I Raced a $600,000 CNC Machine

To try everything Brilliant has to offer—free—for a full 30 days, visit brilliant.org/inheritance. The first 200 of you will get 20% off Brilliant's annual premium subscription.

We here at Formula Kentucky would like to thank Brandon and Machine Time for machining our uprights this year. They do amazing work and their generosity helps us more than they can imagine. Generous people in the community are what allows us to succeed and we couldn’t be more appreciative.

As a member of an FSAE Team from Germany myself I have to thank you so much for doing this. Without people like you our cars would be nothing but a 3D model and a dream. Really appreciate the work you do. Take care

I think the real lesson here is the importance of networking and maintaining relationships. Great work on all counts.

I'm recovering from a stroke right now, and can't get out in my shop. Your videos are keeping me sane, and helping me imagine getting back to work. Thank you!

Stunning level of manual machining.

Everyone needs to pause at 6:25 to appreciate this Calendar. It's hard to pick a favorite between "Book Sniffing" and the recurring "Pretend To Be Napping". 😂

Outstanding work

I am part of a Serbian FS team, and we JUST finished our upright, and this video drops, insane. Thanks for a great video!

I can't imagine the level of concentration you have to maintain over 23 machining hours, knowing that the slightest error could junk this part. You have my highest appreciation of the machinists art!

It really blows my mind what complex geometry you are able to create with manual machines! We never did anything remotely complex in machineshop classes, really wish we did

Member of BYU FSAE here! This is our first year back in the competition since a win in 2012, and fully electric this year! CNC uprights are our last part needed for suspension

99% of the time I have no idea what you are talking about as I have never touched a lathe but I love watching your videos. Your sense of humour and your attention to detail are brilliant.

I'm getting cold sweats remembering trying to mill an FSAE upright on an ancient Emco F1 CNC training mill using a Windows 95 version of MasterCAM and drip feeding it over RS232. We quickly gave up and cut them from foam for an investment casting, which also didn't work. I ended up welding them up from steel tubing.

A great video and a good looking result. This shows exactly why manual milling tends to be used for one-off parts, but CNC rapidly pays off as soon as you add repeats. Which is good because with the cost of CNC machines, tooling and software, you need to be running through a lot of production to start getting your money back.

Thank you for your time that you donated to that cause. As a machinist of 34 years, I must say I truly enjoy watching your content and honestly have picked up a few good ideas. The saying never to old or proud to learn. If you think you are then it's time to give it up. Thanks for all you do my friend. Prayers and thoughts.

I am the Leading officer at the Baja team at my school, and people/ companies like Brandon and Machine Time are literally blessings to teams like mine. They're the most helpful sponsors we could have

Cal Poly Racing Baja SAE member here. I had no idea it was even possible to do parts like that on manual. I especially appreciated the explanation of climb vs conventional milling. Great video!

26:18 I like the sticker "DO NOT" :D

Craig was very kind to you. The part is not particularly complicated and is very stable. It also requires no special tools. With a well set up cam programming station and also the machine you should always be much faster. CAM 3-6 Setup 0.5-1 Proof 0 Machine 3 So between 6.5-10 hours. I've been a machinist since 1998 and worked most of the time in single part production, first conventionally, then 3-axis CNC, then 5-axis, and I wrote most of the programs on the machine (Heidenhain) during that time. For the last 7 years I have only been programming with Cam software for both single parts and series parts. Even if you program the program on the machine, you should only need 6-12 hours for programming. That depends even more on the skill of the machine operator.