BIG BOLT NUT is an ISO 9001 certified company and has been manufacturing bolts and nuts in stainless steel, carbon steel and alloy steel since 1989.
Pulling an old HP printer to bits for parts, and it suddenly turned into a CNC machine conversion. Took me 4 days, but there were a few small hurdles to overcome. The brains of it is an Arduino Uno with a Protoneer CNC shield running GRBL. (Big shout out to https://info.protoneer.com/1)
The Z and X axis runs on ball bearing drawer slides, and they have absolutely no vertical or horizontal play.
The threaded rods run through MDF thread inserts and using a small piece of 6mm acrylic for a ‘nut’ to lock it into the mounts. The inserts don’t seem to have the same amount of backlash as a standard nut.
All electrics (incl a PSU) is at the end where the ink carts used to be.
The X axis is a bit noisy because it is mounted to the printers steel base plate, but some nylon washers should dull that down a bit.
The dremel flexi-shaft runs down the inside of the 1″ square tube (the bit the pen was zip tied to) on the Z axis.
PS…I’ve never attempted anything like this before, I’m still learning about the whole CNC thing (spot the sticky notes to remind me what axis I was moving!). The fact that I could use the original bodywork (panels) was more good luck than good design….except when it comes to drilling holes for USB cables. That was just crappy “eye-ometer”.
UPDATE: Here is a blog I wrote up about the build, including the first runs.
https://justcheckinm8.blogspot.co.nz/