My daughter is learning to make customs cowboy boots and one of the issues she is running into is the amount of time it takes to hand shape the foot mold for a customer. I have been looking at building her a cnc lathe to be able to automate the making of the foot molds (called lasts). Here is what I was thinking I could build: this video shows a cnc lathe being used to to make what I am talking about. Is it possible? I don't have much CNC experience. Most I have built is a few 3d printers. But it seems that it should be possible. Any advice is appreciated. Yes, I have looked into buying a machine like they have in the video but it is far too expensive. Thank you for your help. Regards, Gregory
Can be done, but it might be a lot easier in terms of software toolchain to just use an OX or C-beam and do the last in 2 halves,... left side, right side, or top/bottom, then glue them together. That 'lathe' is really a 'mill' with an A axis for the spindle, and possibly no Y axis motion at all. I say this because of the requirement for synchronization between the A axis and the cutter. BTW I have been looking for an easy/cheap way to do the foot scanning. My wife needs custom inserts (too much dancing when young) and they are expensive so I am hoping to be able to make them myself someday.
For my scanning of objects and someone who is patient I used structured light with Precise 3D-Scanning - affordable for everyone Mostly have them stand on a turn table I built when I had my photography studio. You could have them lie down on a table and capture the bottom of the feet. Precise 3D-Scanning - affordable for everyone is really good at stitching the images together to make good model and easy to clean up the background as well. I like this idea I found this: CNC SmartShop II 4-Axis Machine | Laguna Tools it seems similar to the process of mill the two sides separately but without having to glue them after the machining. I could keep the tool path simple mill one side, flip and mill the other side. You can see how they do it on their machine with a gun stock:
