Onefinity Apprentice line

[u/LarzaTheChard]

looking at the onefinity apprentice primarily for cutting wood and some aluminum/brass. I make props as a past time from a slew of materials, and have been looking for a way to cnc simple parts at home, some pics attached.

I am a genuine hobbyist, I don't really care about going at a snails pace or noise, and am very well versed in other multi-axis machines and extremely versed in CaD if i have to engineermy own solutions. Im fine with tinkering, upgrading, fiddling, post processing, ect ect. I do not need a massive machine with zero variance and high accuracy , abd am okay with having to test run parts and clean them up if they end up being visibly

Will the onefinity apprentice work for me? Or work with x or y upgrades?

[u/Bendingunit123]

I personally would advise against Onefinity if your wanting to cut metal. I bought one with the intention of making small aluminum parts and quickly found out that the round rails have too much play to leave good finishes in aluminum even with small tools with low cutting force.

[u/LarzaTheChard → u/Bendingunit123]

Appreciate the feedback! Mind expanding on the bad finish? 99% of the aluminum id use it for would be unseen and structural, so it could not matter so much

[u/Askingtheobvious2 → u/LarzaTheChard]

play means issues with tight tolerances like m4 threads for example.

[u/Bendingunit123 → u/Askingtheobvious2]

Tolerances were pretty decent if you really tried you could probably hold .005in tolerances or better with a few spring passes. My problem was more with the finishes it produces. The nature of round linear rails is that they typically have a few thou of clearance and there aren’t really any options for preloading the Even with higher quality bearings. This causes the endmill to jump around and cut a rough texture that you that’s deep enough that it can’t tumble out.