Was kind of excited about something James Rivera mentioned the other day.

Was kind of excited about something @SirGeekALot mentioned the other day. He mentioned storing an OX in the vertical position, I thought why not cut like that?

Flipped one of my OXen on end today.

The belt system won’t lift the X gantry. I think the motors, might do it, but can’t get traction.

It was a fun idea and may be a useful one very soon.

Oh well. It might be possible with screw drive versions of the OX.

Maybe counteract the weight with springs, like on a tool balancer?

Perhaps just the right amount of tension pulling the x up by means of a bungee cord connected to a wall anchor above the machine?

How much does the X gantry weigh? Counterbalance it by adding a corresponding weight (divided by 2) to each side on pulleys (e.g. a couple of bricks on braided fishing line). Unfortunately, one (minor?) issue with this would be increased inertia (effectively doubled), so the maximum acceleration (and deceleration) would probably need to be reduced. (Disclaimer: I’m coming at this from the 3D printing world; I have no idea if grbl supports easy acceleration and jerk adjustments, but I think it is fair to assume it must account for this somewhere.)

+Peter van der Walt I think the idea was to use the axis with dual motors to fight gravity, but you may be onto something: just have less mass to begin with and a single NEMA 23 might be able to handle it. Proper application of KISS method. :slight_smile:

+Peter van der Walt That’s how I read the original post, I assumed the machine was already mounted with Y going left to right and the X being the axis that needs to go up and down, with bungee cord assistance if need be.
If the X is on a lead screw, that should help, no?

Ah you’re right. So the consensus is that it should be an H rotated 90 degrees. Preferably counterclockwise, because that’s how my brain says it should be :slight_smile:

I believe if I were to rotate 90 from an H configuration I would deflect. We would be applying all the weight in the skinny direction of the 20x80. Also would load the track and belt full of chips.

Counter balance is the only way I can think of that would be successful.

@Brandon_Satterfield sooo…bricks on a string? :wink:

Hahhaa you got it!