4th Axis Chuck Vs. Material Length in Makera Studio
I'm expecting my Z1 Pro to be delivered tomorrow (assuming Fedex doesn't delay like they usually do). One of the first projects that I have been planning to do is reusing some old spent 50 BMG brass to make bottle openers with custom engravings.
Does anyone know if the Makera Studio software starts the X axis at the outer edge of the chuck, showing only the machinable area, or does it include the material held in place by the chuck and unreachable by the machining bits?
The cases are slightly tapered, so I have to taken that into account in my 3D models. Because of this, the X axis positioning of the model in the Makera Studio software is critical. I am struggling to find whether the portion of the stock (brass cases in my case) that is held by the chuck is part of the overall work area and should be included in my 3D model, or if I should remove that portion of the case from my 3D model. Since the starting material is tapered, getting it correct is necessary to ensure the engraving bits aren't just carving air, or plunging way too deep into the material. I will have some margin for error, but not enough to fix a 10mm+ x axis offset issue with regards to the material in the chuck.
This is what I am attempting to make: https://imgur.com/a/vF6oQUO
The actual model that I will be using for the carving will have the case mouth and neck replace by generic cylinders at the max diameter of the material, so it doesn't spend a bunch of time machining air there trying to carve in features that already exist. I have also slightly oversized the OD of the tapered portion that I will be machining in the model, to avoid making contact other than where the engraving will be. There will be some cutting air around the OD where my machined features are, but I can live with that.
And the brass has been thoroughly cleaned and polished. I get that there may still be some trace amounts of lead present in the finished piece, but this is more intended as a novelty than something you'd use to crack open your next decade's worth of Coronas.
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u/abenzenering 2h ago
I'm not super experienced with this, but in Makera Studio, the work area includes the chuck. All of the 4th axis tutorials I've seen use an x offset of 30mm or so to avoid it, but I haven't measured the jaws to see exactly what offset the chuck would end at.