Swallowing pride and admitting I made a bad decision even with many of you advising me correctly. My current CNC is decent but I quickly out grew it and what it is capable of. Soooo. I cashed in my Christmas and Birthday chips and was going to buy a Onefinity X-50 woodworker. 32x32 cutting area. When I get a bigger space I can upgrade to 32 x48. While sitting down with the one who must be obeyed discussing things. I am wanting to do a little side hustle and long story short she blurted out get the Elite but you better not complain it won’t do what you want! Lol So, I ordered a Onefinity Elite Woodworker. Yes I will be starting with a Mikita router and that will be the weak link but one that I believe I can work with to get up and going and of course have some fun…

Moving on up, to the big times.  At the price range you are moving into you might also look at what Probotix.com sells.  A little more money, but the machines they sell come with a PC already configured with LinuxCNC, the controller already set up for the machine less plugging in cables, and a more rigid frame made from t-slotted extrusions that hold the potential for creative jigging to to vertical/angled/compound angled cuts, and even hand assembled furniture inside the frame to cut details or joinery mortises or inlays, etc..  All of which I've done with my older version from them.    I did notice that you've already ordered the Elite.   Just park my suggestion for when you move up to the next stage of what a CNC can be used for.   I started with a 24 x 24 CNC Shark bought from Rockler.com.  I moved up in scale only to have more cutting area, but discovered far more potential because the CNC I bought had a frame made from t-slotted extrusions. 

 

4D 

I love hearing new tool purchase stories.

Kev ---- I still have my Probotix Nebula that you could slide into quite reasonably - and still keep your place in the bedroom.

On 11/28/2023 at 10:55 PM, honesttjohn said:

Kev ---- I still have my Probotix Nebula that you could slide into quite reasonably - and still keep your place in the bedroom.

Well seeing I have already ordered the Elite unless you are going to donate (after all I am a non-profit <just not according to the Govt>). I do appreciate it. 
 

I just looked up that Machine sounds like a beast. 

Edited December 1, 20232 yr by KevTN

4DThinker. Those look like nice machines but i was pushing the limit with the Elite. I need to step back and get back to some basics. I think I am trying to fly before I can run good. The Elite will allow me to grow in size and different accessories such as spindles, increase size (I am getting 32x32 but can go up to 32x48)and fourth axis. I got the stiffy to stiffen the frame though with the Makita router I may not need but down the road when I upgrade to a spindle it will. The MASSO 3 controller will be interesting to learn and will hopefully lead me to learn G code better. I have upgrade my Vectric desktop to pro. Yes I know Aspire is the Bees Knees but that money thing again. I do get a year of Carvco maker so that will be fun to play with. They have an interesting feature called the magic wand I want to play with. 

My machine is projected to be shipped Jan 22. Until then I have a couple of projects I need to finish up with the MillRight. I already have a project for the larger bed. 
 

 

On 11/27/2023 at 8:27 PM, Grandpadave52 said:

I love hearing new tool purchase stories.

It’s also fun watching my wife’s eye twitch 😬

Never hurts to take slow affordable steps along the way to mastering the potential of a complex tool.  There are expensive CNCs out there bought by hobbyists but never assembled to use.  They can be intimidating beasts.   

4 hours ago, KevTN said:

... lead me to learn G code better.

Although it doesn't hurt to know and understand G-Code, what benefited me most was learning the shortcut keys for my CNC controller software (linuxCNC).  Like "R" to run a job again,  Useful when the toolpath was being used over and over again for repeat parts. Once a job finished, just reload the machine and hit R. 

 

You can find lists of G-code function on the web, and spending a little time to make yourself a small 3x5 cheat card of the really useful commands to keep by your controller is well spent time. 

19 hours ago, 4DThinker said:

Although it doesn't hurt to know and understand G-Code, what benefited me most was learning the shortcut keys for my CNC controller software (linuxCNC).  Like "R" to run a job again,  Useful when the toolpath was being used over and over again for repeat parts. Once a job finished, just reload the machine and hit R. 

 

You can find lists of G-code function on the web, and spending a little time to make yourself a small 3x5 cheat card of the really useful commands to keep by your controller is well spent time. 

Well for G code if there is an issue power outage with the Masso controller I can choose what line I can restart from if I have to do that I want to start back the most appropriate place. and I like to know what’s going on…the only codes I know right now is G20 and G21.

 

Oh and I definitely love short cuts and hot keys. Lol but I also like know why they and they work.

I find G0 useful for moving the bit position where I want it.  G0X2.5 for example will move the bit to positive 2.5 on the X axis. G0Y5 will move it in the Y direction to 5 inches from where 0 was set.   If you have a rotary axis then G0A90 will rotate the work to 90 degree from where your set it A at 0. Change the number after A to whatever rotated angle you want. Absolute positions, and not relative to your previous position.  

Keyboard hotkeys I appreciate in LinuxCNC were I to put jogging in increment mode, and C to put it in continuous mode.  Useful when setting up each job and setting the X, Y, and Z home positions. You might look for similar shortcuts in your controller software.  

I'm using Mach3 to run my CNC milling machine and find it more of a challenge than LinuxCNC.