I have a brand new s5pro 4x4. I built a cabinet for it to set in. If I run the gantry to the back of the machine the front right corner of the machine will lift up a 1/16 of an inch. To me and my simple newbie mind that means the machine is sitting on a non level surface. Which means I need to disassemble the whole thing and level out the surface that the machine is sitting on.
I just need someone with more experience than me to tell me yes that’s what will fix the whole thing you stupid newbie you should have used a 4ft level instead of a 6 inch level.
My solution for this sort of thing is to put the machine on a sheet of foam which takes up any unevenness or lack of level, allowing the machine to find its own level on the yielding surface.
Well that actually sounds better than hand planing like I was going to. What thickness would you suggest using and I’m assuming that you’re talking about the 4x8 sheets at the local big box store.
Thank you for the information. This has been a very crazy experience for me. I’ve never spent 5k for a tool and I’ve had it put together for 5 days and haven’t even been able to use it.
You can buy the rigid foam at big box stores and other building supply stores. The offer .75" and 1.0". I would get the 1.0" but the .75" would work. Because of the size of the SO5 you might need to get two sheets of the foam. I dont have an SO5 so I dont know if they have leveling feet but if they do I would remove them to let the machine sit down on the foam.
Gentlemen,
Thank you for the suggestions and I really do appreciate them. This is the first time I’ve ever posted a “stupid noob” question on a forum and have not been negatively turned away by useless and sometimes rude answers. I’m thick skinned but that crap gets old. It’s refreshing to get honest suggestions especially when I would have never thought of something as simple as foam to fix my problem.
Thanks again and hopefully after I get some experience with this big guy I’ll be able to contribute and help answer questions like this in the future.
Your comment if about this forum is shocking to me. We are moderated and frankly I have not seen but a few snarky responses here on this forum. Not saying it is impossible but mostly all I have seen for the past 5+ years is positive and encouraging comments.
Nathan, you are absolutely right about this forum. Nothing but very helpful people who love using their cnc machines and passing on the knowledge they have. Looking forward to see what you make on yours.
After having my 3xxl on foam for years I went a different route. When I built my 5 4x4 I squared and tightened everything. The went back and removed half the slats and shimmed under all the cross bars.
The machine is also screwed to the table on the corners so it can’t move.
Thank you for all your help. I went with the 4x8 1/2inch sheets from lowes and it solved the problem. I let it settle in for a week and I can run the gantry to any position and the bed doesn’t move at all.
Sorry it took so long to get this picture uploaded. I’ve been rearranging my shop around. I stumbled on a local deal too good to pass up and picked up a dust extraction system full size drill press, 8 inch pedestal Belt and Disc Sander and an old band saw. So i’ve completely had to rearrange everything in my shop which is a massive undertaking. I have too much crap but it should all get organized in the next couple of weeks.
The life cycle of a shop is it starts off bare. Then it is over filled. Then it is messy. Then it is cleaned up. Then it is over filled. Then it is messy. So the entire life cycle of a shop is rinse and repeat as necessary. If your shop is clean and neat that is good but likely you are not doing any work to get it messy and dirty. I would recommend that at the end of the day in your shop you spend 10 minutes to put things back up and clean up. When your shop gets too messy it gets dangerous. The other problem with a messy shop is you spend twice as long as necessary looking for things because you did not put them back where they belong.
One important piece of advise is things in your shop that have not been used in 6 months or more should be moved to a storage area or at least out of the main line of sight. Put those things in the back or stored up high to keep the things you do use regularily in a good and consistent spot. Finding things in the shop is half the battle of working in a shop.
The first time I turned the machine on and translated the transom to the back, the machine launched a corner up 4" or so. I thought I had squared the machine, but the transom showed me the real square. This is on plywood so there is no slippage.
So I shuffled it to settle on the table, shimmed the bottom and all is good.
Thanks for the words of wisdom. My goal for this fall/winter is to get rid of a ton of crap. I Have a shop most men dream of. It’s an old Paint factory that is 6500 sq ft but I bet I dont have 200 sq ft of open floor (not Joking). Now I do run my Ebay business out of it and I have a small farm so you can imagine the crap I have stored in it. Half of the back of the shop has had junk sitting in it for around 10 years and I couldn’t tell you what half of it was for or who owns it. (friends that have left crap for storage) So my goal is to get it cleaned, organized and downsized. Wish me luck!
Wow sounds like you were in a bind lIterally and figuratively! I figured out my problem was inconsistency in the OSB thickness. The cabinet bed joists were perfectly level but the cabinet dimensions are 7ft X 7ft. I had to use two sheets of osb one was the full width of 4ft and I had to cut the other down to 3 ft wide. The first time I turned the machine on and moved the gantry to the back, the corner that was sitting on the small sheet lifted just slightly. The thickness of that sheet was about a 1/16th difference and the styrofoam boards resolved the problem and took a lot of the echo and vibration noise out of it. Would have all been avoided if i had used some good sheets of plywood but that would have ran the price of my cabinet up from around $350 to who knows how high. My local price for a sheet of 1/4 inch ply is almost $30 and half inch is close to $47 a sheet cabinet grade is $80+. So I opted for 1/2 inch OSB and add my veteran discount into it and they were right at $15 a sheet. But I learned a good lesson dont assume that OSB is truly dimensional; some sheets are + or - on the tolerances.
