Mostly 3D Printed CNC Foam cutter

For over a few months now I have been building a hot wire foam cutter. First I was just trying to make a hot wire bow for cutting foam
and making an air foil for my R/C plane with 3D printed templates and metal foil tape. It sort of worked. But I could never get a 
good cut without having to do a lot of sanding and even then it didn't look good. Next I tried to make a gravity actuated foam
cutter like the old Tekoa feather cut foam cutter. It worked better but I kept having problems with the hot wire snagging in unpredictable
ways and not getting a good cut. My next thought was to just build a cnc version that I have seen on YouTube by RCKieth. Lots
of good information on his channel and site by the way. I came across a Thingiverse version that used 3D printed brackets and linear
rails.
www.thingiverse.com/thing:3676825/files

For the control system I am currently using GRBL 5X with the RAMPS 1.4 board. That Said I will be switching to LinuxCNC at some point.
Mostly because I intend to use the same machine to do hot wire and hot pin style foam cutting. I am posting some pictures in later posts
.
 

Someone made a fun hot wire cutter some time ago. Imagine a pair of bipods like: wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?Koppi%27s_Toy bolted to the roof of the workshop, with a hot-wire "bow" hanging between them.

I thought it was clever at the time, but can't currently find any pictures.

Forum thread: forum.linuxcnc.org/10-advanced-configura...tter?lang=en&start=0

Wiki's certificate has expired!
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A loooooong time ago i built a 1X1X2 meter cut area foam cutter, now you reminded me i never ever took any picture of it, shame on me as some 2 months ago i was there and watched it working. Over 15 years for sure...
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What size did you go for?
And use a spring for the Nichrome wire, but do not send the power through it.
Having over 2 meters of wire dangling taught me some things the hard way!

   

 
 

the cutting bow
 
 
 
 
 

so basic travels are
450mm or  17.7in. in X travel
350mm or 13.78in. in Z travel
and when equipped
700mm or 27.56in. in Y travel

Though the photos don't show the machine in full setup configuration
it will be 1000mm wide X 600mm long x around 500mm tall.

current control is for now GRBL 5X
and RAMPS 1.4 break out board

The bow uses a 48in. long  1in. X 1in. X 0.0625 wall aluminum boom
I 3D printed the Isolator adapters out of PETG and used 2 
carbon fiber arrow shafts cut in half for the tensioner posts.
I retained the threaded ends for the wire attachment and electrical
connections. I use a 22ga. nichrome wire for the hot wire.
For power supply I use a 450 watt 24 volt std power supply
and I use a 30 amp PWM brushed motor speed controller
to dial in the energy needed for the wire. That also means
I can use thinner nichrome wire if I so choose.

many changes coming soon image missing /media/kunena/emoticons/devil.png