Milling with the Modela
This tutorial is made for people who have never used a modela.
It should describe the proces to mill something in the most simple way. Questions/suggestions? please drop me a mail.
Preparation:
Export your 3d model as a STL file and open up 'Roland modela player 4'.
Under Linux, you'll find it under wine/programs/Roland modela 4.
Choose file/open and load in your stl file.
Then go to File/preferences to choose between mm or inch. Then, on the top right, click on the model setup icon (green head). By 'Size and Orientation, you'll see your measurments of the piece, and to the right you should choose the direction you want to mill it. Next, set the origin to the center of the model. Back in the main screen, choose the material you are going to mill. Next, click on the milling surfaces icon (orange cube below the head icon) and choose the number of milling surfaces. In our case 1. Then choose the model area icon (next to the orange cube), set margins (automatic), set depth (automatic), slope (automatic - no slope), note your cutting area, your piece of material is bigger than this.
Recommended: (surfacing the table)
For those of you who want to work as precis as possible, read on, otherwise skip to the next section.
Surfacing:
Of course you need a piece of wood mounted on the table, otherwise you may mill in the table and screw up the machine!. Make sure it's big enough for the grid area (150mm x 200mm). To be sure the underlying surface is perfectly horizontal, we surfacing it bevor we start with the actual piece.
Click on the right 'New Proces', choose Surfacing, then 'Top [+Z], then choose your tool bit. Use a square one, not a ball. See also http://fablab.waag.org/?q=node/811. choose specified area, and set the lower left to -100, -75, and upper right to 100, 75. By depth, choose 0.5, that should do the job. Next, choose Scan lines X, Cutting start postion to lower left. Next, XY speed= 10 mm/sec, Z speed= 0.4mm/sec, cutting in amount=0.5, path interval=1mm. Next, give it a name and save it.
Now, click on the model position icon (blue green block near the bottom).
Set the model position centerd in the printable area of the machine (100mm x 75mm).
On the machine, take your piece of wood, and stick it to the table using hot glue. Put the machine on, then press the up & down button simultainously, the green light will blink, when it stops blinking, the machine has emptied the buffer. Thats very important, otherwise the machine may start a job!
Now go out of view mode by pressing view. The head will move to its reference point = down left. Now you have to move the head a bit in x y, so you can reference your milling bit in the Z axe. In linux, open the terminal window and write: move 0.5 0.5. hit enter and the table moves in position. In windows, you can do this in cutting-position window in the tool movement area. Now make sure your milling bit is mounted deep in the chuck. Press the down button and move as close as possible to the wood. Losen the screw and let the bit drop to the surface and tighten it again (both screws!). Now this is your 0 point in the z axis. Now you are ready to start the surfacing process.
modela table measurments: 160mm x 250mm | grid: 10 x 10mm | size: 150mm x 200mm (= printable area)
position from left 24mm, 4mm from the bottom
Update march 2,2010 : WIN only!
If for any reason you have to cancel a job, or you are emptying the buffer and it keeps blinking, go here and follow the steps: http://www.intellecta.net/mdx-20_spooler.html