New Worksurface (aluminium)

[danizichi]

Hello
Since the first aluminium cut I realized coolant is problematic due to the MDF hygroscopic carateristic.
A full size plate in Aluminium actually is out of budget for me.
Usually I mill small aluminium or brass parts, a full aluminium plate is useless so I thinked to use a small one only for metals milling, when I need to cut large wood parts I will put the mdf plate.
I have got a 450x400x10 aluminium sheet so I designed this type of mount for the plate.
What do you think about that?
I am worried about the squaring of the frame, however I will keep the stock diagonal bar.

[elsouss]

Ciao danizichi,
I wouldn't be worried about the frame squaring as you keep the diagonal bar.
Yet, making sure the top surfaces of the 3 cross bars are all on the same plane AND parallel to the XY plane will require a lot precision when drilling.
So I would suggest to allow for the cross bars to be adjustable vertically.
I would move the work surface forward to have it centered vs the actual work area of the machine.
Finally the 6 bolts per cross bar support might not be necessary, 4 per support would probably be more than enough.

[DaveDolsonUSA]

I just read about this mod.
How did it work out?
I was just looking at large sections of a square t slot sold for beds for machines like a 3018 cnc router.

How are you dealing with the coolant under the bed.