More accessory base questions

Been watching some videos - just had a couple questions pop up:

1. The manual rotary axis mentions that you shouldn't mount material greater than 16 inches in it when used as an indexer. The rotary axis mentioned the same thing - but when you check the Shopbot site on the axis it would allow for 36". If I were to make a longer sled for the accessory base, could I also theoretically hold a 36" piece in the manual rotary and still expect to machine it well?

2. Can the Handibot actually reach the top the accessory sled when mounted in the accessory base at 0 z? For example: could I expect to be able to V-carve an 1/8 inch sheet mounted to the sled or would I need a jig?

Thanks!

Oh - also forgot to ask: Has the FABMO software been updated to allow a 4th axis to work yet or do you still have to replace the Y axis with B to use the rotary?

Thanks again.

The accessory base was designed to be as tall as possible while still being able to reach the center of rotation of the indexer when it is mounted on the tray. That's with a standard length bit (like the V bit). When I'm doing work on boards that are too low in the accessory base--I usually slide a 2x4 onto the tray and clamp it in place. Then I can attach my material to the 2x4.

There's no reason you couldn't machine a longer piece using the indexer--if it gets too long I'd worry that the piece would vibrate while being cut and the finish would suffer.

The latest fabmo update corrected the issue that made the 4th axis not work correctly--so you should be good to go!

Thanks!

Order placed, and I can't wait to play with it.

With the new FABMO update, can I leave the rotary attached all the time? What I'd like to be able to do is a typical 3-axis cut, then move the rotary manually through the fabmo interface and do another 3axis cut either on the back or side.

Yes, you can leave the rotary axis active all the time. It uses a separate driver channel from the other 3 axes. So the tool still functions as a regular 3 axis tool even when you are using the 4th rotary axis. This would definitely be the way to go if you had a complicated 3D part that needed to be machined from 3 or 4 sides--clamp it in the rotary and turn 90 degrees between each 3D cut.