My milling attempts are getting better and more routine. Although the included 400 watt spindle of the Genmitsu SainSmart PROVerXL 4030 V2 CNC router is completely okay for getting started (and probably also for model making applications, etc.), it works much better and faster with a more powerful spindle.
I’ve treated the 4030 V2 to an air-cooled VFD spindle from Vevor with 1.5 kW power including a frequency converter. The matching 63 mm mount is supplied by SainSmart, so you don’t have to modify or tinker with anything here. In addition, the mount is made of aluminum, which provides additional heat dissipation from the spindle. I didn’t want to mess around with a water-cooled spindle at the moment, as the effort for that is disproportionately higher. The cooling water must be treated with additives so that it doesn’t go bad, etc. Unfortunately, this spindle motor seems to be sold out at the moment.
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The connection of the Vevor spindle , with the small aviation connector, is quite fiddly and also not exactly VDE-compliant. I soldered it so that the stripped area is minimal and additionally put heat shrink tubing over it. I also filled the connector with hot glue so that nothing can come loose here. Nevertheless, I will soon convert the connection to something more suitable, such as a Harting connector, and print a new cap for it. An Ölflex CY 4x0.75 cable with shielding was used.
In addition, you must ground the router well, whereby you also have to ground the gantry separately, as it is not electrically connected to the lower frame.
I’m deliberately not providing instructions here, because when it comes to mains voltage, you either know exactly what you’re doing, or hopefully let someone else do it who is familiar with it. I haven’t been able to detect or measure any problems with interference fed into the grid that would require a line filter.
Milling wood with the air-cooled 1.5 kW spindle from Vevor
After some test runs, I designed and milled a French Cleat holder for my new Presch files in Solidworks. 10 mm birch plywood offcuts were used as material. The milling bit is a straight two-flute with 3.175 mm. I tested these end mills from Amazon for this and am more than satisfied with them. The edges are very clean and require (apart from removing the tabs) no rework whatsoever.
The feed rate was 1400 mm/min, plunge rate 600 mm/min, depth of cut 4 mm. I created the milling file in Estlcam 12. First, 6 pockets with 5 mm depth and then the cutouts are milled. The tabs are 4 mm wide and 3 mm high. This holds perfectly and they can be separated almost without tools. The total milling depth was 11 mm.
I used Candle again as the G-code sender, but I also have OpenBuildsControl in use, which I like very much. The smartphone can be used as a manual control device with it.
The quality of the milled parts is really remarkable and everything was absolutely precisely fitting. A bit of wood glue and the holder made from 3 pieces of scrap wood is ready.
The feed rate could probably even be increased further with this material, because neither the spindle nor the closed-loop steppers of the Genmitsu router showed any signs of being impressed. The spindle becomes lukewarm at most during the approximately 5 minutes of machining time.
The upgrade with the 1.5 kW spindle is a completely different world once again. It simply goes much faster and more effortlessly. Even the air-cooled VFD spindle is significantly quieter than a Makita router - besides, the vacuum cleaner is running anyway. The Scheppach DC100 extraction system with the upstream cyclone filter does an excellent job here.
After the successful tests, the frequency converter will get a small ventilated control cabinet and the central extraction system still needs to be connected. And of course I’m waiting for the extension for a 600 x 600 millimeter working area.
Read now: My accessory recommendation for the Genmitsu CNC router
Hi! I'm Markus – the Fricklr. ⚡ Electrical engineer, 🎵 musician (bass, guitar, keys) and professionally 'something with the internet' 🌐 for over 30 years – nowadays with AI too 🤖 – a 55-year-old generalist from Bavaria, Germany.
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