CNC mill conversion G0704 Grizzly – cheap

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  • #5412

    I am in the process of finishing up a cnc conversion of my 4 year old grizzly g0704 mill, trying to do it piecemeal and low cost. Decided on the TinyG as I did not want to invest in having to use a parallel port computer. This also freed me up from buying mach3 and allowed use of my laptop to keep things really convenient and inexpensive. Along with tinyg, used 3 of the 425oz 2.8amp steppers, and made all my own brackets, trying to keep the parts count low, simple, and cheap. I originally used the stock acme rods and proved out the concept, but once that worked, I had to upgrade to the ballscrew version. So conversion costs were about $130 tinyg (no extra mach3 or parallel port computer) 3 steppers @ $50 apiece ($150), eventually a ballscrew kit at $200 which is optional, and various hardware, mostly oldham couplers at $60, angular contact bearings (only for ballscrew conversion) $25, about $30 in Z axis pulleys and belt, for a total of about $400 for the stock threads and $700 for a ballscrew converted version. So far its looks like the tinyg has enough power for the 425oz steppers and machine. It also leaves me one more axis for a horizontal rotary table if need be.

    #5414

    A really ugly video milling a 1 inch hole in 3/8″ aluminum is here:

    #5420
    Riley
    Keymaster

    Sweet do you have a build log?

    #5428
    Riley
    Keymaster

    Alden and I each have a similar grizzly. Do you have sources for some of these parts? I am a bit jealous. I have been wanting to do this exact project since we started TinyG 🙂

    Any details might help me get mine converted too!

    Riley

    #5430

    Here are pics of the parts I had to fabricate. A great resource is g0704.com, he sells plans, videos, parts lists, cad drawings, etc as a package. However, most of the parts I built were not of his design, but simplified (and not as nice, but work fine and were cheap and relatively easy to fabricate).

    #5436
    Riley
    Keymaster

    Did you forget a link? I do not see any pics.

    #5437

    The site seems to strip a hrefs, and I didn’t see an easy way to upload images:
    http://www.cnczone.com/forums/benchtop_machines/212088-g0704_tinyg_controller_simple_ugly_cheap_parts.html#post1440486

    #5438

    Riley,
    Can you respond to this quote about some of the limitations of tinyg compared to a Mach 3, what g code features are yet to be implemented in tinyg?
    “1 – First, all of them only use only a subset of the RS-274 g-code command library. The codes that are incorporated are the very basic ones. Many of the ommitted codes I find very useful. Some examples of ommitted codes are G40, G41, G42 (cutter diameter comp), G43 (tool length offset), G81 through G89 (Drilling and boring cycles). I’m sure there are others, but most of the microcontroller based G-code interpreters don’t have enough memory to allow for the program overhead to include these.”

    #5439
    alden
    Member

    Very cool project. To your request:

    The Gcodes that are not implemented in TinyG are largely those that people use when hand generating Gcode. With the exception of tool length offset (which we plan to implement) the others are not used widely with machine generated Gcode, or the CAM can be instructed not to use these codes. We recognize that it would be nice to support hand generated Gcode, but other priorities have our attention at this time.

    #6652
    JeromyReno
    Member

    That’s so rad. Good work

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