Don's CNC things

Bits Everywhere! I got tired of chasing my bits around the surfaces of my CNC and decided to organize them. Now I have a 3 drawer chest that holds my bits in separate wooden sections organized by bit type. I plan to mark the bits with #'s that correlate with my tool library in F360. I wanted to keep the holders that come with some bits because I like how they protect the bit. For these cases I glued the bottom of the holder into a slot I milled into the wood holder. I found that gluing a piece of foam at the top edge of the holders help to keep the bits from falling out. We will see if this solves my problem :). Enjoy and comment, Don

Dust Shoe and Hose Management Designs There are many dust shoe designs both commercial and DIY for dust extraction in a CNC. Mostly I do not like that the dust shoe seems to be in the way and it blocks the view of the bit. Perhaps as I become more confident with my CNC programming I will not care if the bit is visible. Furthermore the vacuum hose designs I reviewed were quite complex and generally put stress on the gantry.  I set out to see if I could design/build something simpler and easier to use. Prototype Dust Shoe I decided to see if I could build a plenum that attached to the spindle bracket and pull air from around the bit. This would be simple to adjust up/down and simple to get on and off without obstructing the view of the bit.  I postulated that if the orifice at the bit was kept close enough and the velocity high enough I could pull away most of the chips. Alternately I could add air to try and blow the dust toward the vacuum plenum. In the protot...

SPOIL BOARD Google'ing shows that there are a gaggle of spoil board configurations out there. Since my initial build I have been using a spoil board made of particle board with routed T-slots. I used a secondary T-slot board to increase the holding options. This spoil board was made from two sheets of particle board with milled T-slots. The two board were joined in the middle using a lap joint cut on my router. This was material that I had yanked from someones pile of kitchen refinishing remnants. The upper spoil board was also made from particle board with T-slots milled transversely. Practical Work Holding I mostly have been working routing wood and that has driven me to use a different work holding method. The following approach will not work for milling metals at least not anything robust. Tape as a Work Holding Medium After many frustrations hitting the clamps used in traditional work holding ) using a variety or T-clamps) I investigated using tape as a hold...