Cutter not level with table

[lazym]

I did my first sign this evening and it was nearly great. The board was 23" by 11". I found the router was off by a little more than a 32nd of an inch. Left side high/right side low. Of course, the letters on the right side looked crappy.

Is there any way to level the cutting arm with the cutting board? I can't imagine that I would have to shim every piece.

Thanks,
Wayne

[fison]

Wayne,

In my humble opinon this is one of the hardest things to get perfect. You have to level the Shark's work surface. If you have a Pro Plus I'm not sure how to do it but on the Shark and Shark Pro by shimming it. Get it as perfect as you can an check it every once in a while.

[REG]

I did my first sign this evening and it was nearly great. The board was 23" by 11". I found the router was off by a little more than a 32nd of an inch. Left side high/right side low. Of course, the letters on the right side looked crappy.

Is there any way to level the cutting arm with the cutting board? I can't imagine that I would have to shim every piece.

Thanks,
Wayne

Wayne, this has been discussed a few times on the forum, in particular by me. The assumption is you get the Shark in and fully assuming everything has been machined for a perfectly square and plumb setup where the router arbor is ready to cut the lighest carve across a piece of material stretched at either X or Y axis. Truth is, the Shark is precision machine but it is not possible to have the table on the same plane as the cutter right out of the box. You have to place a sacrificial board over your table and cut it down with a flat bit. The board will be machined to a flat by the router so any low or high spots should now be on plane to the gantry.
Instead of covering my table I made oak slats instead so I can still have the use of the T-slots of the aluminum table top. Since I did this all my work has a consistant carve depth.

Topic link: http://www.cncsharktalk.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=287

I have the carve file for this project using a 3/4" flat bottom bit and is designed for a solid surface (using the pocket toolpath). It is simple toolpath to build but I can share with you to save you time if you like. It uses the center of the X and Y travel of the router arbor, not the center of the table (which is why you see my slats in the link offset in the photos).

Bobby

[lazym]

Thanks for all your hints. I ended up taking the table off and shiming up the right side with metal tape.
After playing with it for awhile, I was able to get everything leveled up pretty close. There is a .018" difference
between the left and right side at a length of 23" I can live with that.

Thanks again.

[doceby]

I would like to have that file to level my table. I have a shark pro for about 2 years and I have been fighting this problem too. It causes problems when cutting text over a large area. I make large ceder lined oak chest and cut names into the tops and sides. the wood is very expensive and I do not need any mistakes it cost about 40.00 dollars a 24x40 in. panel. thank you doc eby

[REG]

I would like to have that file to level my table. I have a shark pro for about 2 years and I have been fighting this problem too. It causes problems when cutting text over a large area. I make large ceder lined oak chest and cut names into the tops and sides. the wood is very expensive and I do not need any mistakes it cost about 40.00 dollars a 24x40 in. panel. thank you doc eby

Doc, the file I made is for the Shark Pro Plus table size but I built the file in V-Carve so you can easily edit the material to configure for your table material. Rather than posting emails on the forum just send me your email in a PM and I will email the .crv file to you.

Bobby