Starting Mechmate in Czech Republic
 

Hi,

My name is Martin and I live in Czech Republic.
I have the plans for Mechmate for few years now, but I did not have a time to start until now. I'd built in meantime a small CNC from MDF. The working size of my Mechmate is going to be 2070 x 2850 mm.I already outsourced the laser cutting and bending, bought Geckos and other electronics. Now I am about to order the material for the table. I am a bit confused if I should buy circular or rectangular tubing. In the drawings are used pipes, but I saw many people to use rect. tubing. Any advice? Thanks

pipes are preffered but some of us feel more comfortable dealing with rectangular tubes (cutting joining). So use pipes. As I understand they are stiffer than same size rectangular.

Welcome. The base is very flexible as to how you build it. Tube is sometimes easier and cheaper to aquire. But square will work. Looking forward to your build.

Thank you very much for your comments.

I am now reconsidering the size on my mechmate. The length will be definitely 2800 mm, but the width could be either 2070 mm which is standard for MDF or I could do it just 1250 mm, which standard for most other materials, such as plywood. Is there a significant structural loss and increased building difficulty comparing 2070 to 1250 mm? Thanks

I made mine and friends for width of full board, the difference in cost is so small you would not notice it. And it is well worth the little extra effort if you can spare the extra width in your workshop.
There are a lot cnc machines around that can do 1250 width but very few that can do 2050 like mine, keep that in mind when thinking of size.
Also plywood sometimes comes in 1525x1525 sizes (the quality ones here) so it is always advantage to have a full width and use material properly without large offcuts.

Gantry tubes on mine are 3mm thick and my friends are 4mm, go for the 4mm tube wall if you can. It seems to me that he is having a little bit less vibration. And the extra mass is always welcome. Also you can tap in 4mm and leave out the strip inside tube.

One other consideration is the operating convenience; you can reach almost every point on a 1250mm wide machine from one side or the other. At 2070mm, you will need to climb on top more often, depending on what type of work you do. Think through how you are going to do your material hold downs.

Thanks a lot for your quick comments. I am not afraid of the climbing on the table, and Danilom has a good point that is more difficult to find a cnc machine bigger than 1250. Therefore, I think I will do the 2050, the only thing I am afraid is that it will be much more difficult to reach a good precision of the machine during the build.