"Walking slowly before running..."

[Jim Becker]

Mark, I actually "get" this kind of thing pretty quickly, but am being cautious to take things step-by-step. In addition to adding some complexity, I'm also observing and listening so I begin to get a feel for when things are cutting efficiently, too. Today's exercise, after entertaining yet another medical professional, was to do like Keith mentioned...a raised letter scenario and I chose to use that exercise to also prototype my "logo sign". I cut it multiple times with different material, too. Overall, I'm pleased with how this worked out and will paint it up to see how it will look when I cut it out of material more appropriate for a small building sign.

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[David Falkner]

Looks good, Jim. MDF cuts nicely but it sure is dusty.

David

[Jim Becker]

Looks good, Jim. MDF cuts nicely but it sure is dusty.

The Kent dust hood got probably 98% of it outside of the little bit I blew out of the kerfs while doing the profile through-cut. I also cut this in cherry, but inadvertently knocked the switch and hadn't marked the center point on the blank, so I couldn't restart a bunch of lines back from where the power dropped. That version was looking "quite Krispy", too. But I don't mind cutting things in MDF for the practice for sure. The first iteration of this one was in some white pine and it was a little too soft for the fine serifs to survive fully intact.

[Mark Bolton]

Mark, I actually "get" this kind of thing pretty quickly, but am being cautious to take things step-by-step.

No doubt your killing it straight out of the gate. Once you get healed up and less distractions youll burning the rubber off the soles of your shoes. Wasnt saying going faster or anything just more a comment about how the wild capabilities as it goes along. Its a fun process. Im endlessly impressed by the tech especially on the software side. Just had a local shop owner in our shop yesterday and he was talking about having done a job many years ago that had a really large mantle in a commercial job that had text carved in it. Was several feet long. Back in the days before VCarve and how the shop that ran the job had hours in writing the code for the letters and now we can whip out an entire job, multiple toolpaths, multiple bits, in no time. He sat an watched me output a kitchen job for him and just sat there shaking his head. Wild times.

[Jim Becker]

I figured out pretty quick that I'm going to love this tool and it doesn't take away from other things I do because I can do them while babysitting the cut in progress.

[David Falkner]

Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. The little production run I did the other day cutting 4 pockets and boring 4 holes in twenty-five 5"x6"x0.7" Walnut trophy bases took just under 2 minutes each. So I no sooner got the part mounted in the quick change fixture and hit the cycle start button before it was time to take that one out and put the next one in. I tried sanding some pieces but it was just easier to stand there and swap parts out of the fixture.

David

[Mark Bolton]

I figured out pretty quick that I'm going to love this tool and it doesn't take away from other things I do because I can do them while babysitting the cut in progress.

Thats where I absolutely love our machine. We just ran a job with a slew of parts that had several tool changes and reasonable times between off and re loading. The work you can get done while the thing is chunking away (hopefully spewing out work or even better dollar bills) is great.

That said, I do still find myself on certain jobs (3D work for sure) having a hard time prying myself away from standing there waiting to see some detail poke out from under the dust shoe.

For us with panel processing the precision and speed is astounding. Whipping out what is now a simple shelf was something that would involve TS, Tape measure, a drawing, dado setup or router with straight edge, and so on. And the amazing part is when you get dado and tenon tolerances where you like them, parts go together with complete friction fit, dead square, gosh its heaven. We have switched to all blind/qualified dados and its been amazing.

Will be a real game changer for you Im sure.

[Jim Becker]

Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. The little production run I did the other day cutting 4 pockets and boring 4 holes in twenty-five 5"x6"x0.7" Walnut trophy bases took just under 2 minutes each. So I no sooner got the part mounted in the quick change fixture and hit the cycle start button before it was time to take that one out and put the next one in. I tried sanding some pieces but it was just easier to stand there and swap parts out of the fixture.

Yes, if there's a production run happening, that might require hands-on and focus on the CNC. For other things that are one-off and take cutting time to complete, it's easy to keep busy.

Here's how the logo-sign prototype turned out after slapping on a little color...

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[Keith Outten]

Nice job Jim, you are really learning fast and well on your way.
See you Thursday morning.

[Mark Bolton]

Can't beat that. The super slender portions on the B are the berries (lol). Super nice. I hate finishing MDF.. what did you use on the background?

[David Falkner]

That looks nice, Jim. What was the total time for machining?

David

[Jim Becker]

Can't beat that. The super slender portions on the B are the berries (lol). Super nice. I hate finishing MDF.. what did you use on the background?

I just used some left over BM Advance black and applied it with one of my artist brushes that date back to when I was at Penn State in the late 1970s. I'm going to give the background another coat when I get back from Aspire Camp. Thanks for your kind comments...I used a 1/4" spiral downcut for this with the machine speed kicked up a little as well as for the spindle. It cut really clean on the MDF and was cutting the cherry really, really nicely before the intermittent switch issue I was having kicked in. That's been solved, BTW. Support responded to my email today in about 15 minutes and it turned out that a piece on the back side of the physical switch assembly had been jarred loose during shipment. It's rock solid now.

Kieth, I'm looking forward to seeing you and many others (great group!) and I suspect I'm going to have some sign-making questions to pick your brain about.