Jasper, one additional piece of data on my Mechatron purchase is I asked them to quote the package delivered, including freight. Therefore they turned the package over to UPS and they paid for the freight. Then I had to pay for the duty.
My advice to anyone buying the spindle where it has to be shipped similar to my case is to get Mechatron to determine the freight cost and let it be included in the order. You also may want to consider paying by bank transfer versus using PayPal. PayPal has a pretty hefty fee for international purchases.
I went with the intermediate way as some other owners did, and bought a Hitachi VFD with a Huanyang 220 spindle. Hopefully one day I could upgrade to an ATC spindle. Now I am collecting components to build the control box.
Hello - I’m in the process of gathering information on an exhaustive list of what I’ll need to purchase when it comes time to buy the Woodworker. Since I’ve chosen to upgrade to Onefinity, I’ve decided that my next CNC will run with a spindle and not a trim router. During my initial research, I have found that Mechatron appears to be a reputable spindle manufacturer. I’ve sent them a request for quote on both a 65mm and 80mm 1.5kw air cooled or water cooled version, but I was wondering from the forums experience, what kind of investment I am looking at. Thank you for your time.
Aiph5u
(Aiph5u (not affiliated with Onefinity))
25
Hey Chris,
please use the search function of the forum.
You will find a lot of information, including that I have reported what I have paid here. You may also find this and this.
A spindle is a three-phase induction motor which requires to be driven by a VFD which should be enclosed into a control cabinet, for two reasons: Firstly, a VFD (and the spindle cable) is the source of heavy EMI, and secondly, in addition to the VFD itself, you need a number of other components which are conveniently installed together with the VFD in a control box that is grounded and therefore acts as a faraday cage to shield the EMI. If you want to have information on how to build an appropriate control cabinet and what to put in it, see here.
Note that Mechatron has a Web Shop for end users and even an Ebay shop.
Note that there are a lot of spindle manufacturers in Germany, Mechatron is only one of them. It is however one that also adresses to consumers and hobbyists. If you are interested in German and European spindles, see here.
If you use the search function, you will also find that there is a disadvantage in using a 65 mm spindle, because it does not clear the stepper on the Onefinity, as explained here and here. Better buy the optional 80 mm spindle mount with the Onefinity for this reason.