[rrrun]

Pulled the trigger: my Probotix Nebula is on order. Finally.

I eagerly anticipate doing these things:

1. Cutting the juice grooves for my big cutting boards ... and smaller ones, too.
2. Cutting the shaped boards (currently, pigs & bears) that are popular with my customers.
3. Designing a new carving board that's got optimized juice grooves and a juice reservoir: perfect for those that cook juicy meats.
4. Routing small wooden bowls for crackers to use up ALL of my end cuts and off cuts.
5. Making a whole array of new items to fill my booth, from art pieces to clocks to wedding gifts.
6. Expanding my mind to do the things I can't even imagine yet.

Here's the stuff I've been doing by hand. Can't wait to update my techniques a bit! Stay tuned.

I've already called on several in this community for help as I've built up to this moment, and I'm sure I'll continue to do so. Thank you in advance.

 

[honesttjohn]

We'll help you as much as we can, Henry.

Congrats!!!

 

[MT Stringer]

Good luck man. I know the feeling well.:grin:

 

[RainMan 2.0]

Congrats Henry . It's extraordinary what your doing by hand , can only imagine what you'll accomplish with a cnc

 

[difalkner]

Congrats, Henry! Of the items shown above, what portions will you do on the CNC?

David

 

[Pro4824]

Congrats Henry! You're gonna be busy because you'll never get around to doing all the projects that you'll be able to do now. -Joe

 

[MT Stringer]

My machine has been running for more than four hours on one project. Today is my indoctrination into the world of 3DCarving!

 

[honesttjohn]

Carving ain't fast, Mike.

 

[4DThinker]

Congrats rrrun! I don't know what plans you have for a table to put your Nebula on, but for a simple and quick solution feel free to copy what I came up with after 2 earlier attempts. The corner plates have two holes 1/4" up from their bottom edge. I mounted my Meteor on just 4 cedar 4x4s with a 1/2" x 1/2" rabbet on the top edge and some plywood stretchers to keep those posts vertical. I used large casters so I could move it around easily, but you could opt for leveling feet screwing into a t-nut you've embedded into the bottom of the posts.

If/when you want to open up the bed for vertical or angled cuts you'll be happy not to have a top on the frame below the CNC. I did add a shelf on the back edge of the stretchers to keep it square and hold a tool chest (not yet installed in the photo below). My controller and PC are on a repurposed microwave cart just out of the view on the left.

4D

 

[rrrun]

Congrats, Henry! Of the items shown above, what portions will you do on the CNC?

David

I'll do 2d cuts on the bears & pigs, eliminating the need to trace the outline of the pattern in pencil, bandsawing the outline and then smoothing my rough cut. At the least, I expect the CNC cut to be smoother than what I could do by hand.

Juice grooves are very popular with many buyers, so those will happen as well. I will also do juice grooves on shaped boards, like these handled boards, that I call sous chef boards, shown below. I'll cut these shapes on the CNC as well, when I get a bit smarter.

The routed bowls are part of my quest for the perfect cheese & cracker server. Shown below is another attempt I made which incorporated routed grooves for the crackers into the serving piece. I'm going to do some of that, but make a lot of routed bowls using my end cuts from 8/4, 6/4 & 4/4 stock that are less than 12" long ... and now fill 4 big boxes in the shop. I've been saving up.

There's a free project from Aspire that has "cheese" in various languages carved into 2 edges of the piece. I cannot WAIT to tweak that design just a bit & make that piece.

Finally, I might - MIGHT - make another batch of the domed cheese & cracker servers, shown below with the wine & cheese. I hired a guy to do the groove capturing the dome on his CNC. I found the pieces didn't sell that well, but they are great conversation pieces for the booth. When I own the means of production, it'll be easy to do more ... affordably.

My little woodshop will be exploding with activity. It better be: sales are up so far this year about 50%.

 

[rrrun]

Congrats rrrun! I don't know what plans you have for a table to put your Nebula on, but for a simple and quick solution feel free to copy what I came up with after 2 earlier attempts.

4D

I should have talked with you about this earlier, it seems. I ordered the rolling stand & computer screen & keyboard holder from Probotix. Do you have experience with them? Did I make a bad choice ... or just an expensive one?

 

[MEBCWD]

Congratulations Henry.

It looks like a CNC would be a big benefit to you with the projects you already do. You will be able to cut a project while cleaning up one that was just carved. With this new CNC you can add inlays to your boards and personalized jobs will be easily accomplished.

Don't worry about the stand you bought, you know it will support the CNC and all you have to do to get going is assemble it. You can add shelves and things later. I like the computer arm to hold the keyboard and monitor, that would have been something I would have wanted.

 

[MT Stringer]

Good luck, Henry. Good times straight ahead.

Yesterday, I was multi-tasking in my cramped one car garage carving on the CNC while I was prepping drawer parts for 16 drawers (kitchen remodel). Suddenly I realized this is now a "2 man shop". :grin:

 

[honesttjohn]

I should have talked with you about this earlier, it seems. I ordered the rolling stand & computer screen & keyboard holder from Probotix. Do you have experience with them? Did I make a bad choice ... or just an expensive one?

Probably an expensive one, but useful and time savings. It's a good stand.

I actually have 3 stations going. While one project is cutting, I sand, stain, and assemble and glue at another, and finish at the third. I just float from one to another. Once you get a rhythm and system going, you can put some product out.

 

[JFPNCM]

@rrrun

Great work Henry. I would appreciate your comments on the woods used, particularly in that bowl in the bottom photo on the first post.

Looking forward ot your posts with the CNC.

 

[Gaffboat]

My machine has been running for more than four hours on one project. Today is my indoctrination into the world of 3DCarving!

That's why I try to cheat on my 3D carving as much as possible, Mike, by combining a lot of 2D with a minimal amount of 3D. Sometimes you can fool the eye like I did on the sign with the alligator and do no 3D carving at all.

 

[rrrun]

@rrrun

Great work Henry. I would appreciate your comments on the woods used, particularly in that bowl in the bottom photo on the first post.

Looking forward to your posts with the CNC.

I currently use about 25 species of hardwoods in my projects. This bowl never made it out of Mrs M's collection, so I think I did OK on it.

Honey Locust rim. The spectacular grain pattern is from Jatoba. Cherry & Walnut complete the piece.

 

[JFPNCM]

@rrrun

Thank you for the details. That rim really makes that bowl pop.

 

[TwoSkies57]

I got 2 nice sized pieces of Figured Jatoba (Brazilian Cherry) down in the shop just waiting for the right project. You did a beautiful job incorporating it into the bowl. Not hard to see why the Mrs. snatched it up