These are great thoughts, but my fellow Maslowians, what about the hobbyist who wants to engrave his pogs? What about the poor Yorkshireman who lives in a paper bag by the side of the road?* A 4’ x 2’ build area is too big for them. You know what they say, “Go small or go home!”** So just how small can we go with the Maslow design?
Modulair to the MAX! that’s somehing to look forward to.
I’m also thinkng of a frame that needs less space. My shed is kinda small, though I should just be able to squeese full size maslow inthere. So i will need to figure out something flexible to get the most out of that little space. I eventually could temporary move outside on a sunny day. And then that autocalibration will make the difference.
Where can i find drawings or pictures of that pantograph kinemetics approach???
in the topic “throwing my hat…”
I also thought of hanging a router on 3 chains on the ceiling and use the floor as workspace.
This then could do many other tasks… in full 3d space
or inverted 3 chais floormounted and a 4th chain for z axis. In a tetrahedron space. That would make the machine big in respect to the effective workspace, but open up a range of possibillities.
It should at least get you started in the right direction.
The design is pretty simple so you can certainly make the linkages yourself! Or, if you don’t want to deal with making accurate parts I make laser cut kits too that come with all the needed hardware (link).
I especially love seeing other people’s version so if you do make one please post pictures!!
Oh! Were you picturing linkages only without any chains? That’s an interesting thought…
@bdillahu has posted pictures of his finished and assembled linkage set-up that he built using one of the laser cut kits. So you can see how it actually looks on a real Maslow:
So it still uses the chains and motors to control the sled location but the way the chains interact with the sled means that instead of having a mathematically quadrilateral shape and trying to calculate where the router bit is (which is how stock Maslow works) the linkages make it so that the chains always point directly at the router bit. This means we now have a mathematical triangle! We always know the exact length of all three sides so it becomes much much easier to calculate and drive sled location. Plus the sled itself is more stable and not prone to wobble.
He’s a smart man. The young often must learn through mistakes rather than the advice of their elders. It’s why they haven’t earned the right to take their pogs to their pog
Here’s the thing though: the main value of a vertical CNC is in space conservation. If you’re looking for a micro-CNC, is there really a need for a vertical CNC at all anymore? If not, then something like an OpenBuilds MiniMill would suffice, no?
I’m not trying to stray off topic, merely pointing out Maslow’s strength lies in large-size CNC without requiring a large horizontal shop space.
this is what I had in mind, but then vertical, but now I see that this still has the issue of needing a bearing around the actual tool tip. But maybe someone else can see a way around that.
Another issue with this is that the whole thing sits in front of the workspace.
But for a ultra small machine this kind of construction could be just right…
AFAIK another modern alternative design, Shaper Origin cnc -handheld router with computer vission corrected router bit track uses this double hand kinematics to compensate the imperfections of human hand movements.
I have a little doubt about the longevity of this (double handed, not usual x-y or triangulation like Maslow) mechanism, even at the usd2300+ price for high tech device. https://www.jeremyblum.com/2018/06/03/ifixit/
That’s not the biggest issue with the Shaper Origin, though. Most people who bought one are discovering how tedious and tiring it is to push the router around, manually following the path.