ShopBot Arrived Wednesday

[Jerome]

As promised the Bot showed up Wednesday about noon.

We worked all Wednesday afternoon and all day yesterday and have made a lot of progress.

Some observations from what I have seen so far

It is heavy, I was kind of surprised at how beefy the parts are.

All the parts and holes line up. Sure made it easier to assemble

I'm not sure how to phrase this but the machine seems to have quality stamped all over it.

I called ShopBot with a question and a nice lady answered on the first ring. I didn't even have to press 1. The guy I talked to answered my question in a friendly and courteous manner.

The only con so far has been mentioned several times here on the forum. that is documentation. I understand the problem as I have written some documentation and it is difficult to explain every detail so anybody can understand it.

I spent the morning downloading and printing every document I could find on the Shopbot web site. Something I should have done earlier.

I hope to at least have the Bot runningby the end of the weekend.

More questions will follow, I'm sure of that

Jerome

[dlcw]

Jerome,

Congratulations on your new "baby".

Don't rush into setting a short deadline to get it operational. Read everything you can get your hands on first to get a feel for what is going to happen when you do turn that switch on. Make sure all the little details have been handled completely, so when you do turn that switch the surprises will be minimal.

Have fun!

[dana_swift]

Jerome - you are learning what those of us who own shopbots already know: they are very solid. That extra metal and stiffness makes it possible to keep tolerances. You will really appreciate it later.

And your calls to SB got that same human touch we all get.

Its a good company, and I think you will never regret picking the brand. I haven't.

When you do get to the point of applying power and making your first move commands, it really helps to have someone around who has done it before. Cuts the learning time by a factor of 10 to 20. Plus they know if what it is doing is normal or not.

Good luck- keep us posted.

D

[erik_f]

It has taken you two days already? What is wrong with you guys??
Just kidding. It took me a week solid every night after work to put together my first PRT96. At least you are doing it the smart way and have some help. Maybe I am numb to it since I have been at it so long, but the learning curve is much lower now than 10 years ago. The control software is much easier to navigate (the first control software I used was in DOS) and the CAD/CAM software is WAY better. A lot of the stuff you learn along the way is now is the PartWorks software, like the "dog bone" feature. This allows you to carve out a little extra material on an interior corner so that you don't have to chisel it out for another piece to mate up to it due to the radius of the bit. I used to have to draw points on every interior corner joint and then run a drilling routine. I still use this point and drill idea when I have to screw material down. I run it as an individual file for just the drilling and only go into the material about .1"...drawing in your screw down points really makes it easy to secure material without wondering if I may hit a screw. Also...I have found besides a full blown vacuum hold down screws are the easiest and fastest way to put material down and keep it there...even with the vac sometimes screws are easier. Another thing. When I first started using the PRT, for the first month I was on the phone with SB trying to figure out what was wrong with my Z...when in fact I finally figured out that the material was moving up and down causing dado's to have uneven passes from one to the next. Simple things like this will have you frustrated...but once you start to think like a CNC router and how it cuts, designing and setting up becomes very easy...even for one offs. I would say SB does a great job at making their machines very easy to use, but using a CNC router is nothing like using traditional wood working tools in many ways. Partworks is a great design program and has a lot of features (and is free)...I have gotten used to designing in Rhino and for 2d design work is my program of choice...I have to admit I originally bought it to get into 3d designing, but have found I do not have enough time to really learn it enough to become good at it...and for the most part I don't really need to do anything in 3d...I just want to. Give yourself some time and ask a lot of questions! Use the search, the forum and the phone...many will give you their phone number and help you if you can't get a hold of Tech support on a weekend. Good luck, you are going to love it!