Thanks, Art. Still got a ways to go... My Gecko G540 came in today. Kind of a puny little thing for that kind of money! But as long as it works...
I'm pairing 20 tooth with 48 tooth pulleys on the X-Y Axes. I need a smaller pair for the Z axis and happened to have a 15 tooth pulley for the motor so to keep the ratio the same as the other axes, I needed a 36 tooth pulley. I know it's not necessary to have the same gear ratio on all axes, but I like consistency. I didn't have a 36 tooth pulley on hand and I didn't want to pay the outrageous price for one, so I decided to make one. Here's a picture of the blanks I turned.
Attachment 208864
I already had a cutter I had made a number of years ago from a 1/8" slitting saw. I had beveled the edges to the proper angle and used it once before to make another pulley. Here it is chucked up in the mill, teeth already cut. I'm using my Arduino powered dividing head to index the blank as I gut the gulleys.
Attachment 208866
Unfortunately, I cut two of the gulleys twice as deep as they should be. I had forgotten that my ball screws move the axes twice as far as before! Made the correction and cut the rest of the teeth. I don't think it was make much difference.
Here's the (nearly) finished pulley.
Attachment 208868
Still need to bevel the edges of the teeth and bore out the hole in the center to the correct diameter.
I also just realized that the electronic dividing head will make a nice 4th axis when I everything up and running. Guess that 4th axis on the G540 will come handy after all!
Chuck