Home Built Hot Wire CNC Foam cutter
Day 1 - Vertical Y Axis
Day 2 - Horizontal X Axis
Day 3 - Lead Screw
Day 4 - Electronics
Day 5 - Finalizing the machine
Other CNC foam cutters
A New Design - Hot wire CNC Foam cutter
Foam Sample Cuts
Foam Cutting Videos
Links - RC stuff, Stepper Motors, Lead Screws
More information - about stepper motors

Links
DIY Mach3 with Joystick and gamepad
FoamLinx Site - Foam Cutting CNC Machines
CNCLinx Site - CNC Router Tables
Foam Cutting Services - EPP, EPS, XPS
All About Foam Forum - Beta
Composites Prototyping and Design
Large and Configurable CNC Machines *
Low cost Hot Wire Foam Cutters
Online Store



Articles
How to coat EPS foam (Crown Moldings)
How to build an EPS Foam Recycler
How to build an EPS base and Cap cutter
How is EPS manufactured - molded
How to make RC foam planes
How to cut EPS, XPS, EPP foam
How to cut Polyurethane foam ( PU )
How to cut Acrylics - Laser cutting
DIY CNC Foam Cutter Blog - New

What is - more info about foam
What is EPS foam
What is XPS foam
What is EPP foam - Expanded Polypropylene
What is PE foam - Polyethylene foam
What is Polyurethane foam
What is Memory Foam

 

FoamLinx

                            The X Axis - (The Horizontal Axis)

This U shaped part (the X axis carriage) will hold the Y axis stud.
Here is the Home Depot Catalog number for the part below:
"Half Base" made by Company named Simpson
Catalog number : C751-973
Home Depot num: 044315-10350
these parts were punched and then bent, when we decided to make our own parts we had
them laser cut and bent - then powder coated

Drill the 3 holes on the slides (24" slides)

Place some masking tape  the slides so no dirt will reach the bearings - This is very important !!!!!

It is very important to keep dirt away from the bearings inside - remember, one piece of metal
the smallest, can damage the bearing causing the machine to skip steps resulting in a bad cut

Mark the 4 holes for the Y axis

2x25" studs, measure 1" from the edge and 1" from the side and drill the holes

Place 2 screws - these screws will hold the two studs together.

Connect the slides to the studs (take a look at Day 1 for more info)
Each stud will have a slide on its side - then both of the studs will be connected together.

A closer look at how the slide is mounted on the stud

And another one

The two studs connected together (at the bottom you can see the slide)

Connect the top part to the slides

Another look at the X axis carriage - in the picture above notice that the X axis carriage
is mounted on the moving part of the slide - This is the lowest possible linear slide I could come
up with without jeopardizing the cutting quality

And you are done - At this point we have an Y axis carriage which is mounted on the X axis carriage

Now make another unit just like it - there are two of these in each machine.
One for the left side of the machine and the other is for the right side of the machine