CNC plans - DIY kit? Thoughts?

[Cap'n Jack]

I did the majority of my project with CNC. I bought a 6040 CNC router when I started the ribs. I had a local place CNC cut a plexiglass jig as my router wasn't big enough. The local place was happy to do the plexiglass jig. I know another place that will CNC laser cut 4x12 sheets of aluminum no problem. I'm not sure why the holes need to be punched.

I did all the small plexiglass parts and all the wood rib parts. For sure my ribs were accurate because of the CNC. Putting the rib jig together was just a matter of assembling the parts in the pre drilled holes.





I also had all the metal parts CNC laser cut locally. My CNC router can't cut 4130 steel. All of the stuff I outsourced was from the DXF files I supplied. They did the conversion to gcode and optimized the parts on the material I supplied. The cost was a few $ per part. Money well spent.



I recently learned how to cut Aluminum with my CNC router.





The parts I did myself were converted to from dxf to gcode with some software I purchased (~$150). For sure adding a CNC router to your inventory of tools adds another level of skills needed to complete a project whether it's DIY or outsourced. For me, the $2G I spent on the CNC router and learning to use it was time and money well spent.

As mentioned most of the kits are already done with CNC. I think it's a good idea to start sharing CNC code for plans built projects. Sky's the limit when you put your mind to it.

Those images look really nice. How easy is it to run your files on a machine made by a different company? Now that you have your parts optimized, I'd think you could give or sell those files to someone building the same model of plane, so long as they also bought plans from whoever is authorized to sell them (avoids copyright problems). Thanks for sharing your experience!