Quiet router motor?

[Mike Heidrick]

The 2.2kw chinese water cooled spindles have really opened up the quiet spindle accessability to the hobby market though and teh 3.0kw spindles are only marginally more. You are looking at a $200 VFD and a $400 (or less) spindle and a small water pump and a circuit in your controller to start the VFD (very easy and cheap if you built your own controller). A set of precise collets will run you about $100 for ER20 and that will give you 1/8 to 1/2 bit mounting capability. The 2.2 mounting requires a 80mm mount and K2CNC makes those available for $65. 3.0kw is 100mm. While a 7518 can be had new from $249-$300 I am still thinking I would like to try one of the spindles out.

[james mcgrew]

the downfall to the chinese water spindle is the fish tank pump, throw the chinese one away and invest in something you can trust, if the pump stops you may not catch it quick enough and bump new spindle!!

john keling has them in chicago, nice chinese fellow purchased many a part from him and he always answered my calls

http://kelinginc.net/CNCSpindleandController.html

jim

[Bruce Page]

Jim, thanks for the link. Great reading!

[james mcgrew]

the chinese do not have it together when it comes to the metal but some of the parts and drives are good i have used them. i have johns motors on one of my routers, (switching to the tecknics servo soon)

[Dennis OBrien]

Well you could run two pumps in parallel for redundancy...

the downfall to the chinese water spindle is the fish tank pump, throw the chinese one away and invest in something you can trust, if the pump stops you may not catch it quick enough and bump new spindle!!

john keling has them in chicago, nice chinese fellow purchased many a part from him and he always answered my calls

http://kelinginc.net/CNCSpindleandController.html

jim

[james mcgrew]

dennis you have a stinger with the pc, so just how loud is it?

jim

[Gerry Grzadzinski]

I'm in the camp that says cutting noise is loudest, although I'll agree that 3D finishing with very small tools is very quiet. But the roughing passes will still be loud.

Also, 1/4" bit's tend to be quite noisy. Moving to a 3/8" or 1/2" can be a lot quieter.

I use a PC 892 in my homebuilt CNC. For most cutting with 1/4" bits, I run it at 12,000 rpm, and it's quieter than my dust collector. But the cutting noise is much louder.

I'd seriously consider the chinese spindle from Ebay. It's basically the same spindle that Keling sells, for half the price or less. If you go that route, it's a good idea to buy the spindle alone and get a name brand VFD to run it. Many use the Hitachi. I've seen many, many people using these with no problems at all.

In my experience as a machinist the actual noise of the cut was, in most cases, directly proportional to the rigidity of the setup. Is that not the case with a CNC router?

It is the case, but in reality you may not see it. Wood is too flexible and resonates easily. My day job is running $100K routers, and you need a really good vacuum to hold the part securely enough to quiet the cut.


My router site side of the wall behind my TV. I've had it run for hours while watching TV, and it's barely audible, although the wall is insulated. As Jim said, if it's in the garage, keep the door closed and you'll be fine.

[John McClanahan]

For anyone thinking about getting a Chinese spindle, go over to cnczone.com, find the DIY CNC Router forum and look for a post titled something like "So you think you want a Chinese spindle" and read up. Then decide.

John

[Dennis OBrien]

dennis you have a stinger with the pc, so just how loud is it?

jim

Stinger with PC router yes. PC with old operating system - on it's way. I'll tell you when I get back from York PA next week. I HOPE!

[Matt Clara]

M12VC is 79decibels and the 2.2kw Chinese water cooled spindle is 72 decibels.

Thanks for the correction, Mike, but just for further clarification, the Hitachi M12VC is still the quietest router on the market today. Spindles are a different story, obviously, but even the cheap Chinese ones cost 3 and four times more than the Hitachi, which can be had from amazon.com for $118, shipping included.

[Gene Crain]

Search ebay for "spindle motors"

There are several sellers now offering air cooled units, also on youtube you can find videos comparing the water vs air cooled units as far as noise levels.

Spindle vs router...."speed costs money, how fast ya wanna go?"

Gene

[Joey Jarrard]

For anyone thinking about getting a Chinese spindle, go over to cnczone.com, find the DIY CNC Router forum and look for a post titled something like "So you think you want a Chinese spindle" and read up. Then decide.

John

I 2nd what John says. Do your home work it always pays off.

I think my history teacher said those same words to me in high school.

[Mike Heidrick]

I really iked the post with the CPU cooler, radiator, and hose links. Very good.

I do not own one of John's keling's spindles but I will say I sent him an email to call me because I had some questions on his controller boxes and he called me right back. Great CS and I was not even a customer yet.

[James L Barber]

+1 on buying parts from John. I've never been disappointed.

If you do happen to buy a 1.5, 2.2 or 3KW 80mm spindle, make sure to buy a decent quality collet nut and spanner. The Chinese units are junk, which is strange because the overall quality of the Chinese water-cooled spindles (especially the ones retrofitted with quality bearings) is otherwise pretty good. I have 1.5 and 2.2KW with VFD's in daily use that have lots of hours on them and still run great with very little run-out. I've had good service from Maritool on the collet nuts and wrenchs. As an example, the 1.5KW spindle mounts a standard 14mm thread ER11 collet nut just fine. BTW - the matching wrench is necessary because the shoulder profile height on the collet nuts is on the short side.

If you do end up getting an 80mm spindle and decide you want a dust foot for it, let me know (PM with email address) and I'll send you either DXF or VCarve-format files for one I've developed over time that works well for me, at least.

--jim

the chinese do not have it together when it comes to the metal but some of the parts and drives are good i have used them. i have johns motors on one of my routers, (switching to the tecknics servo soon)

[Richard Link]

Bruce,

I recently ordered a Stinger with the 1HP spindle. Although it will take a while to get my machine, I'd be happy to measure the sound output or make a video for you so that you can compare the noise to the router based Stinger.

Richard