcome, this is just a concept, and I'm not very knowledgeable in this.

  • in reply to shabaz

    shabaz,

     

    This looks pretty good.  I am wondering if this is going a little too far off of topic on Ralph's post?  Maybe we should take this conversation into it's own thread?

     

    Gene

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