I have some pieces that are 5 1/2 and 6 inches tall, does Carbide3D or any 3rd parties sell a gantry and bit setter lift kit?
The reason for not having a lift is because of the increase to all issues associated with it. Especially if you’re offering a warranty the issues that would arise with selling a part like that would negate any profits you intended to make.
Aftermarket not really because with the number of them you’d actually sell your prices would be similar to a machine shop.
Your best bet is probably seeing if your local machine shop can do it based off your own design assuming you’re out of or don’t value your warranty period.
If the parts are narrow you could do:
and secure them at the front of the machine.
with just over 2 hours of run time, I am not quite ready to design my own parts just yet, haha
I am working on a 3" lift kit for my Shapeoko 5 Pro. I found 3" x 4" x .25" rectangular tubing that can be cut to any length when ordering. It’s not cheap but the 3" of extra clearance is a game changer. The gantry sits too low and won’t clear material over 4". So if I don’t need it I just use 1" MDF under my workpiece to bring it back up in height. The tubing is around $650 for the 2 side rails. The rectangular tube mounts on top of the hybrid rails and under the Shapeoko side rails, so in essence your lifting the entire machine except for the hybrid table and the bitsetter remains in it’s original location mounted to the side rail.
That sounds awesome, I am very interested to see how it turns out.
I’ll post a video of it on YouTube and here
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Could you do the opposite where you remove a couple table slats to sink the project lower than the default work surface height?
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You could if the piece your cutting fits in between the main supports of the hybrid table, which then depends on how flat that surface is to work off of. I am making a permanent solution for the entire machine where I am not limited to a small work zone.
Yes that’s interesting also. Except I plan to do it from right under the side rail and on top of the 4 hybrid table rectangular tubes. The reason is because it will keep bitsetter in its original location mounted to the side rail. It may cost more in aluminum but the machine won’t even know it got lifted up.
I would have it done already but work has been slow and too many other bills to pay, but it’s all planned out.
I was also looking into doing this for my s4pro as well after losing some valuable Z height from installing the SMC fixture plates. The method I was considering was to increase the height of the existing spacers between the Y rails and hybrid bed frame, and design/machine taller plates for the rails. My thinking was that would keep the stock rigidity of the X/Y gantry and rails by just adjusting the height from the hybrid table.
There is a company that makes X gantry riser extension plates but kinda pricey: https://www.3dtec.us/product-page-1/gantry-riser-set-for-shapeoko-4-pro
What is the max height of a piece of stock the Shapeoko 5 can handle? I have not bought a Shapeoko yet, but i do know that some of the work i plan to do is machining stock that is at least 4” tall.
I am also trying to determine the max depth of cut, as i will need to make some deep cavities.
The space under the gantry is well over 4 and a half inches.
Max depth of cut will depend on part and endmill geometry and how it relates to the shape of the dust collection/spindle.
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