BT32 operational

[tomahack]

I received my BT32 Alpha with the HDS spindle on Tuesday. Everything went fine ( except for a missing screw) and it was running on Wednesday. One complaint: the docs are not on par with the quality of the machine IMO. Many issues are not mention in the manual. Now, the fun part begins! I will try to cut something today.

[kfitz]

Jean,
Just curious; did the machine come with a ShopBot logo and safety stickers on it?

[tomahack]

Yes why?

[kfitz]

I heard that someone recently got one with no markings of any kind on it. No SB logo, no safety stickers, nothing. I was just curious what your has.

[dave_k]

My opinion on the manual... since there is a lot of info in it that does not partain to the benchtop, the majority of the assembly chapter for example, it would be less confusing if they took the time to make up a manual just for the benchtops. I wouldn't think that would take the pub dept long to do that. Heck now that I've actually read that manual cover to cover, and many chapters several times, I know what parts are pure benchtop and what parts could throw a newbie off, and thus I could even do that for them.

[kfitz]

David,
Amen to that. A new user would be better off just throwing the manual in the trash. It really does more harm than good.

[dave_k]

Yes well, not sure I'd go as far as trashing the whole manual <smile>. If you’re completely new to CNC and Shopbot, it is full of good info IF... IF you take the time to weed through it carefully, reading parts of it several times till you glean enough about the bot and the system to figure out what parts of that manual don't apply to the benchtop, and what statements (oriented to the larger bots for which it was originally written) might confuse a BT owner at first. The main components are indeed identical on both types, but there are unique design differences. If you're brand new to this, those differences, not always clearly explained or shown in that manual, can be confusing at first. One example... I had to disassemble my BT32 to get it down into my basement shop, and then reassemble (and thus realign) everything once down there. I was able to do so simply by looking at my bot and figuring out what to tweak to align everything (the BT-32 comes already assembled and aligned from SB). I got her done and it’s dead on again, but my point is it would have been nice to have a Benchtop manual that stepped through aligning a BT32 from scratch. I’m sure there are others that have had to unbolt a benchtop into smaller pieces to get it through a door. A great little $9K machine like the BT32 alpha deserves a good dedicated manual. At the very least, have a detailed BenchTop chapter in the main manual explaining how to align a BT from scratch for folks that may need more help than I did.

All that said... I LOVE my PRSalpha BT32 so far, and have gotten great support from both this forum and SB email support for the few minor problems I've had so far. With a Shopbot CNC in the shop and the software that comes with it, you’re basically limited only by your imagination and the size of your table.