The iF’s interest in CNC started with a desire to construct a completely homegrown DIY device. Despite the commonality of a CNC (head to our fav local hardware shore), the project posed great challenges from the perspective of intergrated software and hardware communication and minimized budget.

The effort began with Alex B, Mike N, and Marshall H teaming up and tackling the project. Currently the iF team has been able to transpose simple designs from CAD into CAM software that dictates the actions of the CNC controller. Below are a few examples of our test projects:

Recently, an older Bridgeport CNC has been purchased to accommodate larger scale projects and versatility in materials and design. With much tlc the Bridgeport CNC has come to life as of late, but much work is still underway. The iF family is working producing a homegrown XY-axis CNC table to further increase the CNC’s functionality. If interested, please check out our forum page on the latest CNC chatter.