O/T Freakin Bad A$$

[Rick McAllister]

Check this out. I've seen pics but not the movie.

I don't know how to post it here so maybe one of you Gurus can help.

 

Free Floating Milling Machine

[gcode]

I saw one of these at Westec last year.

It was a real light duty machine, just good for

very light mill cuts and drilling and tapping small holes. It was blazing fast and a blast to

watch run.

[Camdude®]

That reminds me of the Hexapod machine that NIST was working with. the big problem with it was rigidity or rather the lack of it. pretty cool looking though.

[MATT Q]

I like that laser cutter that thing was flying:)

[Scott Bond]

quote:

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I saw one of these at Westec last year.

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Hi Gcode,,In the video you can see the reflection of the people walking around at the show in the glass. This design is still faily new compaired to seasoned cnc styles, I would imagine that they will get bigger and better if(or as) they get more popular.

[Nominal]

I'm surprised nobody's come here looking for a free post for one of those yet.

[Guest]

I saw the milling machine last year at Westec also. I talked to the operator and he said the programming was the same as any other cnc mill. At the time they had just sold 6 machines to Lexus for machining aluminum castings. I thing that machine is by far the coolest cnc machine I have ever seen. It is very original and innovative.

[Allan Brown]

Actually the machine kinematics are so brutal that all the math is typiclly done on board the control. The G-Code uses XYZIJK where IJK is the unit vector of the tool - available through vtoolx, vtooly, vtoolz in the post. Easiest 5-Axis post I ever worked on!

[gcode]

quote:

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I would imagine that they will get bigger and better if(or as) they get more popular

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I think the salesman told me they cost about $350K each. They were very light duty. To me it looked like the weak link is the spindle drive.

I think the spindle at the show was driven by a flexible cable like a rotto rooter.