Workholding & Fixtures

The hidden 50% of CNC: the part doesn't matter if it moves while you're cutting. Workholding choices are dictated by machine type and material. Routers want T-track and clamps; benchtop mills want Kurt-style vises; plasma tables want sacrificial slats; PCB mills want vacuum or double-sided tape. Most workholding products are physical hardware, not software, so this page is more catalog than tool list.

Vises (mills)

• ★ Kurt DX6 / D688 / D810 — the "Kurt-style" anglock vise; the prosumer benchtop standard. Expensive but rebuildable for decades. Knockoffs (Glacern, Shars, Glanze) hit 80% of the performance for 30% of the price; very common on Tormach and PM-class mills.
• Glacern GSV / Shars 440V — paid, mid-tier; the realistic Kurt clones for hobby use.
• Modular vises (5-axis style): Kurt VersatileLock, Lang Makro-Grip, Schunk Tandem — paid, prosumer; clamping pressure with low profile, useful on Pocket NC / 5-axis trunnion setups.
• Sherline / Taig vises — vendor-specific; the "use what came with the machine" answer for micro-mills.
• Cheap drill-press vises — fine for one-offs; bend under a real cut.

Clamps & step systems (routers, sheet work)

• ★ Step clamps + T-nuts — the universal kit; works on any T-slot table. Fischer / Te-Co are common brands.
• ★ Mitee-Bite Pitbull / Talon-Grip — paid; cam-action edge clamps that grip a side feature without towering above the part. Indispensable on benchtop mills with shallow Z and on routers cutting flat stock.
• Carbide 3D / OneFinity / Sienci low-profile clamps — vendor accessories for hobby routers; cheap, work fine.
• Toggle clamps — De-Sta-Co style; paid; used on plasma tables, drag-knife jigs, and the side of router tables for sheet hold-down.
• Hold-down brackets / hex-head bolts into T-nuts — the cheapest; a sack of these will hold most plywood signs.

T-track & fixturing plates

• ★ MagSwitch / magnetic clamps — paid; switchable rare-earth magnetic clamps for ferrous work; great on plasma tables and steel fixturing. Pricey but transformative for plasma.
• Matrix / fixture plates — drilled-and-tapped aluminum plates (M6, M8, ¼-20 grids); Saunders Machine Works (the Mod Vise / Fixture Tooling Plates), Datron plates, Avid CNC plates. Pair with cam clamps and vises.
• T-track aluminum extrusions — Rockler, Powertec, Kreg; the woodworker baseline. Bolts down to most router beds.
• Spoilboard with threaded inserts — drill-and-tap MDF with M6 / ¼-20 threaded inserts on a 50mm grid. Cheap, replaceable, very flexible. Standard on Shapeoko and Sienci.

Vacuum tables (sheet routing, PCB milling, plasma)

• ★ Passive vacuum jigs — pull-through MDF + venturi (Vaccon SD60 / VFA-200) or shop-vac; works for thin sheet plywood / acrylic / PCB blanks. The DIY hobby answer.
• Active vacuum pumps — ENJOMOR, Becker U4, Travaini rotary-vane pumps; serious vacuum for production sign work. Loud, expensive.
• Vacuum chucks for PCB / small parts — Bantam Tools vacuum table for the Bantam Tool Mill is the canonical example. Avid CNC sells modular vac tables.
• Mat-vacuum systems — flow-through silicone mats over an MDF plenum; decent for sheet jobs.

Plasma table workholding

• Sacrificial slats — replaceable steel slats spaced to support sheet without burning into the table. Standard on Langmuir CrossFire, PlasmaCAM, and most DIY tables.
• Water tables — water under the cut catches dross and reduces noise/dust; common on industrial; trickling on Langmuir's MR-1.
• MagSwitch hold-downs — magnetic clamps double as plasma workholding because everything's ferrous.
• Downdraft tables — fan + duct underneath the slats pulls smoke down through the table; alternative or supplement to water tables. See Dust & Coolant.

Soft jaws & sacrificial fixtures

• ★ DIY aluminum / HDPE / MDF soft jaws — the cheap-and-cheerful: machine your own custom jaws to hold an irregular part. Standard practice on Tormach / PM mills. Saunders Machine Works publishes patterns; Fusion 360 has soft-jaw templates.
• 5C / ER collet blocks — for round stock work on a mill.
• Pin / locating-feature fixtures — when running production batches, locate parts with two dowel pins + one clamp.

Tape, glue, and "just stick it"

• 3M VHB / two-sided carpet tape — paid, cheap; absolutely standard for one-off router work on plywood / acrylic / Lexan. Don't overuse on tall parts (lever forces will pop the tape).
• Hot-melt glue / blue painter's tape sandwich — the woodworker classic: blue tape on stock + spoilboard, CA glue between, zero-clamp setup. Very common on Shapeoko sign work.
• Cyanoacrylate (CA) glue + activator — same idea; even cheaper.

Documentation / fixture-design tools

• Fixturate — paid (one-time); CAD plugin (Fusion 360, SolidWorks) that generates soft-jaw and modular-fixture geometries. Niche but well-loved.
• Saunders Machine Works free Fusion templates — free; soft-jaw and matrix-plate starting Fusion files.
• PCB hold-down jigs — see PCB Milling.

Pick this if…

• First Shapeoko / Sienci, want one kit: spoilboard with threaded inserts + Mitee-Bite Pitbulls + a T-track on each side.
• Benchtop mill, real metal: Kurt DX6 (or Glacern clone) + soft jaws when needed.
• Sign / sheet plywood production on a router: vacuum table (passive Vaccon for hobby; active Becker for production).
• Plasma table, small shop: sacrificial slats + MagSwitch.
• PCB milling, single boards: vacuum nest or double-sided tape.
• One-off pretty wood thing on a router: painter's tape + CA glue, ship the part, move on.