Makera Is Releasing a 3D Probe for Z1 and Carvera Air Machines

The most challenging aspects of working with a CNC mill are often those you don’t even think about, such as workholding. One of the trickiest parts of the job is locating your stock’s origin point, relative to the machine, in three-dimensional space with both accuracy and precision. To make that easier on their Z1 and Carvera Air machines, Makera is coming out with a new 3D probe.

The Carvera Air and Z1 actually come with a pretty nice probe for finding the top surface of the stock, which is handy. But it can’t do anything for finding the edges in the X and Y axes. You can use a traditional edge finder, but those are inconvenient. Or you can use anchor point system, which is quick but not particularly precise or accurate — it also isn’t very good if you plan to mill the edges of the stock touching the anchors.

This 3D probe solves all of those problems, which is why similar units are so popular in the CNC world. It taps and detects surfaces of the stock in the XY (top only, of course), ZY, and ZX planes, providing you with a precise and accurate origin point in three-dimensional space.

That’s particularly useful for second operation jobs and for working with pre-squared stock that is already cut to the final size. It is also nice if you’re using a vise, rather than anchors on the spoil board.

Makera says this 3D probe will be available on their store “in the future.” They don’t provide an exact release date, but it will probably be sometime in the next few months. And for Carvera owners, Makera plans to develop a wireless version.