Making room for my Elite Gen 2 Journeyman in my workshop required a lot of thought about space, power, lighting, dust collection and computer setup. I hope to document the process to solicit suggestions of lessons learned and perhaps offer so ideas to others.
A closely related issue is that the Journeyman is not the only piece of equipment in my shop. I have a table saw, shaper, 18" surface planner, router table and the usual sundry of power and hand tools for woodworking.
Perhaps more unique, is that I also have a saw mill for cutting up 36" diameter logs into planks. Which means I also need room for a kiln and stacking dry wood.
I went with a DIY solution using the following materials. Total cost was about $300.
660 CFM Central Machine blower.
50 gal plastic food grade drum.
Lots of stuff from Amazon!
Cyclone dust separator
4" dryer vent hose
4" PVC dust collection hose
2" PMV dust collection hose
4" blast gate
30 micron dust collection bag
4" x 2" ‘Y’ PVC adapter
4" Dryer vent wall plate
heavy duty toggle latches
Make a removable lid with a scroll saw, I carefully cut off the lid off the drum, leaving a clean top edge about 1" down. If you invert the lid, it will fit over and seal against this edge pretty nicely!
Add the latches to pull it tight, cut holes for the dust separator and plumb in the blower, vents as needed.
Put in blast gates right above the drum for two 4" hoses to use in the shop & router.
Added sliding hanger rod overhead the CNC area to carry the 4" hose.
I mounted my blower to the wall above the drum for easy access and clean up and I decided to vent the blower output to outside the shop wall, so any residual dust does not go into the shop!
I decided to go with a rather ‘unconventional’ routing table to support my QCW. The QCW is very strong and designed to be supported just at the four corners, where there are 3/8" leveling feet which actually support the whole CNC assembly!
Rather then build a big massive table to hold this 300+ pound machine, I decided to anchor it to the wall with heavy duty shelf mounts with a 1" thick oak shelf on one side and then use 3-point adjustable pipe stands to hold another oak shelf on the other side.
This his very stable, rated for 1200 pounds and leave lots of room underneath for my roll-around work benches!
In addition, I plan to add heavy duty hinges to the wall shelf and ceiling winch to life up the CNC flat against the wall when not in use. The pipe stand shelf then will slide in nicely underneath it.
This frees up 100 square feet of additional work space for other equipment and projects.
Today I completed the assembly of my 1F Journeyman on the QCW frame and I have to say I am very impressed with the quality, workmanship and general heavy duty material and well thought out design!
The one lesson learned was that the cables limit the location of the controller and orientation of the motors… I wanted to put the drive motors away from the door, and mount the controller on the wall… that is not possible with these cables. It is definitely worthwhile modeling your site setup to locate work space, dust ducting, controller mounting and lighting before starting the assembly process…
But then again, I specifically design this setup to be adaptable. No doubt it will evolve over time… I think this is a good starting point at least…
