# My new CNC mill has arrived



## kvom (Feb 9, 2010)

It's a Novakon NM-200. Details can be found at the Novakon website: 
http://www.novakon.net/nm200.html

It was shipped last Wednesday, so one week end to end. The truck delivered 2 wooden palletized crates:







The smaller contains the stand:






I set it up to lift off the pallet with my auto lift. The base was attached to the pallet with a single bolt.






With the stand in the air, attaching the 6 feet was easy. 






I adjusted the corner feet to be equal with the two centers a little short. Once the mill is in position I can level it more precisely. In any case, measuring with an electronic level after it was on the floor showed 1 degree off crosswise and 3 degrees lengthwise.






The chip pan is banded to one side of the mill crate.

With the sides and top of the crate removed, here's the mill as packed:






And with the packaging removed. Notice the steel bar that's protruding from the sides of the column. That's one I placed through the holes provided and that I will use to lift the mill off the pallet.






Here's the mill as seen from the rear:






I'm going to hold off until Friday for the assembly, as a friend will be available to lend a hand. I suspect the mill will tilt when lifted off the pallet. There are two eyebolts on the front of the base casting that can be used to level it off. Once in the air, I'll maneuver the stand and chip pan underneath and lower it down.


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## GailInNM (Feb 9, 2010)

Looks like a nice machine. You should have a lot of fun with it.
Gail in NM


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## 1hand (Feb 9, 2010)

Kvom,

I very glad to see that your CNC mill showed up unharmed. Thm:

Couple of Questions:

1. What was your deciding factor to go with a Novakon?

2. How is this model compared to the LMS CNC, and the one from Smithy.

I'm in the process of patenting my prosthetic wrist, and doing a some research on the cost effectiveness of in house machining or farming it out to a shop. I would really like a CNC for further complex designs I have in mind, and if I could recoup the cost with manufacturing mine own wrist, instead of paying someone else would be an easy decision"for the silent partner of the household". Right now manually takes me 2 days to make the 5 parts it requires to build the wrist.

Thanks, Matt


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## kvom (Feb 9, 2010)

Matt,

Compared to the LMS mill the NM-200 is a lot bigger. The LMS is closer to the NM-135. 

I wanted a mill with enough Z travel to fit my 8" rotab in vertical mode, and enough X and Y travel for any parts I might conceivably want to make in the future (not just model engines).  I did consider both the Tormach and the Mikini as well. The newer Syl mills seemed interesting, but they don't seem as readily available. Novakon gets good reports on service on cnczone, and the price was within my budget. It also has a footprint that I can just make room for in the shop. I can also mount my Kurt 6" vise on the table.

If I had more shop space, I would have preferred a used VMC with a tool changer.


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## 1Kenny (Feb 10, 2010)

Kvom,

That is one nice machine. It is good to see people are buying new machinery. Did you get the software with it?

Kenny


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## Maryak (Feb 10, 2010)

kvom,

 :bow: WOW :bow: WOW :bow: WOW etc................

That looks like one nice machine. I hope you enjoy it.

Best Regards
Bob


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## BigBore (Feb 10, 2010)

Gull Dern your Hide! I'm so jealous, my ear wax turned green. Oh crap, my typing turned green. 

Very cool tool, KVOM. Congratulations. Enjoy.

Ed


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## kvom (Feb 10, 2010)

I bought the CD-100 controller with a motherboard, 2G memory, and Windows 7 installed. Doing it this way Novakon installs Windows and Mach3, then configures and tests the mill with the controller that's shipped. Thus, I should have to do no software configuration to get running correctly. We shall see.

I connected all of the cables to the controller, added a mouse, monitor, and keyboard, plugged it in, and booted it up. So far, it all looks OK:






Mach3 starts up, but states it's in "emergency mode" and requests an external e-stop. I'm assuming that's because the cables that attach to the mill are not attached.

The CD-100 is a hefty unit, much stouter than my other PCs. I'm estimating it's at least 30 lbs. It appears to be designed to sit as shown in the photo, given the placement of the air vents and the rubber feet. With the installed motherboard, it requires two separate power cords. So it appears that the motherboard and the CNC controller have separate power supplies.

The two cables that connect the CD-100 to the mill are about 10' long, so there's a lot of latitude on placement relative to the mill itself.


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## deere_x475guy (Feb 10, 2010)

"Mach3 starts up, but states it's in "emergency mode" and requests an external e-stop. I'm assuming that's because the cables that attach to the mill are not attached."

Thanks Correct, there is an option on the menu that will allow you to run Mach3 without a machine connected. I am at work right now so I can't go there to explain how you find it.

Were you able to get the big discount for students they were offering on this?


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## kvom (Feb 10, 2010)

> Were you able to get the big discount for students they were offering on this?


Yes. The discount was a big factor in the decision.


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## doc1955 (Feb 10, 2010)

Nice! I am envious of you the fun you'll have with that. :big:


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## ariz (Feb 10, 2010)

congrats kvom, it seems a great CNC machine, you should be able to do marvelous things with it

I visited their site, specs are impressive, 2 HP and so on...

I'm guessing why they didn't cover the Z axis lead screw? but perhaps it isn't necessary, it's only a doubt caused by envy 

enjoy it :-*


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## kvom (Feb 16, 2010)

The bolts needed to mount the mill to the base cabinet were missing from the shipment, so I needed to acquire 6 M12x1.75 bolts that screw into threaded holes in the base.

Having gotten the missing bolts, I undertook to mount the mill to the base this morning. First I needed to turn the mill sideways between the lift posts so as to have room to maneuver the pallet jack. This is becaause the jack fits only from the side of the base. So I lifted the mill with the slings on 4 arms, slid the base underneath, and lowered the mill onto the base. In this photo the mill is facing the wrong end of the base.






Next, I turned it 90 degrees, reattached the straps, and raised the mill a few inches over the base. Because my auto lift has an adjustment that lets me raise one side independently, I could get the mill to sit fairly level front to back. I placed the steel pads on the table, aligned with the holes in the base, and inserted the bolts in the mill casting. Next I maenuvered the pallet jack so that one back corner bolt was over its hole and lowered the mill so that I could get a couple of threads engaged. Now I could move to the other back corner and use a steel bar as a guide to align that hole as well. Now with 2 bolts partially installed I could lower the mill onto the base with a good chance that the other holes would line up as well. If I'd had someone to help I think it would have been easier to keep the mill suspended while starting all the bolts.

With the 4 corner bolts installed, I could remove the lifting straps to move the assembled mill out from the auto lift:






I discovered that the side bolts are still too short. While Novakon calls for M12x1.75x80, it needs at least a 100mm bolt. However, the mill sits formly on the supplied side pads. Perhaps the mill's casting has changed since the assembly instructions were written.

Next I just needed to attach the sheet metal guards for the rear of the table:






and the x-axis motor:






I still need to find a place for it. Right now it looks like I need to sacrifice the beer fridge.


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## joeby (Feb 16, 2010)

> I still need to find a place for it. Right now it looks like I need to sacrifice the beer fridge.



 I thought that's what the base cabinet was for. ???


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## kvom (Feb 18, 2010)

I got the power cord built, the machine moved and hooked up:






I need to get some sort of cart for the PC/monitor/keyboard, but for the time being I wanted to do some testing.

Machine gets power; I was able to home all the axes and jog them. There's still some sort of warning message flagged on Mach3 that I need to research.


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## Noitoen (Feb 18, 2010)

In our local Chinese store they sell some cheap flexible rubber, waterproof keyboards, maybe it's a good solution to make it swarf/coolant proof.


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## kvom (Feb 19, 2010)

I cut metal for the first time today, testing out the machine and Mach3. Just a circular pocket in a 4" disc of 6061. Eventually the program will cut a flywheel with curved spokes (hopefully).


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## ariz (Feb 21, 2010)

happy to see that you broke the ice with your new cnc mill kvom


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## CrewCab (Feb 21, 2010)

kvom  said:
			
		

> I still need to find a place for it. Right now it looks like I need to sacrifice the beer fridge.



Blimey Kurt ............   ................. that's a bit extreme ???






Seriously though that's a nice machine, having seen what you can now produce with manual machinery we have high expectations for your CNC work ;D

Above all ................. have fun th_wav

CC


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## Maryak (Feb 22, 2010)

kvom,

I admire your forward look to curved spokes. It's a sine of my age but I'd soon be off on a tangent before I lined up the cotangent for changing direction if you get my drift. :

Best Regards
Bob


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## kvom (Feb 22, 2010)

Bob, don't cosine any loans for new gear either. Take a secant to think it over! ;D

I discovered that my x-axis is configured in reverse, so I will need to delve further into Mach3 today to change it's direction. I'm pretty sure it's just a simple config change. I also found out I needed to configure a much longer dwell time on spindle startup. The motor can take 10 seconds to go from 0 to 4000 RPM. You don't want to start a cut until the spindle is at speed.

I'm taking baby steps getting up to speed on Mach3, esp. as I love watching the Olympics on TV when I could be in the shop.


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## ksouers (Feb 22, 2010)

Maryak  said:
			
		

> kvom,
> 
> I admire your forward look to curved spokes. It's a sine of my age but I'd soon be off on a tangent before I lined up the cotangent for changing direction if you get my drift. :
> 
> ...



Bob,
You really do need to get more time in the shop ;D


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## kvom (Feb 24, 2010)

Made some progress on the demo flywheel, cutting out the pockets that form the spokes:







My main issue now is that because Novakon increased the column height without lengthening the Z travel, the spindle is 6" above the top of my vise when at its lowest point. They are sending me an extension bar that will attach to a R8 collet and supply an ER-16 collet chuck at the bottom. This seems less than ideal as I don't have any ER-16 collets, they go only up to 3/8" capacity, and the extra length is likely to add runout and reduce stiffness.

So I'm also looking at making some riser blocks to place under the vise and raise it above the table.


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## mu38&Bg# (Feb 24, 2010)

I made the same mistake when I built my CNC mill. I knew I wanted to work on material directly on the table, but somehow figured things would be OK. ??? I had to block up my last workpiece 2.5" to get a short cutter to cut. Other work gets a 4" long 1/4" endmill in the spindle. Luckily, parts in the vice aren't usually a problem.


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## shred (Feb 24, 2010)

;D Not too many people complain about _too much_ Z height. Weird they would have done that.

What vise do you have on there?


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## kvom (Feb 25, 2010)

Yesterday I made some risers for the vise at the school shop. Took two 6" lengths of 4.375" diameter steel tubing, cut and faced on the lathe, then ground all ends so that tube ends are parallel and both are the same length.

Here's the mill with one of the risers next to the vise. The spindle is at the "soft limit". 






With the vise sitting on both risers fore and aft, the spindle will go fairly deep into the jaws.


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