We're all ecstatic about the performance. RoGR's, but also Robins and yours!!

Cheers,
Gerhard

Great news about ROgR working so well in it's beta version!!! It is a tribute to the three of you and your abilities, intuition and focused energy that you have done it so quickly.

If you guys ever have a tape or rule in your hand as you pass the pile of micRo parts, could you please note the dimensions of the circuit boards and power supplies? By the way, are we going to be using one or two PS? I am hoping to be able to put it all on a tray beneath micRo.

Davedavedave-

Parallel break-out= 1"x2-13/16"
PSU= 1-1/2"x3-3/4"x5-1/8"
Driver= ~1-7/8"x~3/4"

Thanks Robin. Dave I hadn't forgotten, just got waylaid Friday.

Thanks guys. I will now lay out the electronics tray. I assume there is only one PS.

Brain, count me in on the base + the Grizz. Have you already listed what taps we'll need to tap this thing? Have you listed pricing for the "options"?

BC, assuming you are willing I will go in for that base, tapping and hardware too. As quadmasta is asking above, what are the current "options" price-wise? The holiday clutter is leaving me with little leeway for things that you can provide in a less time consuming manner than I, so I'm willing to to cover the difference.

Hi everyone. I told BC I'd post this movie for him while he's at work. He had jury duty this morning and has not had much time to use the computer.

Jury duty??? I'm surprised he got selected.

Where I live, just saying you enjoy staying up all night designing and building a race of self-replicating robots would be enough to be stay off the jury.

I guess down south you have to try harder to scare the court.

When I worked in Shelby NC the judge used to send the sheriff out to the Walmart at lunch time to get jurors to serve. If they did that here in Jersey there would be riots.

Yep one PS..


Coming up I swear!


Working on the prices/time now...


The case settled out of court, phew.


I was quietly rioting within (or maybe that was gut-slam from having to get up after an hour's sleep).

Hi Everyone! We've been super busy getting set-up for the first production run. Today we actually begin making the pieces! The fixture we built is beautiful and the test pieces are holding tolerance of <.001! Check out the chip from a day's tests!

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I remembered that I had some heavy alum box extrusion, so I cut it to fit the RoGR for setting the fixtures on, and I surface milled the extrusion with the RoGR to provide a machined flat base.

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Robin worked the big mill for a couple of days to produce the fixture itself. It's more finished now than the pictures show. More tonight.

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Woohoo! Things are looking great guys! Now I really need to buy a new PC for my wife so I can take hers for micRo control....

Does that schtuff recycle???

Awesome tapping solution above!

What's with that tap anyway? It's like two taps in series. Y'know what I mean? I've never seen one like that. Is the "upper" part slightly larger than the "lower" or maybe "pilot" part???

I've been following the progress from the start and I'm thinking about getting one, but I was hoping for a heavier version of it(mainly for copper and some alu work). There was talk about one earlier in this topic.

Will you make one?
How much more will it cost?
Will you ship it to europe?

Exciting times gentlemen!

Cheers,
Gerhard

Excellent job guys. Question though. Realistically do you have any figures on what kind of out production numbers you'll have? The all important tapping looks like it'll be a limiting factor. The cutting, boring operations look like they'll be held up with loading the pieces. Then there are the screws which I assume is still a semi-manual process with the lathe electronic, but not CNC'ed yet.

Seem's like there are enough spots for 3 people slaving (4 once enough parts ready for packaging). Whew...Then being a solo run in the shop most of the day I assume makes for some busy days. Think all said and done you'll be at around 1 hr per micro [+ maybe 1-1.5 hours to add all the other tapping if requested ].

Congratulations you two!

Great work, looking like I'll need a larger tree this x-mas to fit my Micro under!*

I think it's only fair to send Micro #1 to the Make guy, it would be great PR for you and help boost sales so you can invest in future projects (and pay Robin). No reasonable person should be upset at being 3rd in line for their Micro -- after the Make guy and I get #1 & #2 then it won't take long for everyone else....



DISCLAIMER:
While it may seem like a clever idea to buy yourself exactly what you want for Christmas, have it wrapped in the same impeccable manner your wife would, sneak it under the tree and then act surprised when opening it on x-mas day, I can say with complete certainty that this is a BAD idea, do not try this at home without buying something 4 times as expensive for your wife.

Heeeyyy Robin, nice to see you

yay! in production!

and, yeah, i'm fine with you selling #1 to the make person. more PR = LL stays in business!

Hi everyone! Well we began the production run and we were so happy with our results that we stayed all night last night making micRo Z-bloks, coming home at dawn. I was surprised; thinking it was closer to midnight!

Here's a pic of the Z parts in the fixture:

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The Z-bloks are stacking up:

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The bloks are all checked for accuracy. In these two pictures you can see that each bore has maintained <.0005 (highest measure I can take with the calps). This is greater than engine tolerance. I'd say RoGR is no slouch!

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Yes

Acme precision threadform...they're all like that, mostly. Extremely nice tap.


I'd like to make a mid-size bot next. In keeping with my beliefs, I will try harder yet to integrate the modularity concepts that allow the robot be configured into various machines serving multiple purposes (in other words I'm kinda excited to make a new bot).


Thanks Gerhard! Cheers



When have I ever been realistic? About the need for more laborers; if I work 20 hours/day it's the same output as 2.5 people! It's like magic or something...

It is also true that much of the job is still hands on; who says the USA doesn't make anything anymore? I think that two people can make at least a few micRos/day, though the exact output figure will come later as the process develops and more automation is available.


Thanks. BTW, I think we'll see a concrete bed quite soon.


Yep, I never forget a favor (and you wouldn't let me anyway!) This is the "Blue Bin." It contains special parts. All I will say.
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Secret admirer?

I had a dream I made a Z blok by hand... it came out terrible.

Jijiji, I am falling in love, but it is impossible, sniff sniff, 5000 Km are a lot for the first date , and we can't meet at the middle, there is a lot of water :D.

Flattery gets you everywhere especially if you're cute. Either way I've been trying to dis-immigrate for at least the past 10 years, but the closest I've come Is moving to Asheville...

Here we go, making the motor mounts:



Parts are stacking up! This is just a fraction of what we have to machine for the first run...you see why I wanted to finish RoGR!

Hey! Wait a sec... My special blue box still has the same number of parts in it. Something's fishy here... I guess the parts are cutting too well to go into the blue box...

I'm not saying anything....(PS, the MM have no handmade ops).

BC, Those parts look great! Good Work!

Question. How does AC get into the PS? Does it have an IEC cable or is it screw terminal? If it has IEC then I can use my BIG RED BUTTON to switch an AC strip on and off, with both the Grizz and micRo plugged into it. I realize I could have a plug in either case. I was just counting the number of sockets I would need.

Would you have a kill switch turn off the coolant pump as well? I am leaning towards leaving the coolant on. I can't think of a situation where everything needs to stop and it would not be benificial to have the coolant on.

Looks like RoGR is living up to it's expectations, it's weird seeing so many parts appear so fast after all the waiting.

I seriously doubt it matters much if you leave the coolant running...I'd kill everything at once; it's just easier to have it all stop when something goes awry.

The micRo power supply has screw terminals:

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Beyond I'd say...I'm loving it.

Awesome project. I have spent all day reading about the MicRo. I definitivly want one of these.
If i order one in you webshop today will it be posible to sqeeze into this first production ? (but of course staying in lane)
Feeling like christmas

I'm also a long time lurker who's interested in a unit. I've seen previous posts as well as the listing in the store describing the items I get for the base price, but I'm still unclear as to what a spindle mount, base and pre-tapped holes would run (basically the package for someone with limited machining experience or access to tools). Has this been described anywhere? Also, how expensive is shipping given the bulk of all this stuff?

It's been amazing watching this take shape, great work.

Hi Jan Erik, Sorry, no more are left for this batch, though I expect the next batch to be shipping around the New Year. It is best to buy early though, as the most perks come that way. Early adopters from this batch have gotten lots of "freebs".


Hi bdmacrie, I'm going to include the spindle mounts for free for anyone who pre-buys the micRo now. The aluminum base is in the store. For the shipping, if USA it is about $25 for micRo and base total, but if you are a Pro Member you can use the coupon which gives $60 off.

So... is that $60 off coupon good for the base as well?

Are you planning on stocking the Grizzly tool as well or is that expected to be sourced by the end user?

The coupon is for 10% off any total order from our store. If you spend $5000 you get $500 off, for every order. This is available to Pro Members in the members' section.

I have another source for spindles that are made by the same manufacturer as Grizzly's, but I can have the equipment made with ABEC 7s etc. There is no reason for me to buy a spindle from Griz for anyone else domestically. Those great intrepid souls who have begun this ride have certainly noted the latency of my predictions, so it is folly for me to predict a date for the spindles; best guess being within 5 weeks for the "test pieces".

---------

Today we made parts. Specifically a few hundred X motor mounts; second operations (out of 3; meaning the piece is jigged again at later dates two more times). I had to lathe-machine a brass "collet-reducer" to neck down the .25" collet to .125". I was happy with the precision (required at the high RPM), since I will need several reducers for the various mills required to complete the micRo.

Like Robin says ... "Great job"!


cheers,
Gerhard

I just have to say impressive work. I wish a discovered your site months ago, i found it through a google search that pointed to hackaday.com. I Hoped to have one by christmas to play with between chrismas and new year, but Santa will be comming to my place in January some time then, bacause i placed my order today, LOL

Thanks guys, it means a lot!

Hi everyone! Happy Thanksgiving!

Score one for Turkeys on Turkey Day, haha!

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Just because I'm vegetarian don't take this as an agenda; I think they are truly magnificent creatures!

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I wish all of you a very relaxing time with your friends and families, and if you have neither, well, just relax! I've decided to take a couple days off for the first time in a long time and I'm really stoked to spend time with Kellie and my kids.

-------
Quick update: Robin and I spent the day checking the RoGR tramming and making changes we need for the next run of micRo parts, which are the harder parts for us requiring lots of ops. Bad news; the Z back plates were machined by the plastic supplier to the wrong spec; .125" under the 2.500" required. Damn shame too; those pieces were milled on all faces (by them). They were good about it though and are making replacements. It's ok for now; I'm waiting for a couple of end mills we need to machine the remaining pieces (though the plastic supplier is slow!) We will see...

Cheers!
Grayson

Yes friend, breaks are absolutely necessary, and more with your (and Robin) load of work, have nice & relaxing days with your family.

Kind regards, see you.

You too Mashu, cheers!

Woah, stoked! I came to the site looking for info on projectors, and ended up in here, spending ~3 days drooling over videos and info on various CNC thingies.. awesome!

I have been wanting a mill as an upgrade to my little personal garage/hobby work place for some time now, and I have previously been looking at The Cool Tool Unimat1, though I quickly reached the conclusion that it wouldn't be capable of a lot of things I'd throw at it, so I've been browsing ebay looking at used giant mills like the one in your shop and never really found anything that suits me. They're either enormous or their price is. Yes, I would also like to have the CNC-option, but it's too expensive, and seems awfully hard to learn, so until now I have been concentrating on manual mills.

Then I find the mighty micRo, it seems to fit my budget and the small physical size of my garage/room, and it's definitely "tech" enough. The CNC-part seems flawless, though I am curious about using it with no or only partial computer control/involvement. To clarify, as of right now I know nothing about CNC, I have only barely used Solid works before. Controlling the micRo 'directly' might be easier than I expect, so what about: Those situations where you could easily just use a hand held Dremel or drill, but since you already have this cool machine, why risk a crooked cut/distorted finish with a hand held? Still, it's a small operation where you only need to control one or two axis at a time, and hence "programming" it would be a waste of time..
- I am picturing that you could control it with manual "wheels/dials" like regular mills, but seeing as this is a robot which has the necessary motors, maybe the proper way would be to use a joystick? One for x/y, one for z and one for rpm/speed (wait, does micRo control rpm, or is this tunable directly on the Grizzly?). Some kind of control panel which could work without the computer. I guess it could be a small pad with push-buttons, but that might just as well be implemented as software on your monitor (it might already exist for all I know) - though I'd like some kind of analog stick which would allow more fine tuned control/feel than just on/off.
Two beers to the one who comes up with a device/free driver that lets you control micRo with a wired Xbox controller . Yes, I read about the USB-issues, it would just be awesome to control this machine with a joystick like that, especially considering it might be something people already own. Any old joystick would be awesome, bit more info here, has a couple of mentions on parallel ports.


Meh, long post, bear with me.
I'm just curious to what the plans are for the future of micRo. If I buy this, do I risk not being able to use it without hundreds of hours learning g-code? I know it's being sold as a DIY kit, but as you guys are really lowering the bar (money-wise) for people to get into the CNC-world, I am wondering whether you have plans for lowering the bar on the other difficult areas like: Actually operating the machine, making it into other tools, meaning: Will you be manufacturing bloks which one could use to (re)build the micRo as a lathe? If not, will you allow these forums to be a resource where others might do so? Also, will there be an online repository for all things software for micRo+RoGr, I mean like g-code snippets/cad-models and other useful info (by both admins+users)? Like Sketchup 3D Warehouse? I am reading the micRo product page and am left with all these questions.. thankfully the forums are a great help, I'll keep browsing! I guess a lot of these questions will be eliminated when the micRo is in steady production, and other cnc-newbies like me get their hands on one. I think you will sell loads more of this machine if you just get the documentation right (explain the CAD -> end product process in detail). With the software simplified, this would appeal to loads and loads of people.

Thank you very much for you hard work so far - major props! Enjoy your days off, excuse my long rant of a first post, and keep those videos coming, they are great for keeping me (us?) tuned in and interested!
(wasn't sure where to post, feel free to move or split into a topic of its own)
- Chris

Hi Chris, Welcome to the fray.

The micRo is currently easily controlled with a USB joystick; it's built into EMC2, as well as sophisticated DROs, Python interfaces, PWM, 6 Axis support etc.

For the simple control; I'm with you there. I've been pining for and working toward a simple shape interface, as I believe >50% of the jobs run are "simple jobs". Honestly, G-Code is super easy to learn and is very powerful/quick to implement on the fly with EMC's MDI command interface, (built into the Axis interface). Either way, you'd shortly master many tricks to bring utility to the machine, and we are growing in users which predicts a very rapid growth in usability as more techniques are published.

Don't be fooled into the CAD/CAM methodology; most of our jobs are are simple G-Codes.

Hey Chris, I thought I'd jump in with just a bit of insight. I am a super-novice when it comes to pretty much all things machining (I am a computer/electrical engineer by trade and hobby). Most of my projects DO require some mechanical backbone and finesse, and so this project seems like the perfect fit for me. I am on schedule to receive a micRo soon! Now as for your question--I've been spending some time recently trying to up my chops on how to control this thing. Brainchild is certainly right (he knows what he's talking about!) that most simple jobs can be simple simple G-Code and (though I haven't done this myself yet) I hear that G-Code is quite easy to learn. My current methodology for going from idea to part is this. BRL-CAD for the cad (free open source--used by the US Army and developed by DARPA). From there you can convert to standard DXF (autocad). There are a number of fairly inexpensive applications to generate the G-Code (and take some of the black magic out of machining). My current baby is called MeshCam. It has a 30-day free trial and the full-bore application only runs a couple hundred. Also nice is that it comes with a g-code simulator developed by a separate company to help verify either the G-Code created by meshcam, or hand-made g-code before actually doing cutting.

Time will tell if this approach actually works, but I am hopeful :-D

Chris-
The future of the micRo and the RoGR are linked... EMC, which is the officially supported g-code interpreter software of Lumenlab (though you're free to try others, however, EMC is easily the best), is very flexible, and will allow a number of add-ons... Disclaimer: G-code is quite possibly the easiest programming language to learn (even easier than basic), and I encourage everyone who ventures into CNC to become *at least* familiar with it. I learned it without trying, and with only a command reference guide... BUT, our mid-term goals (after refinements of manufacturing, etc.) are to create tools that simplify the process of machining... To try to make it straight forward for anyone who can read/make a mechanical drawing, or has a decent understanding of what's involved with machining or carpentry.... The key is that the programming language Python can be run directly within EMC- so theoretically, as long as software can be devised to describe the geometries in python, it can be direcly interfaced with EMC. Anyways, this might be too much information, but, yes, it is a mid-term goal to simplify the G-code and cad-to-cam problem/process that should address 95% of CNC operations.

As far as USB joysticks: The flexibility in EMC allows for all manners of input, and one of the easiest to implement is the USB joystick. The USB problem with parallel-port CNC is this: since USB data is serialized, a USB-to-parallel doesn't work, since the data transmitted through USB has to be de-serialize and get sent to the appropriate pin... there's no easy way to assure that data for a specific pin arrives on-time after it's been sent down the USB bus (yes, I know it's redundant). However, the problem doesn't work both ways... Input data (such as direction and "amount" ) doesn't require microsecond accuracies, so any manner of USB or parallel, or other serial data can be used...

robin

Keep up the good work guys. How are we looking timeline wise?

I think reality is slowly sinking in for me.. I don't think I will have my micRo up and running until... March Sounds so far away.. I guess I'll just have to look forward to the wealth of new information available from others by that time. In the mean time, after new year festivities I'll be heading to Asia to overview my own projects manufacture, followed by 2 weeks of "quick do this before you leave" jobs that won't allow me to sleep, eat or sh*t let alone work on micRo... aint project work great! Then off on my lonnnnnnng awaited holiday for a month... plane trip booked and nothing is stopping me... and whilst tempting... no micRo is not going to find a way into the suitcase.