[sdcantrell56]

You say you have good woodworking equipment. I would use that as an excuse to build as much as you can out of wood. Look at old rage robots, or more recently 1726, and our robot, 1771. Wood is a great material to build with as long as you use high quality wood. I would recommend 1/2" or 3/8" thickness baltic birch which can be had for $30-$40 per 5'x5' sheet. Join it together with simple wood screws and wood glue or epoxy and you'll have a very robust robot. Also its a lot less hazardous for new people to learn to machine parts out of wood than aluminum.