I have been watching the development of Shaper Origin for a while and they are about to start shipping production models. It is a handheld router CNC that allows you to cut designs on any size material. It uses a special tape with fiducial markers on it, a computer vision system and articulated motor mount to auto-correct your hands as you cut out designs. I have been looking at CNCs machines for a while but their foot print is just too big to fit in my shop. The Origin seemed like the perfect solution. No bed size limit, compact when not in use, you can CNC the ends of boards and whole boat load of other cool features.
So yes, I now have another brand new fancy cutting tool on pre-order (I’m in Batch 2, delivery starts in January). If you check it out and want to get one too, use this link and we both get $100 off.
I had been watching their progress for a while. I’d love to get one but I have too much money tied up in equipment right now. I’ll take another look when a couple more of my devices start paying for themselves.
Yes, that is one of the reasons I went with it instead of a router that needs a permanent bed, but I still don’t have even the little workspace required. Got a bit of a log jam with a custom car project at the moment. All tools and tables are on casters. Even the car is on caster dollies so I can slide it around easily, but everything is still kinda “stuck”… LOL!!
Ugh! with all of my research and KNOWING there is a referral code I somehow didn’t end up on that thread. I am going to see if they will let me add a referral post sale. Fingers crossed!
It is a really cool tool. Really unique in the class of routers and CNC machinery.
I used one of their pre-production models that they used for testing & debugging, and it was strangely like playing a video game.
The product itself has some really beautiful engineering to make it incredibly robust, and of course all the fringe use cases you can imagine have been thoroughly considered and solved for.
I think I’m going to make a single rowing shell with the combination of glowforge and shaper…
I hear you but this thing has been in the works for years now and from everything, I can see they have it quite well worked out.
Like any smart tool if you try hard enough you will be able to make it mess up. You move the main router and I’m sure that if you go crazy with it you can still brake bits and ruin wood just like with everything else.
I still make bad mistakes with my handibot sometimes and embarrass myself with a broken cutter and trashed project.
Totally fair. I broke a dumb tool the other day that was pretty darn foolproof (who breaks a pin vise?)…
So fresh caveat - in my 5min playtime cutting out a star, I was being pretty careful, but then was told to get reckless with my path-following. Lo and behold, when I ran into a knot in the material, I ended up pushing the bit outside the controllable zone and it happily retracted the bit for me. Then when I moved the tool back over the controllable zone, it gave me the go-ahead to start & plunge the spindle again.
That, I thought, was darn cool.
Humans will always be able to break things, but I think this tool has an interesting intention - which involves a user-friendliness and set of interactions approached from such a different direction than any other CNC tool.
Mark, I have a Handibot Adventure edition also, but I haven’t done very much with it…the Shapeoko 3 has gotten priority w/r to my learning curve. Just a matter of time before I get to it. Agree with you…with the 3D printers, cnc machines, and the Glowforge, there is no reason to join the local maker space since mine will be pretty complete.
Got a bit of a log jam with a custom car project at the moment. All tools and tables are on casters. Even the car is on caster dollies so I can slide it around easily, but everything is still kinda “stuck”… LOL!!