Praxis: Interesting idea of a CNC Truck in development.

From John Robb's Global Guerrillas comes an interesting idea: the mobile CNC machine.

I'm not sure the fellow has thought it through though. Here's the original link.

I think these commenters at GG have good points:

kunkmiester said...

Cool idea. I'd put it in a trailer though. Pickup bed trailer, mount a generator on the tongue, and you have space in the truck for tooling racks and other things needed.

Or perhaps you'd go ahead and put the machine in the truck to allow you to swap out trailers to haul whatever materials you're using.

And:

Jeff Garzik said...

Seems like the main problems with as-spec'd design are
* maintaining level
* controlling vibration

There's a reason why the majority of such machines are professionally levelled and/or bolted to a concrete floor....

Field-friendly CNC machines would probably be self-leveling, but vibration and movement on such a high center of gravity seems like it would be a problem.

Perhaps mounting the generator, material racks and support tool bins in the truck and the machine on a low trailer with outriggers and a leveling mechanism would work. Still, the idea of an itinerant machinist who could travel to the customer has appeal.