Foxalien wm3020 Cnc with Linear Rails & Ballscrews

Comments · 126

• WE

  @webmasterg3526 · 2 years ago

  I've just ordered one of these (Black Friday Deal!) partly because of your excellent review here. I'd also like to thank you for responding to all the various questions people have put to you, which i have also found very useful. Great YouTube - Thanks!

• DA

  @danieldieterle5574 · 3 years ago

  I like your video style a lot because you are going straight to the point. But provides still a lot of information around the topic.<br>Two additional topics as a dedicated video would also be very interesting:<br>1) Attachment methods:<br> &nbsp; &nbsp;o According to material: Aluminium/wood<br> &nbsp; &nbsp;o Scotch: I did not yet understood why there is no double sided scotch used. Instead this &quot;special&quot; green one is used!?<br> &nbsp; o Primer/Glue/Scotch method: I saw this method a lot but did not yet understood its main advantage.<br> &nbsp; o Turning the machining object for maching its sides. Correct referencing after unscrewing the machining object.<br> &nbsp; o Vises: Important aspects of them. There are cheap and expensive ones. What makes sense to invest for such a type of machine?<br> &nbsp; o Egalization/Parallization(?) of four machining object faces?<br>2) Mills / Cooling:<br> &nbsp; o Which coating/mill base material for which working material?<br> &nbsp; o When is cooling required? Which types are when recommended? (I saw your video &quot;Sainsmart Genmitsu 3020 Pro Max&quot; which already gives some details)<br> &nbsp; o Flute types: Single, dual, etc. When to use which?<br> &nbsp; o Material removal/Surface finish: Which mills are recommended for material removal and which are good for a smooth surface?<br> &nbsp;o Operating depth: What has to be considered if you want to create deep pockets? Say 30-40mm? Is it the mill cut depths only? Or more the Z-axis stability?<br>Maybe you do a video with a bit more complex (40x40x40mm and ) wood/aluminium/steel objects and go into the mentioned aspects above a bit more in detail?<br>Thanks a lot!

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• EV

  @evgeniylazurenko · 2 years ago

  Great video! Very informative!

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• SI

  @sickswan61 · 3 years ago

  Did you ever add the more powerful motor

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• NA

  @Nandox7 · 3 years ago (edited)

  Perfect. Great to see this.<br>This is pretty much the upgrades I had planned for my 3020.

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• NI

  @niksechtniks · 3 years ago (edited)

  Glad to see that there is finely some smaller machines coming in with some more capability

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• HU

  @humbertosigala7108 · 3 years ago

  As a good teacher,I appreciate your time

• FO

  @foxabilo · 3 years ago

  Building my own 5050 at the moment using a modded 3018 to make the custom parts, always enjoy watching new designs for ideas, cheers for the great videos.

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• MU

  @Muny · 3 years ago

  Nice thorough review! Your build video of it enticed me enough to buy one for myself a few weeks ago. &nbsp;It&apos;s a great machine, but I&apos;ve already found some ways to upgrade it:<br><br>The stock spindle is good, but mine had a fair amount of runout in the motor shaft. There is a small amount of adjustability in the set screws of the ER11 tool holder, but I wasn&apos;t able to get mine low enough to be satisfactory to me. &nbsp;Additionally, the shaft deflects quite a bit under load, causing chatter. I ended up upgrading it to a 600W Deadelus brushless ER11 spindle. &nbsp;So far I&apos;m really happy with that: it has a very small runout, and the ER11 tool holder is machined out of the shaft of the motor, so it&apos;s nice and stiff. There is very little deflection under load. Also, the collet nut that came with it is heaps better than the stock spindle&apos;s. &nbsp;I&apos;ll be looking forward to your video about your spindle upgrade!<br><br>Another big issue with the WM-3020 is, despite having ballscrews, there is still an amount of &quot;backlash&quot; introduced by the lack of proper bearing mounts. I had read about this being necessary on DIY CNC forums but I wasn&apos;t really sure why until I got my machine. When a force is applied in the axial direction on a ball screw, there needs to be something to take that load and prevent it from sliding (you want the ball screw nut to slide, not the entire ball screw!). On the WM-3020, this force is taken in one direction by a flange-mount bearing, and the other by the bearings in the stepper motor. &nbsp;None of these interfaces are made rigidly, they are all slip-fit. Unless there is some preload applied (which there wasn&apos;t, and I think it would be hard to do) you will be able to shift the entire ball screw in and out without it rotating (ie. your axis will slide when it gets pushed towards the stepper motor).<br><br>I solved this issue using some thrust bearings and machined bearing mounts that take the load instead of the stepper motor&apos;s bearings.<br><br>For some reason the machine came with the GRBL setting &quot;step idle delay&quot; set to 25ms. As soon as an axis hasn&apos;t been moving for more than 25 milliseconds, it will turn off the stepper motor. I don&apos;t think this makes any sense for a CNC machine. For a lot of toolpaths, the Z height isn&apos;t changed for a long time. With this setting left at 25ms, your Z-axis stepper will turn off and upward or downward forces will cause your Z-axis to shift and you will loose those steps. This is a lot easier to happen with ballscrews than with lead screws, which have more sliding friction. You will also almost always lose whatever microstep position you were holding before it was turned off. &nbsp;I highly recommend disabling this feature!<br><br>I&apos;m still discovering ways to improve the rigidty of the machine (for example the plate that holds the Z-axis stepper is a little thin, and flexes under loads in the Z-axis), but overall I&apos;m extremely pleased with it. I am looking forward to an increased Z-axis height kit (If I don&apos;t make one myself first...). That would be very nice because as it is currently, as soon as you add some fixturing you run out of extra height to install your bits!

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• MY

  @MyllerSWE · 3 years ago

  Thanks for the followup vid on this machine! :)

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• RO

  @rob2too2 · 3 years ago

  Great video - thanks :) &nbsp;Alu cutting performance seems hugely better than Genmitsu 3020 Pro Max

• MO

  @Moodyfabrication · 3 years ago

  Can&apos;t wait to met mine tomorrow to mill aluminum