My MPCNC destroyed itself!

This is why you should never leave a CNC unattended.

Luckily the damage seems to have been limited the the machine, there is some smoke damage on the wall and ceiling but nothing else looks damaged.

Originally, the machine was done in white ABS and later I replaced some parts with black PLA. You can see that there was no PLA remaining and many of the ABS parts were warped due to the heat.

[ifnotnowwhen]

Thank you for sharing this, I know it takes a lot of guts to post ones mistaken YouTube because the haters, trolls, and know it alls can be relentless. Much respect. This shows an important lesson for all of us new to cnc routing. Hopefully all you lost was the machine and not anything more valuable. I'm just completing my mpcnc and so far love it. I just added a tool mount with tabs so barring a failure (cracked mount, loosening screws, etc) hopefully this won't happen to mine.

[ikramhadi]

Thank you for sharing! Looking at building a MPCNC and now I know not to ever leave it unattended.

[nathansixteen]

That's exactly why I don't leave my machines unattended until I have enough hours with them that I feel comfortable, and even then check in every hour or so

[AM-jwlo]

Smoke detector wired to a cutoff breaker, simple cheap, and back to cutting while not there.

[markal]

Wow. Easy to be wise once it has happened to you. Thanks for sharing your experience. We do tend to get complacent on safety with how reliable these things are. Mine has run for hundreds of hours and something similar happened to me and I still don’t know why. Not done it again since but enough to scare the crap out me. I must have failed to tighten the collet properly or used a 6mm bit in a 1/2” collet or something, just don’t know. It just got deeper and deeper. Glad I was on hand to kill the power and get the smouldering wood off the bed.

[btkramer]

The sole problem seems to be that the motor mount bracket was not tight enough to hold the router properly, so it slipped which buried the bit and caused the fire. It doesn't seem like a problem with the machine. The motor just wasn't installed properly.

[rok]

Too bad nobody taught you to never ever leave machine under power unattended.
Good for you that after learning this basic rule the hard way you posted this to teach others.

[JustTryGambling]

My only question is how it was able to burn for 8 hours without being noticed at all. Like even if you decide to leave your machine unattended, which you should never ever do really, you should be steadily watching the camera and checking in every once in a while and make sure you’re close by. Did you take a road trip or something while it was going? No hate but I genuinely am curious as leaving your machine unattended like this is the number 1 no-no.

[rodneysmith]

wow, what a bummer! I hope everything (besides MPCNC / table) survived the fire ok... Thanks for sharing this, i'm building my MPCNC now and will absolutely be putting a through screw right through my Z mount into the plastic body of the router to prevent similar slippage... I wouldn't have probably taken that extra measure till seeing this video, but makes perfect sense with all the vibrations induced over a long time of cutting. Thanks and best of luck rebuilding!

[cliffchism]

Glad to hear the damage was limited. But yeah. It takes a long to develop trust in a machine. Unfortunately, by that time the machine is getting older and it's more likely to be untrustworthy. Good luck in the future. I hope you'll be rebuilding it. It looks like a great machine... Except for that last part.

[cu]

Yeah PLA + Hot motor = Fail. Hope everyone and 'everything' were ok after that . Maybe an idea to either add a metal hose clamp/ear pinch around the router/motor to secure everything in place . They only cost a couple of ££/$$ which would have saved the router bit.

[MLFranklin]

Whoa, that sucks. Thanks for sharing though as a warning.

[joshheitzenroder]

Mine has scared the hell out of me! The bit broke off after skipping steps, while cutting though a cuttingboard blank leaving the remaining shaft burning its way through the wood. Filled the garage with smoke but no fire.

[barry]

Holy crap dude!! Hope the rest of the shop is okay!

[FrugalFixerSpike]

Yea, My dust made it's way to a powder coating oven, and I lost my whole shop and almost my life. video of the mess in my channel, if you want to see a mess!!

[TheRainHarvester]

Hey everyone, I use Alfred video security app on Android to monitor my cnc if I step out for a bit. It shows you live video on another phone (use an old phone on your cnc). I make cnc videos too.

[michaelmoncrief]

Man, I'm sorry to see this. I have seen other CNC fires on youtube as well. Do you think the adapter design is inherently flawed?

[jamessmallwood]

guess when i get my case for my mpcnc i'll put zwave smoke alram in it

[defibane]

Sorry
I have cnc Mos and i am sorry for you
Courage for the futur
Denis

[ipadize]

get a decent closed loop cnc controller which shuts off when it detects too much lost steps, too hot of a spindle or if it detects fire (can all be dont relatively cheap with linuxcnc and Mesa cards)

couple of hundred to couple of thousand bucks (for a decent controller)

or

couple of hundred thousand dollars (for a new home)

- your choice