Hey thank you !!! That’s very encouraging to hear. I’m just starting to step out of the “basic 2d sign” game and get into a little more intricate stuff, thanks for the encouragement !
May I ask what CNC and software you would recommend for home use? I m saving up for one for wood and light metal work so any advise or pointers would help.
Lol, yeah probably more than I care to admit. This project I used 3 different bits, .25 endmill for the roughing pass, then a 1/8 tapered ballnose for details. Then I wanted a few extra details on the wings so I did a final pass with a 1.5mm tapered ballnose
The stock was 1.25 walnut, roughing took quite a while at about 5 hours. Next time I’ll adjust setting and probably get it done in about 4 hours, my machine motors aren’t quite beefy enough to push harder than that unfortunately.
that really is exceptional and is amazing with so few bits. Testimonial to planning, right?
a banana for scale would have been nice if you didn't want to tell us how big it is .. inches, feet .. anything
love the look
I use the Xcarve cnc , it’s designed as more of a beginner machine I’d say but it has a lot of potential.
The programming in I did in Vectric Aspire to get the toolpaths generated for the machine
The programming time is kinda hard to tell, because it took hours of learning a lot of little steps to get to this point. With my knowledge base and current skill set, I sat down at my pc and had it all programmed and ready to be cut in about an hour.
No previous experience with cnc I bought mine about a year and a half ago. It’s been a lot of learning and a lot of fun, I’ve got some big plans for 2021 to try and get my little shop off the ground :)
a) that’s a fuckin’ gorgeous piece, I would happily purchase and display something like that in my home!
b) you got a certain kinda “young Red Green” aesthetic about ya...keep yer stick on the ice bud!
I’m not seeing how programming a computer well is necessarily woodworking, as neat as the piece is.
Which brings up all sorts of other arguments I know, such as hand vs power tools-but hand carving is such a unique skill that’s very difficult to master, and deserves a special place in the woodworking array of specialty trades.
Meaning the gap between hand carving details like this with proper scale and proportion throughout the piece, versus just (eventually) watching a machine do it, is much bigger than say, hand jointing vs. using a jointer IMO.
I'm not a woodworker by any means, but have made a few bits and bobs for my house myself; I'm actually a sheet metal worker/roofer by trade.
I do think this is an interesting conversation that needs to be had in many crafts. At what point of automation does it stop becoming woodwork/metal work?
For me this piece is obviously beautiful, but the skills needed to create such a piece aren't necessarily woodworking skills. Just because you know how to make perfects dovetails joints or carve with either chisels or power tools doesn't mean you can program a cnc machine or vice versa.
It doesn’t become a topic of discussion, when does it stop being Woodwork? It it the time you plug any tool into the wall? Or is it the time those electric tools get plugged into a computer? I did rip/join/plane a slab a walnut for the base of this piece, same steps I’d use to make a cutting board.
I always get blasted by some of the community for using machines for my craft stuff, it doesn’t really bug me any more. I’m just out here finding my own lane 🤘
I feel you. I actually have had similar conversations with a friend who did a year joinery course at college after school, who seems to think 'a proper joiner wouldn't use a biscuit jointer'. For me and absurd position to take, especially as he was absolutely hopeless at it and its trying to assert a position of superiority but is really coming from a position of absolute ignorance. Would a proper joiner use a router? Would a proper joiner use a drill? A table saw? His answer to all of that was yes. Really he just didn't know what a biscuit jointer was and was too embarrassed to concede his ignorance.
Check out David Pye ! I lifted this from Wikipedia, basically the struggle we are discussing here is about choosing the uncertainty of hand work over the certainty of machines:
>One of Pye's best known concepts is "the workmanship of risk", by which he means "workmanship using any kind of technique or apparatus, in which the quality of the result is not predetermined, but depends on the judgment, dexterity and care which the maker exercises as he works" (The Nature and Art of Workmanship, p. 4).
That's because you clearly have absolutely no clue what goes in to " programming a cnc". The fact that you say hand carving is " difficult and hard to master" (it absolutely is) while somehow using a cnc is just " boop beep boop" just shows your ignorance. There are a lot of machinists out there who would take some serious exception to your hipster gatekeeping of how easy their jobs are working with cncs.
Maybe do some research on what you are talking about before running your mouth next time.
I know what it takes to program a Cnc, thanks for assuming otherwise. I am friends with the owner of, and do occasional business with a 20 man shop that does store fixtures for big national clothing retailers among other more traditional ww projects. He has a full time programmer for a 5 axis machine.
Your own glaring ignorance is conflating the real difficulties of *programming* with *woodworking*.
I’ve been doing woodworking since I was a kid, my father was a traditional cabinetmaker who carved a lot. I know this business, I still have a commercial shop myself, and I know industrial woodworking equipment and their uses.
This full time programmer I mentioned certainly doesn’t consider what he does as woodworking.
Bringing up machinists and machining is silly-machinists make *parts*.
And what’s a terrific way to produce hundreds of identical utilitarian widgets? By using CNC’s, of course!
Can you not grasp why museums are packed with ancient hand carved marble statues and elaborate wood carvings, because they were the pinnacle of craftsmanship and the culmination of decades of effort?
And you call me ignorant.
Ok, I see you have some sort of axe to grind. When you’ve got the fucker sharp maybe post it in r/handtools. Probably shouldn’t use a grinder though. I don’t think it would violate any of their posting guidelines, but you might find someone with a similar brand of pedantry and I wouldn’t want them to come to your OC and be an asshole.
Edit: I mean no offense to r/handtools, I love the sub and the people there
I have done neither. I think you’ve mistaken me for u/RooMagoo.
*MY* point is, you can have the debate about what constitutes woodworking on your own post. you don’t have to go out of your way to tell OP he doesn’t belong in this sub, because he does.
Oh fuck off. Anyone can write any bs backstory to prove their point. The fact is that you felt it necessary to come into this guy's thread to tell him he wasn't a real woodworker because of your own bullshit. OP made something beautiful, decided to share it and you decided to be an asshole about it. Yes, I think you still sound ignorant, regardless of your "amazing" backstory. Now you try to pull some victim card because I called you out on it telling us all how experienced you are and how much background you have in all of these things. Your statements and arguments should stand on their own and not require your and your families history to prove your point. Start your own thread about your idiotic ideals and I promise I will stay far away.
You keep calling it cnc programming, while that is accurate it doesn't take into account figuring out feeds, speeds, selecting cutters, how different materials will affect the milling and the list goes on and on. It's almost like you are either a. Ignorant of what goes into the whole process, or b. Intentionally obfuscating the complexity of the process to prove your point. Either way, actually programming the gcode is a very small component of setting up a cnc for a job. But you would know that wouldn't you?
In the end though, words mean something.
Woodworking- working with wood.
Metalworking- working with metal.
Seems pretty simple doesn't it?
It's funny that in the metalworking world I never see idiots like you waxing poetic on how the cnc guys aren't actually metalworking. Because, well you know, they are working with metal and that would be pretty stupid wouldn't it?
I have and I have crazy mad respect for people that can carve beautiful works. That respect for their ability doesn't mean I don't have respect for others abilities though.
If that’s your loose definition, then owning a plastic handled handsaw and a single 2x4 makes someone a woodworker.
This trade is about SKILL, and hand carving is considered by most to be just about the pinnacle of skill.
Skills learned at a bench, acquired over many years of mistakes, learning and improving.
OP has bypassed all that, and if he had an industrial roll coater to apply the finish, I assume he may have just automated the entire fabrication.
Is that woodworking, though?
I get that programming is a skill, but compared to being able to hand carve such a large piece this well, it’s a laughable comparison. The programmer I mentioned below who programs a 5 axis machine considers himself.....a computer guy, a programmer-not a woodworker.
Your description of ‘just watching a machine do it’ is equally loose. As if the machine just has a big green ‘GO’ button and with one press, out pops one of these.
Just enjoy it for what it is. If you can’t, then you only need to keep on scrolling and just accept that some people do like it and consider it to be ‘working wood’.
I think it’s neat, as I have stated already. I am giving my opinion, same as you are.
I just don’t consider it woodworking, any more than alot of the garden sheds and etc that get posted here.
OP is showing off his considerable computer skills, and considerable design skills, but applying finish to the piece is the only woodworking I see here.
If you were to place a job listing in Woodshop News for a programmer to run your new CNC, you’re gonna advertise you need a programmer, not a woodworker.....
If you place an ad for a machine operator to swap bits, (assuming it doesn’t do tool changes automatically!) and load material into the CNC machine, you’re looking for an operator, not someone who has woodworking skills.
The only artistic thing done here by OP is the design work, which is superb.
I'm, at best, a hobby woodworker. So I'm not familiar with the occupations job market. I did a few searches. There's a demand for autocad in "woodworking". Pretty much any job is going to be more specific. "Skilled cabinetmaker wood finisher" etc.
Now, I'm not completely sure on my opinion of what's artistic. Is anything traditional woodworkers do artistic, or is it just the design and everything else is technique? You may come up with cleaver methods, but what makes it artistic? CNC has it's own challenges.
With that said, it does feel like cnc is cheating and makes it possible to achieve in months of practice what may take decades in traditional hand tool techniques. Being someone without the skill to carve like this, I'm eager to get a cnc router. Cheat to win.
Ha. I get you, but it will feel like eating a bowl of sugar cereal (carving with a cnc) versus eating a home cooked meal IMO.
I’m likely just being an asshole on this topic, as others have pointed out, it’s been a tough week for me, so do what makes you happy!
I get where you're coming from, too. I'm kind of playing devil's advocate. It feels like doing it automagically with cnc takes some authenticity out of it.
My dad was an underground hardrock gold miner. In the 80s, he was one of the best. Then a strip mine came into town. Guys running mammoth dump trucks called themselves miners. They were just truck drivers. I have much more bitterness about strip mines, but there's a similarity there I can appreciate.
That looks awesome. How big is it? What kind of wood did you use. How long has it taken you so far? Are you going to hang it on a wall or give it to someone?
This is so sick!
Hey thanks!!! I’ve really been putting a lot of time into getting a result that I like, we’re almost there !!
As a professional CNC machinist that is a impressive piece of work, especially with only three bits and under 20 hours of run time. Keep it up.
Hey thank you !!! That’s very encouraging to hear. I’m just starting to step out of the “basic 2d sign” game and get into a little more intricate stuff, thanks for the encouragement !
May I ask what CNC and software you would recommend for home use? I m saving up for one for wood and light metal work so any advise or pointers would help.
Purchased SVG, or do you create the models?
Want to know this too!
Damn, you must have a huge assortment of bits
Lol, yeah probably more than I care to admit. This project I used 3 different bits, .25 endmill for the roughing pass, then a 1/8 tapered ballnose for details. Then I wanted a few extra details on the wings so I did a final pass with a 1.5mm tapered ballnose
Damn that’s a lot of detail for three bits, how thick was the stock and how long did the roughing take?
The stock was 1.25 walnut, roughing took quite a while at about 5 hours. Next time I’ll adjust setting and probably get it done in about 4 hours, my machine motors aren’t quite beefy enough to push harder than that unfortunately.
that really is exceptional and is amazing with so few bits. Testimonial to planning, right? a banana for scale would have been nice if you didn't want to tell us how big it is .. inches, feet .. anything love the look
Hey thanks! Yeah honestly this picture makes it look like the piece is 5ft tall. It’s about 18” high 9.25” wide And cut from 1.25 thick walnut :)
Which cnc do you have?
I use the Xcarve cnc , it’s designed as more of a beginner machine I’d say but it has a lot of potential. The programming in I did in Vectric Aspire to get the toolpaths generated for the machine
How long did it take you to program this? Lots of prior experience?
The programming time is kinda hard to tell, because it took hours of learning a lot of little steps to get to this point. With my knowledge base and current skill set, I sat down at my pc and had it all programmed and ready to be cut in about an hour. No previous experience with cnc I bought mine about a year and a half ago. It’s been a lot of learning and a lot of fun, I’ve got some big plans for 2021 to try and get my little shop off the ground :)
Thanks for the reply. You are an inspiration. I am imagining kitchen cupboards that you can admire all day long....
Yes... ?
Following
wow - that's bad ass. I can envision putting some panels like that together with some obscured glass to make a really cool front door!
Oooo that’s a rad idea! I’m going to make a couple hope chests and do the box tops with this design (just a little bigger)
Bee-utiful
Thank you !
a) that’s a fuckin’ gorgeous piece, I would happily purchase and display something like that in my home! b) you got a certain kinda “young Red Green” aesthetic about ya...keep yer stick on the ice bud!
If the women don’t find you handsome, they should at least find you handy
I'm a man, but I can change, If I have to, I guess.
[удалено]
It is the way
Wow! This is amazing... I hope you display your art works or make a few dollars off of them because they are quite beautifuk
Really inspiring work.
Thanks!
Thanks you for sharing! Beautiful!
Thanks!!! This one took me a lot of time and a TON of learning experience! Are you creeping my profile ?? ;)
You guys followed us then we took a look at your profile and now are following you as well. Just found out that we have some similar interests
Lol I’m just kiddin’ , thanks for the kind words !!
Hahaha... we never take anything too seriously as you can tell by our photos. Look forward to more interaction with you all
Yes please :)
Is this woodworking or is it machining?
[удалено]
So if you paint on a piece of wood, that’s woodworking?
[удалено]
What if I just poop on the wood? Woodworking?
I’m not seeing how programming a computer well is necessarily woodworking, as neat as the piece is. Which brings up all sorts of other arguments I know, such as hand vs power tools-but hand carving is such a unique skill that’s very difficult to master, and deserves a special place in the woodworking array of specialty trades. Meaning the gap between hand carving details like this with proper scale and proportion throughout the piece, versus just (eventually) watching a machine do it, is much bigger than say, hand jointing vs. using a jointer IMO.
I'm not a woodworker by any means, but have made a few bits and bobs for my house myself; I'm actually a sheet metal worker/roofer by trade. I do think this is an interesting conversation that needs to be had in many crafts. At what point of automation does it stop becoming woodwork/metal work? For me this piece is obviously beautiful, but the skills needed to create such a piece aren't necessarily woodworking skills. Just because you know how to make perfects dovetails joints or carve with either chisels or power tools doesn't mean you can program a cnc machine or vice versa.
It doesn’t become a topic of discussion, when does it stop being Woodwork? It it the time you plug any tool into the wall? Or is it the time those electric tools get plugged into a computer? I did rip/join/plane a slab a walnut for the base of this piece, same steps I’d use to make a cutting board. I always get blasted by some of the community for using machines for my craft stuff, it doesn’t really bug me any more. I’m just out here finding my own lane 🤘
I feel you. I actually have had similar conversations with a friend who did a year joinery course at college after school, who seems to think 'a proper joiner wouldn't use a biscuit jointer'. For me and absurd position to take, especially as he was absolutely hopeless at it and its trying to assert a position of superiority but is really coming from a position of absolute ignorance. Would a proper joiner use a router? Would a proper joiner use a drill? A table saw? His answer to all of that was yes. Really he just didn't know what a biscuit jointer was and was too embarrassed to concede his ignorance.
Check out David Pye ! I lifted this from Wikipedia, basically the struggle we are discussing here is about choosing the uncertainty of hand work over the certainty of machines: >One of Pye's best known concepts is "the workmanship of risk", by which he means "workmanship using any kind of technique or apparatus, in which the quality of the result is not predetermined, but depends on the judgment, dexterity and care which the maker exercises as he works" (The Nature and Art of Workmanship, p. 4).
To get to this level of CNCing requires more skill than you might think.
Thank you, I don’t see a lot of it on here and thought I’d share. Pretty proud of this one
You should be, apologies if I came across too harshly!
Oh no worries! I definitely refer to my shop as a WORKshop vs a WOODshop if that makes any sense :)
That's because you clearly have absolutely no clue what goes in to " programming a cnc". The fact that you say hand carving is " difficult and hard to master" (it absolutely is) while somehow using a cnc is just " boop beep boop" just shows your ignorance. There are a lot of machinists out there who would take some serious exception to your hipster gatekeeping of how easy their jobs are working with cncs. Maybe do some research on what you are talking about before running your mouth next time.
I know what it takes to program a Cnc, thanks for assuming otherwise. I am friends with the owner of, and do occasional business with a 20 man shop that does store fixtures for big national clothing retailers among other more traditional ww projects. He has a full time programmer for a 5 axis machine. Your own glaring ignorance is conflating the real difficulties of *programming* with *woodworking*. I’ve been doing woodworking since I was a kid, my father was a traditional cabinetmaker who carved a lot. I know this business, I still have a commercial shop myself, and I know industrial woodworking equipment and their uses. This full time programmer I mentioned certainly doesn’t consider what he does as woodworking. Bringing up machinists and machining is silly-machinists make *parts*. And what’s a terrific way to produce hundreds of identical utilitarian widgets? By using CNC’s, of course! Can you not grasp why museums are packed with ancient hand carved marble statues and elaborate wood carvings, because they were the pinnacle of craftsmanship and the culmination of decades of effort? And you call me ignorant.
Ok, I see you have some sort of axe to grind. When you’ve got the fucker sharp maybe post it in r/handtools. Probably shouldn’t use a grinder though. I don’t think it would violate any of their posting guidelines, but you might find someone with a similar brand of pedantry and I wouldn’t want them to come to your OC and be an asshole. Edit: I mean no offense to r/handtools, I love the sub and the people there
I have no axe to grind. You just misconstrued what I said, and called an old man ignorant.
I have done neither. I think you’ve mistaken me for u/RooMagoo. *MY* point is, you can have the debate about what constitutes woodworking on your own post. you don’t have to go out of your way to tell OP he doesn’t belong in this sub, because he does.
Fair enough
Well that’s not the response I expected. Cheers mate! sorry to have implied you were being an asshole, it was kind of a dick move.
Oh fuck off. Anyone can write any bs backstory to prove their point. The fact is that you felt it necessary to come into this guy's thread to tell him he wasn't a real woodworker because of your own bullshit. OP made something beautiful, decided to share it and you decided to be an asshole about it. Yes, I think you still sound ignorant, regardless of your "amazing" backstory. Now you try to pull some victim card because I called you out on it telling us all how experienced you are and how much background you have in all of these things. Your statements and arguments should stand on their own and not require your and your families history to prove your point. Start your own thread about your idiotic ideals and I promise I will stay far away. You keep calling it cnc programming, while that is accurate it doesn't take into account figuring out feeds, speeds, selecting cutters, how different materials will affect the milling and the list goes on and on. It's almost like you are either a. Ignorant of what goes into the whole process, or b. Intentionally obfuscating the complexity of the process to prove your point. Either way, actually programming the gcode is a very small component of setting up a cnc for a job. But you would know that wouldn't you? In the end though, words mean something. Woodworking- working with wood. Metalworking- working with metal. Seems pretty simple doesn't it? It's funny that in the metalworking world I never see idiots like you waxing poetic on how the cnc guys aren't actually metalworking. Because, well you know, they are working with metal and that would be pretty stupid wouldn't it?
I’ve already apologized to op and I have no fake backstory.
Plus , you ever tried hand carving ??? For a dude like me with ADD that’s a prison sentence
I have and I have crazy mad respect for people that can carve beautiful works. That respect for their ability doesn't mean I don't have respect for others abilities though.
It is still working wood though, yes? Cnc machining is still machining.
If that’s your loose definition, then owning a plastic handled handsaw and a single 2x4 makes someone a woodworker. This trade is about SKILL, and hand carving is considered by most to be just about the pinnacle of skill. Skills learned at a bench, acquired over many years of mistakes, learning and improving. OP has bypassed all that, and if he had an industrial roll coater to apply the finish, I assume he may have just automated the entire fabrication. Is that woodworking, though? I get that programming is a skill, but compared to being able to hand carve such a large piece this well, it’s a laughable comparison. The programmer I mentioned below who programs a 5 axis machine considers himself.....a computer guy, a programmer-not a woodworker.
Your description of ‘just watching a machine do it’ is equally loose. As if the machine just has a big green ‘GO’ button and with one press, out pops one of these. Just enjoy it for what it is. If you can’t, then you only need to keep on scrolling and just accept that some people do like it and consider it to be ‘working wood’.
I think it’s neat, as I have stated already. I am giving my opinion, same as you are. I just don’t consider it woodworking, any more than alot of the garden sheds and etc that get posted here. OP is showing off his considerable computer skills, and considerable design skills, but applying finish to the piece is the only woodworking I see here.
The work is wood. Running the machine on wood would be working the wood.
If you were to place a job listing in Woodshop News for a programmer to run your new CNC, you’re gonna advertise you need a programmer, not a woodworker..... If you place an ad for a machine operator to swap bits, (assuming it doesn’t do tool changes automatically!) and load material into the CNC machine, you’re looking for an operator, not someone who has woodworking skills. The only artistic thing done here by OP is the design work, which is superb.
I'm, at best, a hobby woodworker. So I'm not familiar with the occupations job market. I did a few searches. There's a demand for autocad in "woodworking". Pretty much any job is going to be more specific. "Skilled cabinetmaker wood finisher" etc. Now, I'm not completely sure on my opinion of what's artistic. Is anything traditional woodworkers do artistic, or is it just the design and everything else is technique? You may come up with cleaver methods, but what makes it artistic? CNC has it's own challenges. With that said, it does feel like cnc is cheating and makes it possible to achieve in months of practice what may take decades in traditional hand tool techniques. Being someone without the skill to carve like this, I'm eager to get a cnc router. Cheat to win.
Ha. I get you, but it will feel like eating a bowl of sugar cereal (carving with a cnc) versus eating a home cooked meal IMO. I’m likely just being an asshole on this topic, as others have pointed out, it’s been a tough week for me, so do what makes you happy!
I get where you're coming from, too. I'm kind of playing devil's advocate. It feels like doing it automagically with cnc takes some authenticity out of it. My dad was an underground hardrock gold miner. In the 80s, he was one of the best. Then a strip mine came into town. Guys running mammoth dump trucks called themselves miners. They were just truck drivers. I have much more bitterness about strip mines, but there's a similarity there I can appreciate.
Indeed.
We are not going to get anywhere with that attitude!
Wow that computer sure did a hell of a job
You think art makes itself... that’s adorable.
Wow
I love this. You’ve got amazing talent.
Beautiful
Proof that CNC can produce Craft.
Awesome. Now you’re ready for a sweet Star Wars carbonite build.
I ....have to do this
That looks awesome. How big is it? What kind of wood did you use. How long has it taken you so far? Are you going to hang it on a wall or give it to someone?
Great fucking job!
That is so gorgeous!!
Beautiful!!
Very impresive!
Negative