Been toying with the idea of adding a CNC to the toy inventory very soon.
Who here has them?
Wanna post stories, struggles? projects?
My cnc story-
In high school 25+ years ago I built and installed car audio for most of the people in my school that had systems while I was there.
The project I talked my friend into letting me do with his funds was a low profile behind the seat box for a pair of JL audio 12W3's
Typically people used the off the shelf powder coated round metal waffle style speaker grills but that wasn't gonna cut it with these long excursion (it was back then) subs
The back of his 93 Standard cab dodge ram seat would be in contact with the face of box and didnt want anything to be damaged so I came up with a plan.
I wanted to build a box with 4 face boards plus a flush mount grill.
1 board to mount the speakers, 3 more board layers to space the grill out then a custom Lexan square waffle style grill.
Most of my boxes I did the old fashioned way with MDF, Table saw, Jig saw, rotozip, but grill wasn't gonna be easy that way.
So I talked my electronics teacher who was also my electronics teacher into building a cnc machine to do the faceboards and grill.
I stayed after school every day I could for a few months helping design and build a cnc.
We had everything in electronics class to make our own circuit boards so everything on this cnc was diy. He drew up all the circuit boards and I helped solder, assemble the components.
I wish I remembered more of this project.
I had pics of all if it it but no idea where it all went.
I swear the computer was a pentium 1 or apple 2e. I don't remember but it was very basic.
I wrote each tool path line by hand and we cut the speaker grills first.
Worst part was build up of plastic on the bit oversized some of the waffle holes but it cleaned up pretty well on an oversized finish pass.
It took 4 depth passes and one oversize pass for each grill and nobody around at the time had anything like it on their subs.
I did the square cut outs in the face boards next which was so much easier cutting.
Built, carpeted the box and he had it in his truck for many years. He may even still have the box. Haven't talked to him in 5+ years due to a falling out but sure was a fun project.
Looking forward to hopefully doing some similar projects with my kids now that they are the age I was when I did that one.
Unfortunately that teacher passed away many years ago and I don't have the ambition to built a cnc from scratch like back then so I've been shopping around for a few years to find just the right model.
At the moment I'm leaning towards this one-
AnoleX CNC Router Machine 4030-Evo Ultra, All-Metal XYZ Axis Dual Steel Linear Guides & Ball Screws with 500W Spindle for Metal Aluminum Brass Wood Acrylic PCB https://a.co/d/2qYwK2u
Much smaller than the one we built but probably a decent starting point.
Who here has them?
Wanna post stories, struggles? projects?
My cnc story-
In high school 25+ years ago I built and installed car audio for most of the people in my school that had systems while I was there.
The project I talked my friend into letting me do with his funds was a low profile behind the seat box for a pair of JL audio 12W3's
Typically people used the off the shelf powder coated round metal waffle style speaker grills but that wasn't gonna cut it with these long excursion (it was back then) subs
The back of his 93 Standard cab dodge ram seat would be in contact with the face of box and didnt want anything to be damaged so I came up with a plan.
I wanted to build a box with 4 face boards plus a flush mount grill.
1 board to mount the speakers, 3 more board layers to space the grill out then a custom Lexan square waffle style grill.
Most of my boxes I did the old fashioned way with MDF, Table saw, Jig saw, rotozip, but grill wasn't gonna be easy that way.
So I talked my electronics teacher who was also my electronics teacher into building a cnc machine to do the faceboards and grill.
I stayed after school every day I could for a few months helping design and build a cnc.
We had everything in electronics class to make our own circuit boards so everything on this cnc was diy. He drew up all the circuit boards and I helped solder, assemble the components.
I wish I remembered more of this project.
I had pics of all if it it but no idea where it all went.
I swear the computer was a pentium 1 or apple 2e. I don't remember but it was very basic.
I wrote each tool path line by hand and we cut the speaker grills first.
Worst part was build up of plastic on the bit oversized some of the waffle holes but it cleaned up pretty well on an oversized finish pass.
It took 4 depth passes and one oversize pass for each grill and nobody around at the time had anything like it on their subs.
I did the square cut outs in the face boards next which was so much easier cutting.
Built, carpeted the box and he had it in his truck for many years. He may even still have the box. Haven't talked to him in 5+ years due to a falling out but sure was a fun project.
Looking forward to hopefully doing some similar projects with my kids now that they are the age I was when I did that one.
Unfortunately that teacher passed away many years ago and I don't have the ambition to built a cnc from scratch like back then so I've been shopping around for a few years to find just the right model.
At the moment I'm leaning towards this one-
AnoleX CNC Router Machine 4030-Evo Ultra, All-Metal XYZ Axis Dual Steel Linear Guides & Ball Screws with 500W Spindle for Metal Aluminum Brass Wood Acrylic PCB https://a.co/d/2qYwK2u
Much smaller than the one we built but probably a decent starting point.
Last edited:
