Using one of the first lightly built test sliders and some close-enough wood scraps (no saw handy), cobbled a Z axis just to see if this has a chance of working. It does appear to have a chance.

Here exercising 5 cm travel in each axis:

With optimistic anticipatory debris screen because testing the XY table started to get a little messy.

My faux-Dremel weighed 510gf. A 500ml bottle of water weighed 510gf. Presumably 500ml beverage bottles are easy to find so makes sense to design for a user-provided counter weight.

Unloaded backlash/hysteresis is well under 50μm for all axis. The SM1545 motors have an axial spring to preload the bearings, and that compresses a bit when loaded in one direction. The laser cut parts have untested pilot holes for screws to limit the axial spring play.