r/3018CNC

I'm looking are starting with a 3018 given that I'm new to the hobby.

​

I want to possibly machine and engrave soft metal, like aluminum and brass for now, carve wood, and make PCBs.

​

I'm not quite sure where to start of if this is even the correct subreddit.

​

I've looked on Amazon and see a lot of different 3018s, mostly around the same price ($250-300cad) but they all fall with a 3-4 star review rating.

​

Is there somewhere else I should be looking?

What is a good guide or subreddit for this?

​

I really don't want to spend more than $300 tax in. Preferably $250. Are my expectations out of line? Should I be going with something else?

​

I am somewhat technical and can build kits or from parts and can Solder. I'm currently working on converting my Ender 3v3se to a 5 axis printer.

Prologue: Back in the winter I was gifted a 3018 Pro of undetermined manufacture (but looks like it could be a Genmitsu from photos on the web). It was gifted to the person who passed it on to me and came complete with missing and loose screws, misaligned and incorrectly assembled parts, no instructions, limit switches or off-line controller.

I've tinkered with it off and on in my spare time since, adding things like a 3D printed cable chain, wire protection and a dust boot. If I keep it, it will live in the workshop well away from my computer but I had an old laptop I could repurpose. Not enough processing power to run design software, but should work as a controller. Or so I thought. It's of the XP generation and the only software I could find that would run on it was an early version of Candle, and even that was a bit iffy.

I was able to use Candle's console to set and store variables like home position and limit switches in the machine and to carve one of the sample .nc files.

I bought a touchscreen controller with a primitive wifi capability. The original listing is gone now but it is the same as this:

https://www.cnccontroller.store/2-8-touchscreen-grbl-offline-controller-with-wifi-for-cnc-3018-3020-4540/

I had a lot of head-scratching figuring out the CAM workbench in Freecad, but last night finally succeeded routing out my first design -- nothing fancy, just a simple series of pockets (text). (5mm deep with a 2.75mm 2-flute endmill in pine). Baby steps, but everything is working -- mostly.

I have one outstanding issue which I believe is a firmware bug in the wifi controller. It's a pretty primitive interface. Wifi SSID and password are set by modifying a file on the SD card. Check the local IP address on the controller then navigate to that IP from the remote computer. From there one can see a directory, delete, download or upload files. Everything else (not much really) is done from the touchscreen. Primitive, but adequate to the task.

The problem is the dang controller seems to unmount the SD card every time a write occurs. Reading is no problem -- directory listing and downloading have no issues. But deleting or uploading require the card to be physically ejected and reinserted before the card can be accessed again. PITA when the machine is remote from the computer. Kind of defeats the purpose!

Has anyone else run into this and know of a fix?

One other question: do $110 / $111 / $112 limit travel speeds as well or just feed rate speeds? What is a reasonable limit for travel speeds on these machines? Currently set to 1000 / 1000 / 600 mm/min and was cutting 1.38mm deep passes at those feed speeds last night (@8.000 rpm).

My first attempt:

3018 porn