Nomad - Cutting Aluminum Picture

I just found a few images from a while ago, of the Nomad cutting aluminum. This was a solid block of aluminum that it cut out. Just thought I would share. It was supposed to be an injection mold, but my injection molder didn’t like the plastic material and it was time sensitive so after I machined this, I bought some machining wax and made two patterns to make some silicone molds, and casted them in urethane. Those are below as well.

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You do have a shop-vac don’t you? :wink:

Lol, I believe that I was having issues with static in my shapeoko whenever I vacuumed, so it just scared me on the Nomad, I didn’t want to mess it all up.

Awesome work! First time I see Alu work on the Nomad in such a complexity!

And Alu always makes a great mess :wink:

Would you share the F&S and tools you used for the roughing and the finishing operation?

PS: I use a shop vac from the beginning as well as a dusthead without any problems. Give me a hint if you go for it, I am happy to share pics and design if you need (nothing special, based on the ideas we already have in the forums here)

Thanks!

Markus

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The Nomad is grounded better, and unless you’re cutting highly static materials like plastics with a high carbon content (black in color), polyurethane foams (yellow stuff, lighter than Renshape) or polyethylene foams, you shouldn’t have too much issue.

I’ve never had the Nomad have a static issue, and after the latest board upgrade on my So3, I’ve had very few issues with it even with troublesome materials.

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I did have to get a replacement board for the Nomad, but now I don’t remember why. I do believe I had an issue. And I also have a new board for the shapeoko, I have gone through 2 boards, and the third was the winner. I cut a lot of polycarbonate and mdf on my shapeoko and had so many issues. It was awful. I almost switched to an x carve, but then I decided to reach out to support and they are phenomenal. Now, I have no issues with my shapeoko, it does what it needs to do, when it needs to do it.

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