I thought it was about time to downsize my Shapeoko 2 that I fabricated senior year of College. I used it a lot when I first completed it milling mostly just logos, but I found myself underutilizing the massive bed that I built. As the saying goes, "Bigger isn't always better," and I can definitely appreciate that now. The bed on my Shapeoko 2 was 1000mm x 1000mm, but the original kit was small (roughly 500mm x 500mm).
The final nail in the coffin for this build was the run time for a job would take hours to run a job that took up the whole bed. Not to mention all of the other variables like bed leveling, loosing steps, user error, etc.
All in all a smaller machine will be better for me in the long run.
I even upgraded my Shapeoko 2 to the Makita trim router which is loud, but works much more reliably than using a cheap Dremel tool.
As for size, I decided to cut all the aluminum extrusion down to 500mm just like the kit was originally sold with.
Making sure that I don't loose any of the hardware, it was fairly easy scaling the machine down.
I just removed all the bolts, slid the x carriage off the y rails. Cut the material down to size, and then tapped the ends with a M5 tap. That simple!
I will be sure to post more pictures in a subsequent post when I get it running again. Stay tuned!
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