Has anybody engraved “tile” such as bathroom, back-splash, flooring, etc? Stuff like Ceramic, porcelain, glass, stone.
What about Granite?
I’ve seen a few videos on YT, but it appears most of these are deep cuts, all water cooled/flushed. I’m thinking of a project with a detailed engraving, hopefully dry, since the R7 sits on its spoil board. At least in my current configuration.
Lastly,
Has anybody engraved the faux wood flooring?
** It also seems like the dust is so fine that it would be problematic for the (long term) good of the components…
I’ve tested carving the faux wood flooring. It’s just really sense MDF, definitely makes a lot of powdery dust. A cheap way to test is to get those flooring samples from home Depot for free and have at it. These little trinkets were test carves on flooring, with some chemical wood burning post-cut.
Awesome. I appreciate the suggestion. I’m just running through ideas. I’m getting ready to Retire from the Military and will be leaning on this R7 to start pulling some weight! I was thinking of materials I can get that didn’t require a lot of prep, and would be easily “duplicate” if some of my ideas worked out.
I had a TON of help from Mark Lindsay (YouTube). He even did a google hangout video / desktop share and we worked through some issues I was having with importing topographical images (US States). Now I’m waiting for a fly cutter to get here from Amana Tool.
Last fall I spent a good 3/4 day, pre cutting 2x12’s to length, running through the planer to ensure they were all true and level. I went back to my R7 (under my house, in the crawlspace) last month and they were all turned and twisted. I understand I was taking my chance with dimensional lumber from Lowes, but I really hoped they wouldn’t have been that bad. Especially as long as I let them dray and as dry as my crawlspace and Alaska is during the winter.
That being said, I’m probably going to try and run a fly cutter over them and true them up. Its -20 right now, I don’t want to drag out my planer and set it up.
I have always seen those materials cut with water (probably for dust control and cooling).
As an aside, I am working on a layout to lasercut a base out of steel (maybe 3/16") that would keep the R7 aligned/adjustable between spoilboards. It would have a cutout in the center.
For now, maybe build a torsion box with a cutout in the center. Add an inset plastic box. Screw some clamps down and silicone the holes. Add water and cut. That’s what my friend did with carbon fiber on a MPCNC.
I’m in a unique position, in which my R7 is under my house. Since I live in a log house with a “sealed” dirt floor, its important I keep as much moisture out of the environment.
That being said, I may, in the future, be in a position where I could get a smaller machine and run coolant with it.
I’m thinking the tile idea may not be feasible without water. Blah!
Corey, not entirely sure what you had in mind with the tiles but an alternative is to create intricate molds using the precision of the CNC. Then cast concrete, plaster of Paris, clay, urethane, silicone, (lots of great materials out there) etc. into the mold. In this way you can quickly create custom designs on the R7 but can easily scale the creation of tiles via many molds. This is something I am doing myself right now, but originally I was going to cut the final products from wood. This workflow opens up mineral based materials but with the precision and customizability of CNC. See picture as an example, friend wanted some bitcoin coasters… These are cast concrete.
Darren,
Are you screening the gravel out? Are you using a specific concrete (bag mix)? I love the idea of using the R7 to produce a mold. Plus, that seems to be a trending thing on the DIY’er links & Etsy.
Ideally, I’d like to have the ability to do Tiles, etc. But, I’m probably getting ahead of myself at this point. I’ll seek out Colin’s reference and bookmark it for the future.
Corey I have only tried the cheapest sand but it did have some large gravel chunks that were a nuisance, so I’m probably going to try the slightly more expensive play sand. It’s nice to experiment with sand and cement because they’re both cheap.
@Corey_Perez Yes, the bit was $6 and I just wanted to see if it would work. I have a friend who owns a tile company and he asked if it was possible. I figure if he ever orders any I will set up a little better. I ran dry and I was able to cut that same tile 3 times with no noticeable wear. I would cut wet if I had to do a run but my table is MDF and it doesn’t like water.
@Colin_Kaminski , I appreciate the follow up. I was at our local home improvement store and was just overwhelmed with the options. I also started looking at tile drills, basically seem like they are concrete drill bits.
I have a friend who works at a tool supplier. I was already going to swing by his office tomorrow for a unrelated tool request. I may have to see what he has in the masonry section!
I, like you, am running on MDF. The R7 will have to be a dry cut system. I have recently considered using a heavy duty layer of plastic and making a bed/dam to keep a small amount of water contained. I’d expect some spashing, but at this point I’ll just run any projects “dry” and see how it all works out.
Thank-you again for all the detailed assistance! Thanks to all!!
