We are starting our UHPC Metal Lathe Build which will cover a series of short videos to document our successes and failures during the project as well as having some fun...
Nice. I've been wanting to build a large lathe out of concrete also. Your bed looks better and seems like a better design than others Ive seen. I appreciate your holes in the middle for letting the swarf fall through. I'm looking forward to seeing the completed machine.
That's some confidence in the strength of your wooden table :) Great job. Until I saw this I was dead set on resin concrete, now I'm reconsidering (again!)
I did a couple of smaller tests with resin when i filled my aluminium extrusions on the cnc machine i'm building. too much hassle IMHO mixing and also not really cheap in the amount i needed it. To me the biggest benefit about the UHPC is that it's an industry standardized component with an exact recipe to follow (and if you do so it's amazing stuff) which i got from a shop where people were answering ALL of my questions in the attached forum...
Hello, wonderful channel! New subscriber here. I would like to have details on uhpc you're using, but I can't find you email to contact you. Thanks very much
Interesting choice, as most know, concrete still retains some water after 100 years. The cast also shrinks significantly. Where are the design references that promote concrete versus epoxy type machine tool bases?
Wonderful. I also make my own 5-axis CNC machine. I was thinking of replase all the frames to epoxy granite to increase the strength of the whole machine. However, I known about UHPC by watching this video. I would like to know the advantages and disadvantages of epoxy granite and UHPC.
I cannot much compare Epoxy with UHPC i just used it as it is an industrial standard and if you stick with the recipe you get excellent results. So i haven't had to do experiments with Epoxy to see if it would work as this stuff is quite expensive... Hope it helps, all the best with your project! Cheers.
Hi dear.. It is a great job And I want to build my lathe with UHPC But I wish you to let know the recipes for 100 k.g ..I know that you have wrote them in the video but I think I got some missing stuff..so please tell me I appreciate your reply 🙏
@@amrmegahed4309 You can send me a mail to the channels E-Mail address and i can send you my calculator spreadsheet (see channel info for address) - happy to help out! Cheers
Thanks! I have absolutely no clue, the UHPC is gray, the grit/sand was red'ish, but it still keeps changing colors slightly until it cures completely. It will be painted anyways to seal it for oil/cooling/etc.
As far as I know, the blue coloration comes from the fly ash content in the cement and always occurs in the places where the concrete surface does not come into contact with air. But this is not uhpc specific. The color disappears immediately after demoulding and usually dissolves completely after a short time in the open air. Best regards
11:17 Ive seen this done too many times in Foundry DIY videos lol. They can never get the plastic bucket out of the concrete mix they made. I've seen some people learn from these mistakes and decided to wrap the plastic buckets with saran wrap and they would just burn it off later. Another person used a strip of tin to wrap around the buckets so the bucket could slide out of the tin and since the tin was simply wrapped around it and held together at the ends with tape they would just remove the tape and pop the tin off the sides of the concrete. Others have used cardboard tubes since theyre easier to destroy to get them out of their holes. This step of the process is ALWAYS overlooked but It only takes one time of not wrapping the plastic to learn not to make that mistake again haha. Getting those out are not fun and I could feel your pain from the other side of the monitor.
Great work!! I also want to build a smallish CNC mill using epoxy granite, but looking at your video, i think concrete is a better alternative... Where did you buy the UHPC? and what did you pay for it?
Thanks a lot! I bought it online from a shop here in Germany they also have a great forum where you can ask questions and get decent answers. If you want you can drop me a message to the channels E-Mail address (see Channel -> About) and i'm happy to help with questions. I think i paid less than 200 EUR which included the bags of UHPC, the flux, the mold release agent as well as the different grain sizes (got them from the hardware store tho').
hi there! are you scraping or did you use precision ground stock for the rail bed? if pre ground material has been used; how did you ensure that both sides keep the same plane? i assume as it was drying on a wooden table, the 150 - 200kg of material could have bend it? did you notice any bulging of the sides of the MDF? :) so many questions and so long until this awesome stuff continues! gut ding will weile haben, grüsse aus spanien
hey and thanks! stock was just some cold rolled steel as it makes no sense to bring in any precision before casting this massive block (160kg UHPC + 30kg steel) with all the deformation of the mold due to bending or hardening (even tho' it's UHPC it will shrink to some extend obviously the steel still won't). it is slightly bend with a bow in the middle which was to be expected. bulging of the sides was close to nothing as we pre-calculated the forces (it's particle board not MDF). long story short we're currently building a large CNC machine in parallel to mill the entire bed before starting to either scape or fine-adjust the linear-rails. stay tuned and take care! cheers from germany! 👍
Que coisa mais perfeita. Você poderia dizer se essa mistura é feita com cimento comum? Ou é epoxi? Agradeço muito se você puder passar a receita. Ah, parabéns.
Really cool I'm planning on building a CNC milling machine with components out of UHPC and I read that there's some shrinkage which can cause cracks when you cast in large steel parts. Did you have any issues on those long guide bars? This makes me hopeful that my plans might work though since yours is bigger than what I'm planning and it still worked pretty fine it seems.
Thanks! Haven't had any trouble with cracks at all but shrinkage caused some warping of the steel bars which I learned can be avoided by shorter anchoring bolts (like half the size I did or something). All the best for your build! 👍
Anyone know where to find UHPC stateside? I can't find anything when googling it outside of reference material, magazine articles and commercial mixers. I'm considering trying a non-shrink "precision" grout (not the grout used for tiles, but used for building machine pads to anchor machines to) that is about 1/2 the strength of UHPC but readily available locally.
I've been asked this many times too and it seems to be really hard to find a source in the states. If i couldn't source it i would probably revert to an epoxy granite mix instead of using concrete that's not made for this purpose (at least many machines have been build this way successfully). Besides the low shrinkage of UHPC the more important factor to take into consideration is the increased tensile strength which is close to aluminium if mixed and applied correctly. Good luck with your search!
@@CHIPLOAD Thanks. I was directing this question to my stateside compatriots who I am sure are also following along your build. The problem with epoxy granite mix is that I cannot find a commercially available (to the average person) product and I do not trust those "homemade recipes" I have come across on web searches, because none have undergone any kind of standardized testing. An open source epoxy granite recipe that has been tested and shown to be repeatable would be ideal, but I have not found such an animal.
@@paulprobusjr.7597 I got a few people from the states messaging me on instagram and said they will let me know once they find a source, so if you want you can drop me an E-Mail (to the channel's E-Mail address) or DM me on IG and i will let you know once someone got a source.
Hallo Freund! Können Sie mir sagen, ob dieses Produkt hier in Deutschland erhältlich ist? Ich würde gerne wissen, ob es so gut ist wie Epoxidgranit und ob keine Aushärtung erforderlich ist. denn nach dem, was ich im Video gesehen habe, haben Sie es am nächsten Tag nach dem Füllen der Form entformt.
Hi, ja gibt es in Deutschland, bitte einfach eine E-Mail an die Adresse des Kanals schicken für weitere Details. Es muss aushärten, allerdings kann man es in der Regel nach früher entformen um es besser zu belüften. Einen direkten Vergleich zu Epoxidgranit kann ich nicht ziehen aber UHPC stammt aus der Industrie und ist entsprechend reproduzierbar bei sachgemäßer Anwendung. Viel Erfolg!
Let's say it has notable less shrinkage than regular concrete but it's there. You have to machine the steel surfaces after curing. Once it is cured completely I couldn't measure any more deformation...
@@CHIPLOAD Hello friend, it's me again. I'm trying to find a national supplier for this Nanodur premix, but I'm not succeeding. So, I tried to find out more about this premix, and on their website it says to be a composition of 59% Nanodur cement (which I believe is a good quality cement) and 41% 0.25mm stone powder. With this information, wouldn't it be possible to build a similar premix? Because cement is very cheap and the stone dust was just buying a 60 mesh hand held. What do you think?
From what I could find out you're right it is PCE as a flux. I don't think there is an additive to prevent shrinkage (the water you add will dry eventually and this is probably the main part about shrinking but just my guess)
Is there any specific advantage to using special concrete like this instead of a more typical epoxy-granite that would normally be used for a machine base (if not using real, full cast iron)?
Hey, i somewhere answered this in the comments: the main reason being i wanted something that works out of the box the UHPC stuff i used is an industry standard which (if you stick to it) works great. I did a few very basic experiments with self mixed epoxy granite sampled and haven't had comparable results but can't say much about epoxy granite. Eventually it was just easier this just was available and has been used in other CNC build videos on youtube. Cheers!
This is very interesting. I'am building a cnc mill from Epoxy granite, and seeing the Mpa for the UHPC can go up to 200 Mpa is very impressive. I just started working in a concrete firm mixing and testing concrete. The standard test for a cube is ranging from 30-60 Mpa after 28 days, depending on the mixture. i made samples of EG ranging from 8-16% epoxy in weight. Sand and gravel mixed aprox. 50/50. 8% epoxy i got 49Mpa /1682 gram sample 16% epoxy i got 56Mpa /1578 gram sample These EG samples are smaller then the standard concrete cube witch weight in around 2400 gram. So EG is stronger then normal concrete, But if UHPC goes upto 155-200Mpa and more stable with tempratures and easier to work with, iam starting to think UHPC is superior and waay cheaper...so will deffently try this for my cnc lathe project.
Thank you! Yeah I think UHPC can outperform epoxy granite and it's an industry standard so easy to work with. It all depends on whether or not you can source it. Have had many people in the US unable to find a supplier.
What is your thoughts about UHPC vs Epoxy granite? Seems like everyone knows about EG and says EG is better, but after doing some googling it seems UHPC is just as good as EG. I can't find anyone claiming that UHPC would provide a much better CNC machine bed than EG in terms of longevity, repeatability and accuracy.
I don't have much expirience with Epoxy i have seen people build solid machines with it. The more important driver of my decision was that i don't have to experiment with Epoxy as the UHPC is an industrial standard if you stick with the recipe you will get splendid results and i have seen people build machines with it as well. Hope it helps, all the best! Cheers.
Very cool casting! Is this going to be open source? I design Open Source hardware and would love to help out or try making my own lathe similar to this.
Thanks! There are currently no plans or anything but we are happy to support any endeavours in building something similar. There is plently of things we have to solve in the next couple of steps so stay tuned and if you have any questions let us know! Cheers
@@CHIPLOAD Yeah I'll keep an eye on it. So you're not building based off of any plans? Do you have a Discord or anything like that where people can congregate?
We do have basic plans for calculations/parts but nothing that would as of a quality to open source it right now. Regarding Discord, no there is none right now but we have an oldskool channel E-Mail address if you want to follow up on anything...
@@CHIPLOAD I'd love to see what you have so far in the drawings or calculation department. Very interested in making my own lathe and surface plates. My email is info (at) zurad dot engineering.
It's a special flux which is part of the recipe you get when buying all the compnents of the UHPC here... i'm not quite sure but i think it is basically Polycarboxylatether (PCE) as somebody else asked the same. Cheers!
I used a compound called UHPC (Ultra High Performance Concrete) which is a special cement where you have to add sand, gravel, water and flux in a given ratio. If you want more details i can provide them via E-Mail (just drop me a message to the E-Mail address in the channel info) - happy to support!
hey, you mean the ratio between the components? i created a spreadsheet for that, send me an email to the channel's email address and i can provide it to you.
Another instant sub! Love the way that build starts... Hardly waiting for follow ups! Oh, and expect email to ask for more informations 😜 @heavy_mad_things another serious builder there 😍
you could adapt the mixer for vacuum mixing with a cover and a vacuum pump screwed , this increases the strength (less concrete needed) and durability reprap.org/forum/read.php?1,884820,884820#msg-884820
