About to tackle this as well. Anyone got an amazon link for the 6mm bore pulley? I found the 8MM Bore Pulley from a link above about 3,000,000 posts back haha I don’t wanna order from china and be waiting for a month to get my stuff, I’m way too impatient for that. So I’ll pay the extra for Amazon prime delivery. Hoping to get this cut out this weekend. Thanks!
Here is a pack of pulleys in 6mm with 20 teeth that might work. Also trying to get this project started asap so would be glad to share additional links to parts. I will include what I have found so far:
1/4" x 9" timing belt
16 Tooth 6.35mm Bore Pulley
16 Tooth 8mm Bore Pulley
15 Tooth 8mm Bore Pulley
15 Tooth 6.35mm(1/4") Bore Pulley
10 Tooth 6.35mm(1/4") Bore Pulley
10-32 Threaded Insert
10-32 Threaded Heat Set Inserts
I am new to this so still trying to understand the teeth ratio I should have between motor and lead screw pulleys but will do some more reading tomorrow.
Edit: Removed links since BOM has been updated in garden
Thanks! That GT2 pulley has a different tooth profile than the XL pulleys. Not sure how much difference that would make, but I opted to go for the 20 Teeth XL Pulley instead, since I wasn’t having any luck finding the 16T XL last night.
Good catch, I removed that one from list. Spent the afternoon messing around with my machine and managed to get the axis working. Ended up just needing a bungee around z motor mount to keep it aligned with screw while turning. Ran through cut test in calibration with no z issues at all 
I use a 60T pulley on my servo and a 20T pulley on my lead screw for my Z axis. So far it has worked great and I think I could actually have it move faster than I have used so far.
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@Archie_Slate: Those are great links there. Only thing of note is that the Z-axis motor has a 6mm shaft:
I think some people have made 1/4" (6.35mm) bores work, but it’s less than ideal. Luckily, there is a 6mm one in the same listing.
I’ve pulled those links and put them in the BOM section in the Garden. I added prices to the list to make it a little easier to see what the hardware is going to cost. It’s not perfect, and doesn’t include the price of the miscellaneous stuff you can easily pick up at the hardware store.
As to @shadyG and @elchatoloco’s work with the spindle clamps, I like the direction you’re going in. I would be concerned about the spindle’s concentricity in relation the ring, but it looks like alignment is good from the pictures.
I’ve been ruminating on spindle clamps for awhile now, and I think that the correct direction is to redesign the carriage.
For the 3D printed version, I’d like pull from @Shootquinn’s contributions and make the carriage plate and spindle clamp as one component. Ideally, it would be small enough that it could fit on most print beds, so you don’t need a CR10 or something to print it. My Ender has 220mm x 220mm x 250mm worth of printing volume, would that be a good constraint or should we aim for a smaller bounding box?
The much harder redesign is the Maslowable version. The best idea I presently have is to stack something like 3"-4" worth of plywood. I would be using a similar section to the current version, but with a much thicker front hoop for extra strength. I’m not 100% happy about that idea, though. I’ve thought about plastic ones, but most sheet plastics that would be strong and thick enough would be more costly than me simply selling 3D printed clamps like I currently am.
Meanwhile, I’m still working on DXF’s and PDF templates for the current design. And trying to get my machine up and running again.
So much to do! 
Oh man looks like I confused myself. Thanks @MeticulousMaynard for clarification on the motor shaft size (and for coming up with this improvement). So many factors to consider but it’s starting to make more sense
I went back and looked at what I bought. I bought a MXL 60T pulley and a GT2 20T pulley for mine and it is working even though that is obviously not right.
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I wasn’t really sure if the different tooth profiles would matter, good to know it’s working in that configuration though! I noticed the GT2 has a more narrow tooth profile while the XL’s have a slightly thicker, and more flat profile on the top. Good to know that it would work for those of us that don’t want to wait a month on products from China. Why does it take so long any way? Gah…
@Archie_Slate I blame myself, I got the size wrong for quite awhile until someone pointed out I was wrong. I think it was listed in the old BOM wrong and I probably said it was that size at least a dozen times throughout this thread.
The new BOM greatly simplifies the choice of pulleys, I only put 1 option! xD Right now, I’m pointing at a 8mm bore, 10 tooth XL pulley for the lead screw and a 6mm bore, 30 tooth XL pulley for the motor. This gives us a default ratio now of 3:1, which I’m confident that it won’t stall the motor now that we have real-world data from users.
@SnailPowered While I would be nervous about the mis-matched pulleys, it doesn’t seem to be causing you any issues. I would keep an eye out for belt slippage, but at least it should be very noticeable. You’d start loosing distance on Z moves, particularly while the bit is plunging into the material, as that’s when there’d be the most load on the pulleys and belt.
@wcs39204 I’m sure this doesn’t help you now that you ordered your own pulleys, but the ones listed in the BOM now are from Amazon, so you wouldn’t have to wait forever to get your parts.
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Sweet thanks! I actually was going to order everything when I got home today. The belt you listed however, still says ‘1-3 months’. I found a better alternative, that’s available for prime, and about a $1 cheaper if you wanna check it out and update the BOM.
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Whoa, good catch! Didn’t even notice.
I just updated the BOM with the new link you provided.
You guys are the best 
the different tooth profiles will ‘work’ but they will also wear the belt faster
than a profile that matches the belt.
things take so long because they are literally sending them by ‘slow
boats from china’, the cheap costs are because they put the packages on
freighters (and they are taking advantage of a old mail agreement where
countries agree to deliver packages from other countries for no cost, something
that has changed with an updated ageement in the last year or so)
David Lang
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Updated BOM is much more new-user friendly 
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I agree! Thank you Maynard! Guessing you’re a Tool fan? When are we getting that new album?!! haha
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Yeah, I’m definitely concerned about slippage but have luckily not experienced any so far other than when I have asked it to move farther than it was physically capable of moving. I bought ten belts at once, so I do have some backups, but next time I will get a new 20T pulley and belt to match the MXL profile. I don’t know that I’ve really pushed the Z during my usage either.
I’ve finished making DXF and PDF templates! And they’re now in the Community Garden! 
I’ve broken all the parts out into different PDF’s that you need to print 1:1 for everything to fit together right. I had to use a couple different paper sizes, I tried to put as many of them on letter sized paper as possible, but I had to use Ledger in a few cases as well as Arch D (24" x 36") for the sled itself. Each PDF is labeled with it’s page size. The larger ones should be pretty easy to get printed at a Kinko’s or something.
The DXF’s will allow you to customize your own tool paths. Simply import it into you CAM of choice, and program each path based on the instructions in the layer name:
The first section of the name is the material and it’s thickness, the second the tool to use, and the third the type of operation to be done. In some, they will either say “thru”, meaning the final cut depth needs to be through the material, or they will specify a depth to pocket to.
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Woohoo! Can’t wait to see progress! I love the anticipation when I open a package of parts hahahah
Just an FYI… when @johnboiles and I hit 500 posts in a message thread regarding optical calibration that we were working on, discourse shut the thread down. So with that…
hmmm… well, this is post 501… so maybe nothing happens on main threads? 
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