I’m fairly new to CAM, and have been learning the CAM side of fusion as I wait for my machine. (should be in the next couple of weeks!). I designed a wasteboard that should be able to be cut out using the Onefinity itself, out of 3/4" MDF. Using a 32" square piece of stock, the machine will cut out a 31" square wasteboard. That’s about the biggest I could get while keeping all the tool paths within the cutting area. It can be resurfaced, and easily remade if needed. It features dovetail slots for clamping microjig-style. I also designed sets of toe clamps and oops-type clamps that can be 3D printed to work with the dovetail sliders. It also has holes for 1/4" dowel pegs to use for squaring stock to the machine.
There are 5 operations to the CAM using 4 different tools:
1). 2D contour (with finishing pass) to cut the outline of the 31" board. [.25 flat Endmill]
2). 2D pocketing to clear material from the slots. [.25 flat Endmill]
3). Boring operation for the dowel holes [.125 flat Endmill]
4). Facing operation to surface board. [1" surfacing bit]
5). 2D contour to finish slots. [.5" 10deg dovetail bit]
I learned a ton programming this. A challenge was making sure the tool paths and lead-ins wouldn’t crash the dovetail bit into the stock. Feeds and speeds are guesstimated for now, and we’ll see how many tries it takes to get them right. OBJ file is in thingiverse, and I can email the fusion f3D file if anyone wants to use it (not sure if I can upload it to this forum). When the machine arrives, I’ll try to make a video if it works.
Thank you @muddyfeet that is crazy awesome of you to share your files!! Defiantly going to take it for a spin once my machine arrives in the Sep 14th shipping slot.
Thanks, It’s an untested design until I get my machine, though!
Take note that the dovetail size is not standardized to the microjig system, though- and may not work with their hardware. The dovetail tool takes 2 passes through each slot and makes it slightly wider than .5inches. This was necessary to fit 1/4-20 hardware in the clamping sliders. Im as curious as anyone to see if it actually works.
@muddyfeet Wow, this is really awesome and super nice of you to share. I won’t be getting my machine until December so once you get everything finalized if you wouldn’t mind sharing the results that would be appreciated by all I’m sure. Thanks again!
Awesome bit of CAM work! I can’t even think of how long that took to setup.
The Microjig MATCHFIT system only works with their 14 deg dovetail bit - although if you wanted to use that bit instead in your CAM setup above, it should only be a minor change.
That said - the normal steel MATCHFIT Dovetail Clamps are about 8" in length sticking straight up - which means that the gantry (X-axis) wouldn’t be able to pass over them if said clamps were used to clamp material. You could however use the MATCHFIT Dovetail Hardware Variety Pack to make your own lower profile clamps in those same 14 deg dovetail tracks.
The only problem that I can see is that long-term, after surfacing the waste board a few times, the base-part of the dovetail (that goes into the slot) might not fit (vertically) or have enough “meat” to still hold since you’re taking away some of it’s holding power by surfacing and making the top of the slot wider.
Thanks. I was wondering about the matchfit geometry. If the bit I have is too shallow of a slope I will definitely try to go get a 14 degree bit and change the model to match. I did sink the dovetail 0.025" deep to the surface to try and save a little extra ‘meat’ after surfacing once or twice. But because MDF is cheap, it’s not a big deal to keep the G-code files and just cut out a new board if it gets too thin from surfacing a few times.
I got an email that a shipping label was created for order 053, so I hope to be cutting by this time next week!
Thank you so much for sharing this. As someone who is new to this as well I really appreciate the way you took time to explain everything in a very laymen way that’s super easy to understand for us newbies. Very thorough and thoughtful job not to mention pretty awesome work on the CAM side for a beginner. Thanks!!!
Good question! The honest answer is that this was my first ever cut and I thought I’d practice on scrap that I had on hand- which was the particleboard. I didn’t expect the first one to turn out. MDF would be better for this application.
Side note: Its a few months old and I’ve surfaced it over a few times now and I’m almost ready to cut a new one. The surface is not as smooth as mdf, but it has served its purpose thus far and has worked out okay overall.
