Water Cooled Spindle Motor

[steve harvey 1Participant @steveharvey1]

[steve harvey 1Participant @steveharvey1]

I've decided to bite the bullet and invest in a water cooled spindle motor for my CNC. I Like the look of the Chinese ones on ebay but are they any good ? If anyones can make recommendations or know of a UK supplier I would be greatfull

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

The question has to be: What do you want to do with it & what power?

I have a watercooled 3 phase 800W spindle with VFD. It's good for engraving & routing & light milling cuts in aluminium & brass. It was the one that came with my Chinese 6040 router/engraver. I plan on adding a 300W DC spindle to my cnc lathe as an engraving tool when using it as an X,Z,A machine.

The VFD I have interfered with my cnc PC – a plastic cased Dell with metal spray RFI shielding inside. I tried shielded cable & putting the VFD behind steel blocks, but still got occasional glitches. When that Dell PC died, I used a metal case PC and all the RFI problems magically disappeared, so be aware of this possibility.

As for runout etc, very difficult to disentangle spindle movement & machine deflection. The bearing life of the Chinese ones is supposed to be 600hrs @ 20000 rpm, better than most hand-held routers, but not sure how that would relate to your machine time.

I have used mine with 0.5mm dia cutters and also 16mm dia cutters. Never had a worry with that part of the CNC. Mostly used to cut wood, brass, acrylic & casting wax.

Regards,

Richard

[steve harvey 1Participant @steveharvey1]

Hi Richard

I have a 6040 that I have replaced just about everything on. It's now quite reliable but the original air cooled spindle it came with has long since died. I tried a couple of routers but they are way too noisy and get very hot on long runs. I'm mainly cutting wood aluminium and brass. My main concern is spending a lot of money on a new import spindle ?

Steve

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

Mine is just 30 months old, hasn't been used a lot, or as much as I wanted, but the water cooled spindle hasn't felt even warm. I have a 10l water tank from an emulsion paint pot and a small but very noisy pump that came with the thing, and have used car radiator anti-freeze in it. My usage has been machining pen boxes, lithophanes in acrylic, pen threads and small bits in brass & aluminium. It has not seen a great deal of use, the longest being a 2.5hr spell machining a Lithophane with a 200k line program over an area 9" x 12" with 2.75mm plunge. The stepper motors got fairly warm but the spindle was the same at the end as the beginning.

I think when you get one of these, having to get a VFD is what makes it pricy. The spindles are what, £90-100 on their own or £180 inc vfd: **LINK**

A VFD will have to bought anyway, and from Arc etc the price is a fair bit higher.

Can't advise beyond saying in about 30hrs on my machine, I've had no problems.

Regards,

Richard

[Ian ParkinParticipant @ianparkin39383]

I have 2 of the w/c 2.2kw spindles one in a cnc miller and one as a spare just in case both with chinese inverters

the running one has been in use for 4 years probably 500 hours use and it still sounds sweet

best things i've ever bought for the price

Both bought from a chinese supplier on ebay but from portsmouth

Edited By Ian Parkin on 09/02/2017 15:44:04

[steve harvey 1Participant @steveharvey1]

Thanks for the feedback I think its time to put my hand in my pocket.

[Malcolm FarrantParticipant @malcolmfarrant93389]

I have a Chinese 6060 CNC, it has a built in water cooling system, which I have found to be excellent. Equally I dis have some problems of the CNC suddenly stopping if I was using a vacuum cleaner to collect rubbish whilst I was working. I do not remember which. I bought from Amazon a Connection, and since have had no problems. It was called a "Surge & Spike Protector". Hope this is of help

[Author]

Posts