CNC Mill or Router?

[Lireal]

This year, my team found itself with extra money in the budget, and we would like expand our program by getting either a a cnc mill or cnc router. We most likely will not be able to get both of them within the foreseeable future, since this is happening under some strange circumstance.

Our budget for this would be about $4000-5000.

From your experience, is a cnc mill or cnc router more useful to have by itself? What size of each would be sufficient for an average team?

[AdamHeard]

What equipment do you currently have? If you don't have a manual mill then get that first.

Does the machine have to be new?

[jman4747]

You won't get as much for your money if you go cnc mill. I too would say to get a manual mill first but you need to pay attention too all the tooling you will need to make use of it. You will want someone with experience to help with training for that. I think you may want to go cnc router.

[Joe G.]

Originally Posted by jman4747

You won't get as much for your money if you go cnc mill. I too would say to get a manual mill first but you need to pay attention too all the tooling you will need to make use of it. You will want someone with experience to help with training for that. I think you may want to go cnc router.

Seconded. At your budget, you will be able to get a much more useful CNC Router than CNC Mill.

[Lireal]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

What equipment do you currently have? If you don't have a manual mill then get that first.

We currently have a band saw, drill press, chop saw, hand held circular saw, cordless drills, and hand tools.

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Does the machine have to be new?

Definitely does not have to be new.

Originally Posted by jman4747

You won't get as much for your money if you go cnc mill. I too would say to get a manual mill first but you need to pay attention too all the tooling you will need to make use of it. You will want someone with experience to help with training for that. I think you may want to go cnc router.

Ya, if we are going to get a milling machine, the one we have been looking at is manual, but has a digital read out, and we most likely will convert it to cnc later on.

[Joe G.]

Originally Posted by Lireal

We currently have a band saw, drill press, chop saw, hand held circular saw, cordless drills, and hand tools.

In that case, I'll add to Adam's post and say that splitting the money between a manual mill and lathe may be a good choice. You can almost always find a quality used Kneemill for a couple thousand, with much better deals popping up on occasion (We got a quality bridgeport clone with power feed and DRO for $700). A lathe, likewise, can often be found used, and revolutionizes what a team is capable of building in ways that are hard to fully understand unless you have one. Getting a lathe in 2013 utterly revolutionized my team's build process, much more than the manual mill did the next year.

[AdamHeard]

Ideally a used Bridgeport or clone with dro then.

Skip CNC for now.

[Lireal]

So, I'm still not really clear. Would a cnc router or a manual mill with a dro be more useful in my situation?

[Mr_I]

Here's something to consider: Does your team have anyone with enough CAD skills to justify the purchase of a CNC-anything? If not currently, is it likely that you can develop those skills?

If your team / school / mentor base isn't likely to support creating and sustaining the CAD skills needed to feed the CNC [mill or router], why not stick with manual mill?

[asid61]

I would vote 7x12 lathe and Bridgeport. If you shop around on Craigslist you can get the latter for $1500ish, and a DRO/ tooling for another $1500. Then Spend $1000 on a lathe and tooling and possibly $1000 on a Shapeoko 3 if you really want a CNC.
The Shapeoko is nowhere near the quality of an industrial CNC router, but for FRC use it's fine.

[AdamHeard]

For standard sized shaft work, the mill can easily be used as a lathe. Put the part in the spindle and clamp the tool in a vice.

This is assuming you can't have both.

Originally Posted by asid61

I would vote 7x12 lathe and Bridgeport. If you shop around on Craigslist you can get the latter for $1500ish, and a DRO/ tooling for another $1500. Then Spend $1000 on a lathe and tooling and possibly $1000 on a Shapeoko 3 if you really want a CNC.
The Shapeoko is nowhere near the quality of an industrial CNC router, but for FRC use it's fine.

Shapeoko is going to be pretty underwhelming for FRC for bulk production compared to a $5-20k router. For a few parts it will work just fine (or if you're okay running it 24/7 all build).

[asid61]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

For standard sized shaft work, the mill can easily be used as a mill. Put thi part in the spindle and clamp the tool in a vice.

This is assuming you can't have both.




Shapeoko is going to be pretty underwhelming for FRC.

I do a ton of lathe work on the mill, and it is not fun at all. You can't work on anything longer than a few inches, because R8 collets do not have a through-hole like 5C collets do. Drilling a hole in the end of a shaft requires indicating the shaft. And you can forget about doing tapers or threading. It's definitely a good idea to invest in a cheap lathe instead of just $4000 on a mill and/or router.
I suggested the Shapeoko because for the price and value you can't beat it. The new Shapeoko 3 can cut aluminum out of the box without issues. If the OP is considering one, looking at the videos of it cutting aluminum are enlightening as to its capabilities.

[Ryan Dognaux]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Shapeoko is going to be pretty underwhelming for FRC.

We purchased the 1000mm variant of the X-Carve about a week ago. It claims to have 31" x 31" of cutting space which would be fantastic for many FRC applications.

We've just started assembling it fully knowing we will need to upgrade some items. From the research I've done, it can handle aluminum if you purchase the correct end mills and use something like Inventor HSM to create efficient cutting paths. We're planning on publishing a white paper documenting our assembly process and any modifications needed to make it work well. Cost is around $1500 for the kit to assemble from Inventables - https://www.inventables.com/technologies/x-carve So far the assembly instructions include videos and pictures and has been relatively painless.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by asid61

I do a ton of lathe work on the mill, and it is not fun at all. You can't work on anything longer than a few inches, because R8 collets do not have a through-hole like 5C collets do. Drilling a hole in the end of a shaft requires indicating the shaft. And you can forget about doing tapers or threading. It's definitely a good idea to invest in a cheap lathe instead of just $4000 on a mill and/or router.
I suggested the Shapeoko because for the price and value you can't beat it. The new Shapeoko 3 can cut aluminum out of the box without issues. If the OP is considering one, looking at the videos of it cutting aluminum are enlightening as to its capabilities.

Assuming you can't have both machines, mill makes a far better lathe than vice versa. 90% of the precision shafts we make are 4" or less. Also everyone should be using thunderhex now ( and if you're making spacers make it out of tubing) so drilling is a non issue.

How often are you threading parts anyway?

The shapeoko will be fine for a few parts, but for meaningful qty you'll need to keep the machine running nonstop.

I really like the shapeokos for the price, and 973 is considering getting one for our pit, but they're more of a supplement than a workhorse compared to what a $5k or more router can do.


We're getting off track anyway. For OP I stand by get the best manual mill for the price you can, then get a lathe as well as possible. Don't get a small mill, get a full size Bridgeport or clone.

[RoboChair]

I too agree with Adam here, if you would like help finding good deals on machine please PM me and I can go over details with you.

The issue with a CNC router is that it will not replace an actual mill, but you can do milling with it with effort if you really are heavily inclined to get a CNC first. I would pick a manual mill+lathe and find a laser cutting sponsor(even just paying a shop to laser cut sheet for you is cheap enough to be well worth it) over a CNC router every day of the week.

BTW you can follow G-code on a manual mill by hand via DRO(just try and avoid angles and curves that can be finished by hand later)

I'm almost infamous around central California for buying lots of machines on the super cheap.

EDIT: you are not far from our shop in Davis, I would be more than willing to meet sometime over the next week or two to go over the many options you have before you and the methods 1678 has used to build up our shop in the last few years.