Replication cost

#1 By: Marcus, March 22nd, 2014 16:13

I am interested in replicating the TopBar design. But I'm a total noob at applying myself to fabrication.

Here in Seattle there is a maker space business that charges $3/min for laser cutting. Is using a laser cutter rather than cnc router appropriate? Does anyone have an estimate of how much time it would take to cut the pieces?

From a different route, if I was to get a ShapeOko cnc router could the beehive be cut with it, or is the ShapeOko cutting space too small?

Thanks!

#2 By: Gustavo Arriaga, April 14th, 2014 01:41

Hi Marcus,

The effective cutting area on a standard Shapeoko 2 is about 10 inches square. You'd need access to a MUCH bigger router that can do at least 4 feet by 8 feet to mill a hive using the design files provided. Although you could take the time to cut each piece individually on a smaller router, maybe 2 feet by 4 feet. That will, however, probably raise your costs on material (many small boards are typically more expensive than one big one) and machine time (more time to setup each piece). The overall cut time will vary according to the machine and toolpath parameters. It took us about 3.5 hours to cut one Colorado Top Bar v5 at 60 inches per minute with 0.2 inch cut depth per pass using a 0.25 inch end mill. But I think they just put our 11 hives in 7 hours in Colorado, which is really impressive!

#3 By: Carol Mcardle Carol Mcardle, April 17th, 2014 12:31

I also live in the Seattle area, and having a difficult time finding someone to cut out my beehives. Can anyone help?

#4 By: Wspear, April 17th, 2014 13:25

I've found that sign companies tend to have CNC machines which they use to carve out their lettering and such. If you call around you might find a sign shop that will help you with your project. In a big city like Seattle there should also be some well appointed makerspaces. You can check around on this and similar lists: http://makerspace.com/makerspace-directory A CNC machine is pretty expensive so smaller community makerspaces tend not to have them but the folks that use the makerspace may know where to find one.