cnc router

Hi Charlie,

Do you have a budget figure in mind? These animals are not cheap, and

depending on what you have to spend, you may want to look at used stuff

coming out of a furniture factory closing up and auctioning off its stuff.

The Chinese have been doing that lately to lots of American furniture

operations! I worked for 27 years as the Director of Product Design for

Baldwin Paino & Organ, and we had three or four of these things, in various

states. The last one we bought was about $300,000 new, but when Baldwin

folded about three years ago, that machine sold at auction for only $140,000

(about 18 months old). It was a Northwood. We also had two Eckstrom

Carlsons, an Onsrud, (older and less expensive), and a Shoda (Japanese -

great machine but big bucks). There are smaller, lesser duty machines for

intended for production work will probably exceed $100,000 new. Hope this

helps. If you need any further info on the subject, email me at

snipped-for-privacy@bellsouth.net

Joe Seawright

or if want clueless support staff, then you should try

There are a LOT of homemade CNC routers out there. You just need to google on it, and pick ideas. Your greatest challange is making a system rigid enough to handle a 4'x8' area without excessive vibration and sag. There there are the leadscrews ($$$) for this size. There are alternatives to leadscrews, but I didn't look into those.

John