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I wish he bought a CNC machine because a lot of what he’s doing can be done so easily with a relatively cheap $1500 dollar system.
by bergenty 4y ago
I wish he bought a CNC machine because a lot of what he’s doing can be done so easily with a relatively cheap $1500 dollar system.
- z9znz 4y agoThe downside is that CNC woodworking videos are less interesting. I know it's not "easy", but it looks too easy compared to less automated methods. Some of the most enjoyable videos I've watched are of people using Japanese techniques and only traditional hand tools.
- bergenty 4y agoThere’s enjoyable ASMR tier videos and there’s useful videos and I think Matthias falls strongly into the latter category. Would love to see what he could come up with given the extra capabilities.
- frosted-flakes 4y agoA lot of what he does is pure entertainment and has very little practicality. It's all about the cool ideas and the engineering. No sane person would spend the time and effort to build a band saw out of wood when you can buy a good metal one for a few hundred dollars. At least, that's how his blog posts and videos used to be. I haven't read or watched any of his stuff for many years because I disagreed with him on so many things. I still do want to make a crokinole board like the one he made (I started many years ago, but didn't grt very far).
- HKH2 4y ago> A lot of what he does is pure entertainment and has very little practicality. It's all about the cool ideas and the engineering. No sane person would spend the time and effort to build a band saw out of wood when you can buy a good metal one for a few hundred dollars. Did you see that article the other day about someone cutting their Gameboy in half so they could make it fold in half? That is so impractical. Why didn't they just buy one like that? You may not learn by watching people work and listening to their reasoning, but others do.
- frosted-flakes 4y agoYes, like I said, it's purely entertainment.
- HKH2 4y agoFor you, yes.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- jpeanuts 4y agoI guess I'm insane then... I built his pantorouter, and am half-way through his 16" bandsaw build. One good reason to build the bandsaw is that it's actually a very high-quality machine - if executed well. It has an extremely stiff frame (for a relatively light weight), and a large capacity. Buying a similar quality saw of a similar size would be a lot more than a few 100 dollars. That is in fact part of the reason I'm building it (though mostly it's for the challenge). The other advantage of machines you make yourself is that you can always fix and improve them yourself. Both machines are an engineering challenge by the way. In the pantorouter, alignment/calibration was a big issue for me - there too many of degrees of freedom, combined with inevitable slop in the mechanism, that has to take a lot of force from the router. Also, even after calibration you need to be careful to not cut too deeply, and in consistent direction to prevent the router bit pulling too hard. But it's all worth it once you're making perfect mortice and tenons with minimal effort :-)
- googlryas 4y agoThat's like saying you wish Wout van Aert would just buy an e-bike.
- operatingthetan 4y agoIf you are trying to suggest that CNC is 'easy mode' then please educate yourself on the process and nuances of doing CNC work.
- googlryas 4y agoI'm not. And I've been wood working for 20 years and using CNCs for 10. CNCs would let you accomplish more with less effort but maximizing productivity per unit effort is not what Mattias goes for(I think)
- mattbrewsbytes 4y agoI think you’re missing the point. Doing CNC is different enough that some don’t consider it woodworking, not for some romantic idea about a “true craftsman” but just that you’re programming things more than actually working the wood yourself. Just like in the article he points out that his amount of time spent woodworking is about the same as a weekend hobbyist and he spends more time editing videos. If he were doing CNC primarily then he’d mostly be in front of a computer. CNCs don’t interest me personally and they look fairly complicated but the reason I like woodworking is because I’m not in front of the computer. This is to the detriment that I rarely have a plan and get bored drawing things out but know I should be for better outcomes. It’s fun just winging it.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- speg 4y agoRecommendations for a decent, entry-level CNC?
- mauvehaus 4y agoIf you don't already have experience, join a makerspace or hackerspace. They'll likely have a far more capable and reliable machine than you can get at the entry level. And a community of people who can already tell you "don't bend your arm that way". And handle the maintenance. Ideally they'll have dust collection and some shared tooling that's in good enough shape to get you off the ground. Once you build some skill, you'll develop a pretty good idea of what you want for your use case and where spending an extra nickel or two makes sense or doesn't. I'll also note that a huge hurdle for a lot of people is grasping the differences between raster data, vector data, and actual CAD data.
- bergenty 4y agoThis didn’t work for me. I don’t like shared resources and it wasn’t particularly fun the few times I went into a makerspace because you can’t take your time, make additions to the machine etc. I really started doing new things with a machine once I had my own and could run 12 hour jobs overnight. The maker community online is pretty robust so I had no problems being able to pick up the necessary information that way.
- operatingthetan 4y ago>I really started doing new things with a machine once I had my own and could run 12 hour jobs overnight. You are exposing yourself to fire risk by running a hobby machine unattended for any period of time, and you are compounding it by not being conscious.
- bergenty 4y agoI have a sprinkler system in my shop and the shop is isolated. I also only use upcut bits for overnight jobs and the CNC is in the middle of the shop on a concrete floor away from anything else. It’s a risk I’ve considered and tried to minimize.
- loloquwowndueo 4y agoSure but then aren’t you just glued to the computer doing 3D design and letting the machine translate that to reality? Isn’t the point to build stuff with your hands?
- operatingthetan 4y agoYou need to know a lot about how to use a CNC such as tooling selection, milling strategies, setup, work holding, etc. that dramatically affect the result. It's not as simple as 3d printing, but yes obviously it's more technical and less 'analog.'
- tantalor 4y agoThat would also fix the problem of having to edit & upload the videos, because nobody would want to watch them anyway.
- rzzzt 4y agoCan't the CNC machine edit its own videos?
- cuu508 4y agoMaybe he'll have a CNC machine one day. But it will likely be a green, wooden, hand-built one!
- justapassenger 4y agoI downvoted you as it’s a very bad attitude to have in any hacker/tinker community.
- JasonFruit 4y agoWell, yes and no. It's not hacker-good to dismiss others' cool and interesting work by saying, "That's dumb; a machine could do it easier." But it is hacker-good to see inefficiencies that could be eliminated, even if it's an exercise in missing the point here.
- justapassenger 4y agoTelling woodworker they should use CNC is like telling retro computer enthusiast to buy PS5.
- bergenty 4y agoI don’t think woodworkers would appreciate you calling them retro hobbyists.
- bergenty 4y agoWhat? Deliberately hamstring yourself so the videos are more interesting? I disagree, I feel like he would be able to do much more interesting things given CNC tooling.
- justapassenger 4y agoAre people deliberately hamstringing themselves by playing with retro computers, instead of buying PS5?
- wrycoder 4y agoNot "any" - have you seen Make magazine? Most of the projects involve computers, microcontrollers, and CAD/CAM in some way. Some people prefer to use hand tools (often faster), and some people like to introduce bits and bytes wherever they can. Personally, I like both ways.
- postalrat 4y agoA lot of people aren't interested in programming a CNC machine for their projects.
- lalalandland 4y agoWell, he can buy most of the stuff he makes. So he could just make videos buying the stuff from Amazon... But that's not what he does.
- bergenty 4y agoHe can’t actually, he’s an inventor and afaik the pantorouter is his invention.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago> a relatively cheap $1500 dollar system Spending that much on tools doesn't seem like his style. He makes his own tools using scrap wood and salvaged washing machine motors.
- _jal 4y agoSometimes I eat fast food. And thats fine. Sometimes I'll spend hours making a meal. That's also fine, and personally, I find it more rewarding. I love my fancy tools - I have a couple mills and a lathe I've converted to CnC, and also a sort of weird autorouter I put together for wood, for a specific project. (Probably going to recycle the parts, it was a good learning experience, but very limited.) I also love doing things from first principles, or at least closer to that than letting the computer figure it out. It also makes me better with CnC - just like most things automation-related, doing it by hand illuminates a lot. If you don't like watching his stuff, why not change the channel? There are many, many great CnC operators making video, too. No need to shit on things you don't seem to understand.
- mikehotel 4y agoHe has addressed this previously. He doesn’t want to increase the time he has to spend at the computer, which CNC or 3D printing require. I am sure he would push the envelope in those areas too if he chose to.
- devinshelly 4y agoFor the kind of stuff he does, I highly doubt a CNC would be much easier. He does zero production work, so it's not like he would gain by being able to batch out the same part over and over