Oh, I’m not complaining - certainly. It’s the opposite - I’m trying to show just how fast the design CAN go, and still maintain the quality. How amazing it all is - I did that fish in less than 2 hours by turning speeds up and it still shows the smaller details on the fish. The roughing leaves strings everywhere that the finish pass clears up completely.
I’m using a TR8*8, and external stepper drivers (so each motor is getting a full 1.5 amp, 24V). Eventually I plan to run G2Core but I ran into some problems so right now I’m on just Repetier for Due. If I do upgrade to a spindle (water cooled so dust should be easier to collect, no more brushes to replace, and true speed control that doesn’t limit my torque.) I probably need a NEMA 23 for Z axis since it’s about 8lbs. Probably also would be good for me to go to stainless steel tubing. Hard part is while square tubing is common and I keep finding that, I can’t find stainless steel round tubing locally. I noticed something odd while looking at aluminum pieces in Home Depot though - the round I can bend, the square - I can bend, until I rotate it in my hands, you can’t bend it when it’s at an angle in your hands - even the aluminum kind. Have you ever considered a design with the square shape that’s rotated so the forces are pushing on the corners?
My personal goal? One day I’d like to have it doing .25" DOC with .25" bits and moving along at 100 inches per minute. I don’t know yet what it will take to get there - but I do think it is possible.