I bought the Makita that is suggested and it burned up with less than 5 hours of use. Gross orangish smoke coming out of it burned up.
I understand a factory defect. No grudge there, they handle thousands of products, I assume I am a one off. So I sent it into Makita to get it replaced, That was in August. I got an automated email saying they’ve received it in September and I have heard nothing else from them.
I am a disabled veteran. Woodworking is a hobby for me. This giant machine has been taking up shop space, it hasn’t been working long enough to become a part of any work flow. I am finally getting around to giving it another chance. I am just wondering if there is another router that will fit it? I feel out of my depth with the idea of getting a spindle but if that is the only other option I will consider it.
I really don’t want to reward Makita’s pour customer service by buying any more of their products.
I am sure you will soon get an onslaught of comments in this thread about trim routers and how they are not designed for use in cnc machines due to duty cycle, cooling method (air), and many other things. These are all true. I have also burnt up a makita router in my machine and would love to make the jump to a spindle, but havent wanted to drop the money on it yet.
Depth of cut, bit diameter and feed rate will play a big part in longevity of your new trim router. Order of operation will also have an impact. If you keep the bit diameter small, feed rates reasonable, and depth of cut low, you should be able to use a trim router for most hobbyist applications. I mention order of operations because that is what bit me when I burnt up my router. I had a profile cut that was done AFTER clearing out pockets for finger joints. The router didnt like smashing in and out of the wood at the full feed rate of the profile cut. The bit would bog down as it came in contact with the wood, and then rapidly speed back up as it reached free space. This completely trashed the bearing and caused a “pretty” blue light to emanate from the router housing. I retooled the paths and changed my order of operations to cut the profile first, and then the replacement router made it through with no problems at all.
With the trim router you will just have to go a little bit slower and you will likely not be able to get the speeds / feeds that are listed by the manufacturer of the bits that you are using.
As far as that other trim router and a warranty, the site doesnt make it super clear. I would say that you got lucky that makita replaced your first router. The documentation on the Makita clearly says that it is not intended for continuous use, and placing the router in a cnc voids the warranty. The carbide one listed above is clearly intended to be used in a carbide cnc, but I am not sure they would honor a warranty if it was placed in a 1F.
Makita hasn’t responded to me aside from the first automated email saying they received my router. They haven’t replaced anything yet and I am doubting they will ever get back to me at this point. The 5 hours was not continuous use for certain, and I have done a lot of research into feeds and speeds because I don’t want to damage my bits or the machine.
I went with the trim router because that is what Onefinity suggested with their machine. I was surfacing my spoil board when it went up in smoke. I had my feed set to 80 inches per minute, with a depth per pas of 0.06 (because I am using a router), a 9 inch ramp to depth (which at that depth should be extremely conservative) and my step over is set to 70% with a router speed of 17,000 rpm (setting 3). Which should all be well within safe perimeters for The router, and the bit while surfacing MDF. I wasn’t through the first pass on the spoil board before it gave up the smoke.
I was keeping a log of all of this so I can look back at my data to be able to dial things in. This is something I’ve done with my 3d Printer as well to optimize quality of the prints.
As I mentioned I suspect it was a factory defect in the device.
This is exactly the point we were trying to make on getting some Thumbs Up on this post to have OneFinity make an adapter plate for the Z-Axis to support actual Mulling Motors.
Trim routers like the Makita and every other brand on the market are not designed to run for hours upon hours of time. They are for trimming cabinets, or jobs that typically take <30min at a time. They do work for CNC machines (clearly as a ton of them across many brands are being used.) That does not however mitigate the fact that it is not what they are intended to do. In fact the second you put one on a CNC you void the Makita warranty.
Another trim router you may consider is the Harbor Freight Bauer that can be had for around $79. After returning 2 Makitas to Home Depot because of running hot, I decided to give that one a try. At least if that one burned up, it was half the price of the Makita. It wasn’t a horrible router and it did run hot, but maybe not quite as hot as what I experienced with the Makitas. At least the Bauer came with a spare set of brushes.
Still not happy with that, I moved on to a BLDC (brushless DC) spindle. It’s small, but runs oh-so smooth and quiet. It’s not a powerhouse like a true spindle or router, but it’s perfect for my needs.
For my previous Chinese CNC, I made a mount for a Kress type spindle, but never ended up going that route. If and when my BLDC gives out, I may revisit this for the Onefinity.
Love the way it machines, the spindle seems very stable and holds torque well even at lower RPM’s. What I like about these spindles as compared to their cheaper brushed counterparts, is the bearings support the actual spindle. On the brushed versions, they have 8mm motor shafts with an ER11 collet adapter pressed onto it. They can flex horribly under load.
Yes, I had to make some spacer rings for it. I used Polycarbonate to make 2 adapter rings.
Interesting… I never took any cuts deep enough with the Makita (or Bauer) to notice that.
1 Like
Aiph5u
(Aiph5u (not affiliated with Onefinity))
14
Hey @WikiSnapper, hey E D, hey Auntjemimma, hey all,
it was reported in this forum that the Makita support stated that as soon you put the Makita hand trim router into a CNC machine, its warranty is lost.
Hey Bill,
I too find this to be a possible solution for router replacement vs investing in an actual VFD spindle. The need to make a spacer is a drawback but I’m more concerned about the 12,000 RPM limitation.
Have you found that to be any concern in control of chip load affecting bit life?
Duty cycle is the culprit here. Think of how that router is normally used, trim an edge or two for maybe 2-3 minutes and put the thing down. Probably does not even get hot. Bite the dust and go with a spindle, water cooled if you are planning long duration machining. Way better than being aggravated with the noise and short life span of a cheap router.
Absolutely Michael! I didn’t do this one in 3D, but you get the idea. It does not require the hex shape on the outer profile. I added that as well as the scallops in the ID to facilitate flexing it open to slide onto the spindle. Those spindles are such that they don’t have a smooth body. The upper & lower motor caps are a bit larger than 55mm, so the adapter needs to stretch a bit to go over those features. In hindsight though, all this was totally unnecessary for polycarbonite, because that stuff flexes pretty well without the need of the reliefs cut into it.
I used 1/2" [12.7mm] polycarbonate, with the 65mm portion cut down about .410" [10.4mm], leaving a lip of .090" [2.3mm] thickness. You could make these out of just about any material as long as it flexes enough without breaking.
Phil, I have not had any issues with the 12k RPM limit, as most of my cutting is done somewhat below the top RPM. I have not had any issues with chip load or bit life, although 95% of my work is done with very conservative feeds & small cutters (typically 1/8") in plastics. I do extremely little woodwork, so I can’t really give any valuable feedback regarding performance with larger cutters & more demanding cuts. I can say I am quite happy with it for my use though, and will probably stay with it as long as it holds up. Or until (and if) Onefinity decides to develop & sell a mount for a 43mm Kress-type spindle milling motor.
Before anyone jumps on the BLDC bandwagon though, in the interest of transparency, I will share an issue I’ve had with it.
Prior to using it on the 1F, I had it in use on a smaller Chinese CNC where it performed flawlessly. After putting it on the 1F it again ran flawlessly until one time I was doing a cut and the motor was stalling. This didn’t show up until after a couple hours of running. This issue was not cutter load related, as it even did it on a very light finish pass. I initially thought the motor driver was going bad, but now I’m not so sure. The motor wiring was directly laying on & crossing the curly Z axis cable, making me wonder if it was an EFI issue. I moved the driver module and re routed the wiring to create some separation between the 2 cables. Additionally, I hooked up a relay module from the driver to a ‘tool check’ input on my Acorn controller so if it stalls again, it will stop the feed and immediately raise the Z axis. After doing these changes, I ran the motor for about 6 hours straight with no stopping. I have done a couple small jobs with it as well since then, with no issue.
