I'm sold on Fusion360 as it is basically professional 3DCAD that can be used for free. Full on parametric with a powerful history tree. As you've no doubt seen it has built-in CAM functionality as well, equally professional and it can output G-CODE for most CNC-controllers. So very much all in one. And you'll be glad you learned real 3DCAD instead of meddling with 123D, Sketchup or anything else.

Personally I prefer the Vectric programs (Aspire) for making G-CODE for the CNC as they are geared towards woodworking with features like v carving. Fusion360 CAM feels more like it was made for mills and lathes but can do most things as well.

@rfm69 I think the mechanical stuff is ~$1400 and then ~$600 for steppers and spindle and a few other things.

Of course the machine we're building at the makerspace is the biggest suggested model. Working area ~100x150cm with steel reinforced Y and X and with laser cut steel plates instead of aluminum. So I don't think he ever sold that as a kit internationally because of weight and size. A smaller machine would be much cheaper obviously.

@neverdie Yeah the guy behind the RawCNC has been a bit difficult. This is sort of his side project and he keeps changing his mind on how to proceed. He actually rolled back some of the features to make the machines lighter and easier to ship. But then he didn't sell internationally anyway. At least not for long.

Yes but can he do this?
Cutting some valchromat without music – [00:47..02:52] 02:52
— Raw cnc

The MPCNC is a smart project but I would assume it would struggle with a bigger motor.

The 2.2kW we are going to use weighs A LOT. Around 5kg at least I'd guess. The 1.5kW is not much better. With a smaller spindle, or router like a Kress things would be different. Still I'm glad to have the extra power, and standard ER20 collets up to 13mm. Plus these chinese spindles are really quiet compared to a regular router. And the speed can be set and spindle can be started from the control panel or from the computer. The downside is the low quality VFD I guess, but if it works it works. And you can always use shielded cables everywhere.

@neverdie Yeah that is a surprisingly good machine as it seems to be built from scratch with no plans or whatnot. It says in the Youtube comments that he spent $4K-4.5K on it though, with 1K of that being for the extra cost of servos as compared to steppers. Nice to have those linear rails and ball screws though.

By comparison the machine we're building is maybe $2K. It will have worse precision (than ball screws) as it is rack and pinion. But a work area of ~100x150cm.

The RawCNC uses rods that are glued or pressed into a shaft clamp and then a u-groove bearing on top of that.

Well, we looked into this for our local Makerspace. Especially if you're in the US, the Shapeoko or the Xcarve can be somewhat price effective, particularly when they have their sales campaigns and include the dewalt router and free shipping or whatever. But I still think the Xcarve is a bit flimsy and mostly propped up by a successful campaign in social media where they gave away machines to well known youtubers.

In the end we opted for building a rack and pinion RawCNC instead.
http://cncmaskiner.org/
http://rawcnc.com/
Unfortunately the guy behind the project keeps changing his mind constantly about how to sell machines, kits, parts and plans so I don't know how practical it is to start a build right now. It all hinges on finding the parts like the aluminum extrusions.

In the end we didn't want a timing belt machine. And we wanted a vfd / spindle solution from the start not having to go through a dewalt / makita router first. These spindles are quiet and you get standard ER collets. But they are also really heavy and might not work on a standard Shapeoko without reinforcements. We opted for a 2.2kW air cooled model.

Here is someone who has custom built an unusually small RawCNC:
https://openbuilds.com/builds/rawcnc-1-5-desktop-edition.5771/

@NeverDie Perhaps but the design is a bit too simple and unoriginal. I'd have to clean up the files a bit and I haven't touched Eagle since I made this board several years ago.

Also pretty happy with Domoticz. Also installed Dashticz on one of my two installations (the other being at the local Makerspace). For me, at least historically, I needed something that could run well on a Raspberry. Domoticz is up and running in seconds obviously even on limited hardware. For me at least Domoticz is pretty flexible, with Blockly, LUA, Python and dzVents. I think there is also some sort of add-on for PHP. The interface and the handling of devices is a bit messy but still.

Haven't tried HA but I would certainly consider it.

Could we do what Moteino has done and drop support for HW/W radios and opt for HCW/CW/RFM95/96/RFM12 using double sets of pads?
https://lowpowerlab.com/shop/product/99
Would be great if the community could settle on just one radio or a common way of doing things.