Hi Bob, wow that is really awesome work, both on the machine itself as well as the projects themselves, looks like you have some beautiful pieces of wood to work with, what is that pipe made out of?
Thanks Michael. The pipe is made of briarwood. It was a gift for my brother, and I know very little about pipes. But, briarwood is supposed to be one of the few woods that is suitable for pipe making. Something about wood and fire not mixing...
Really cool items you made there Bob.
The pipe is my favorite, something you don't see often these days, it's a nice piece to have even if you didn't smoke it.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the positive feedback. Prior to MoI I had only very limited experience with CAD in the form of Sketchup which never "clicked" for me. Between the easy to use interface that Michael has designed and the generosity of the members of this forum, I've been able to do things I never thought possible.
That's awesome Bob, what you are describing there is exactly one of the major goals for MoI, to help people benefit from CAD tools with a lower entry bar. I'm really glad that you've been able to use it for these cool projects!
Your work is awesome. I'd like to make my MOI models comes into reality as well. Could you recommend me any commercial CNC machines that works smoothly with MoI?
MOI doesn't really work directly with any CNC machine. MOI makes the model that gets imported into a CAM (computer aided machining) program. The CAM program creates toolpaths which are then imported into a controller software program like MACH 3. Mach 3 then gives the individual motors on the CNC machine the instructions necessary to cut the model. I use Vectric products (Cut 3D and V-Carve Pro) as my CAM software. And both the CAM and controller software can be as difficult (or easy) to learn as modelling in MoI.
As far as commercial machines are concerned, I've heard good things about ShopBot. They have a strong community forum and appear to be very helpful to new users. There's also a forum called www.cnczone.com that could be very helpful to you as well.
