wow just thinking of the 3d relief carving this thing would be capable of doing…it might run for a week or more but wow
Now iis the time to start testing to see just how much more you can do. Try more depth and more speed to see where it starts to have issues…
That is just nuts. I think if you use fusion you can build in the spindle and related geometry to make sure you don’t have a collision at crazy depth?
I hope Dui finds this soon…I can’t wait to see if he wants to try it.
I’ll definitely be pushing to see how much I can do. I’m thinking aluminum might be next. The stiffness numbers are nice and all but cutting is where it gets real. I’m trying to keep my expectations from getting too far ahead… exciting, but we’ll try aluminum first.
Wasn’t sure what to expect, but dang, breezes through aluminum.
1/8" single-flute endmill
0.5 mm depth of cut
480 mm/min feed rate
45% stepover
10 degree ramp for plunging.
We’ve all seen MPCNC cut aluminum before, but with 10 inches sticking out below the center assembly?
I am so thrilled, it’s now official (according to me): I don’t have to choose between height and stiffness!
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Wow, not bad at all. 
Next step is to try the same but with 3mm DOC instead 0.5mm. Just pretend the aluminum is actually wood. And stand back so the broken bit doesn’t catch you (if it breaks).
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You might even get more stiffness than a single-decker MPCNC. It is more constrained. I just really want to do this, but I don’t want it a meter tall.
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That is so cool. I’m sure a lot of people reading this thought it was silly (okay, I still do, look at how tall it is!) but it is hard to dispute those results! Good work.
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In my mind it is still ridiculous. I won’t say crazy ideas are my best ideas, but they are my favorite.
That is pretty nuts to see at 10".
That’s awesome.
Great thread and congratulations on this awesome success!
This machine looks sick and the results are impressive.
I really need to get myself a Dewalt router and try milling with a long Z axis, just to see if its possible without this dual decker setup.
Steel, why not?
Tonight I failed multiple times, broke/burned some tools, wasted some material. Had some serious fun, apart from being hit with tiny HOT chips.
I figured the rectangular shallow facing cut is really boring, so I would try for a pattern that’s a bit more interesting.
Two of my attempts were not totally awful. Here’s one:
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Awesome result, I think the only issue you have is plunging.
Who is this mysterious Tom S. ?
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Heh, you should ship that to me or Ryan. We can put it on the table at mrrf next year.
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I hope this isn’t rain on your parade, but, Z limits are not the issue with Ryan’s design. Z limits are determined by the length of bit you can buy. 10 inches of Z travel with a 3 inch bit? I’ve melted a lot of plastic collets, and the nut on the chuck is burnt black from burning into the wood. That’s where I’ve found the limit to be.
Don’t worry, youre not raining on my parade. I agree, a super-deep relief carving for example needs to worry about tool collisions etc. and even if I had a 7" drill bit, I couldn’t drill a hole that deep because the tool would need to raise above the gantry to start the hole.
The motivation for tall Z is to fit the tool changer and a 4th axis without having to punch holes in the table. Or to mill relatively shallow cuts on the top of taller objects.
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Hhahahahhahahahhahaha omg, too freaking funny
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I am catching up on lots of old posts. Saw this part with your double-decker, looks like some air assist chute ducted from the spindle exhaust.
I’ve been thinking about something like this for my Craftsman. It does blow some air. I have a vacuum but I in deeper pockets for v-bit carving it could use some chip evac. And also if I am doing aluminum.
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Lol yes, it’s ugly but it does blow air. The output ports on the dw660 really blow a lot, so this redirects it to try to clear chips.
The second worst place chips can be is blown all over everything in my shop. So it’s an improvement from the worst place which is staying in the cut gumming up the subsequent passes. But it’s still terrible compared to proper vacuum. I never mentioned it because I really wouldn’t recommend it… 
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