How to find CNC related files on thingiverse? I don’t see an appropriate filter and searching for CNC brings up a 3d printable CNC stuff
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We started a collection of things:
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The reasons there isn’t a site like Thingiverse for CNC has nothing to do with websites, and the reasons will probably surprise you, and the fix is already half done and right in front of us. It has everything to do with the unnecessarily high knowledge and work barrier in CAM while 3D printing has fully automated one click gcode generation (thanks to open source and the RepRap community).
I just posted an article called “Why isn’t there a Thingiverse for CNC? Slice Everything!” on the Workshop 88 Makerspace blog but I cannot post the link here. You can search for it if you are interested.
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Link to your article:
Have you seen kiri:moto? It’s workflow is based on 3D objects only and does a very good job of being automatic. You do have to tune parameters for it. But it won’t let you just click on edges and holes. You have to set it up to cut things automatically. It also has a slicer built in.
There are still CNC related issues that make it harder than 3D printing. For one thing. 2D, 2.5D, Carving, 3D and 4 or 5 axis are almost different skill sets and require different choices in CAM. For another, a lot of easy 2D cuts involve knowing the thickness of the material and baking that into CAD, and then re running CAM. But it isn’t just the thickness. Making something out if MDF or Plywood is pretty different than solid wood or plastic. So designs would include the material to cut them out of as well.
But there must be a way to share CNC cut files. Even if it isn’t as smooth as 3D printing.
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Mill mage is hopefully going to be a step forward in terms of software.
My impression is that because laser cutting and milling have been professional tools there was never an ‘share for free’ mindset.
The toolchain for vinyl printing/cutting is even worse imo.
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Thanks @jeffeb3 for posting the link!
It’s been ages since I’ve looked at kiri:moto, thanks for bringing it up. It’s come a long way and checks a lot of the boxes is multi-machine, open source, quite automatic, and you can even run it locally without internet/cloud dependency (instructions on their github). It’s so close compared to CADCAM packages, but I think it could be even easier to use if it had presets for different materials, and if it automaticaly decided which operations to perform based on the model geometry, machine, available tools, and quality settings (fast versus nice). It may be on their roadmap, they certainly seem to have the same mindset.
I don’t see a way to share CNC files for the reasons you mentioned - gcode has all the parameters baked in, CADCAM software has tons of project presets, and there is nowhere to separate job, material, and machine configuration parameters. Sharing a 3D model is proven to work, it is basically saying to the software “make the best copy of this shape you can” with a chosen machine and material, rather than providing a collection of drawings and specifications that include a mix of dimension and material related parameters. Although Ondsel Lens is really interesting.
I hope MillMage is as good as they say, looking forward to seeing it at Midwest RepRap festival in 2 weeks. It’s still closed source.
FWIW I really like Silouette vinyl cutting software, other than that I think I’ve used some InkScape plugins, yea it can get painful.
The lightburn guys showed us how their slot resize tool works and it will be in millmage as well. That was pretty slick to automatically detect slots and resize them for whatever material thickness you want. It works pretty well.
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