CNC Conversion
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Sturgeo has built up the electrickery in an old 'puter case:



Power supply on the left, 4 stepper drivers on the right and the breakout board below.

Just need to add a mains switch and fuse and we can see what we can break :)

May also fit a cooling fan driven from the PC if things get a bit warm.

EDIT left and right mixed up.

Edited by Paul S on 2nd Sep, 2012.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

your other left...

That's cause I'm left eyed.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Only just spotted this thread. Dave, here at DSN, CNC'd his mill a few years ago. If you get stuck, give him a call. I'm sure he'd be more than happy to discuss it. Of course, these days, he has access to rather more substantial kit! But we have his old one here too and it gets used occasionally.

As an aside...
We've just ordered a CNC turning centre to compliment our two mills. Previously, turned parts had to be sub contracted.

Steve
DSN Classics Ltd
www.dsnclassics.co.uk

Steve,

I did email Dave about the bits that we want to make, but you were unable to do 4 axis at the time. Has that changed at all?

Sturgeo has just generated some G-code for a simple inlet flange, so we should be cutting metal soon.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

If you can, it would be interesting to see a video of it.

http://www.jbperf.com/

Ya I would be very interested to see some video two Paul, also Paul I would be very interested in knowing how expensive this was as I have an old but reliable brig-port I would love to convert, keep us posted Paul

p.s. very well done to the both of you looks class

It's going to be around £1500 in the end. That does not include the CAD/CAM software.

I still have to "make" the 4th axis. This will be a rotary table fitted with a 4 jaw chuck and a stepper motor.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

do you need a rotary table? I have a small one that I was going to chuck on ebay,

How small Joe?

I need to be able to fit a 4 jaw that will hold a bit of 3" square bar.

A 6" table could do it.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

I think its an xp3 on this link, I'll dig it out tomorow and have a look.

http://www.chronos.ltd.uk/acatalog/Soba_Ro...ccessories.html

Joe - I might be interested if Paul isn't.

Are you using a harmonic drive gearbox on the rotary table? With xyz you have a fair ammount of mass to dampen the harmonics of the stepper motors out but on the rotary table. Not so much. Just a thought. Although Im sure youve got it covered in one way or the other. Probably not even something to take into consideration.

How much did the drivers and breakout board set you back?

We are not planning on cutting whilst the 4th axis is in motion. But I'll take your comment on board if we do in the future.

The drivers and boards came from here:

http://www.cnc4you.co.uk/

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

It works !

We have travel in 3 directions.

Now we need to read the manual before we break something :)

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

well done.

Todays progress whilst the old boy watched the cycling :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hy19D8pImg

Running code to machine an inlet flange, looks like the feed rate is too high so i'll bring that down before we actually attempt to make any swarf!

savage lads looks savage Feed should be fine as long as you take small cuts, I find with my little CNC lathe that small fast cuts are better than big slow ones better finish and better chip clearing. stick some alloy in there and see what happens :)

Something broke, that's what happens :)

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

This says test:



Minor issues with the first 'T' and a broken milling cutter due to operator error, but it does what it says on the tin :)

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

The operator was me :$ noticed the endmill was stalling so hit the e-stop, clicked goto z and instead of raising the z axis first it started moving x & y and snapped the endmill... ahwell live and learn!

excellent ,well done.

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM

The end mill was stalling because we just put it in a drill chuck instead of a proper collet chuck. More expense coming up :(

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

well done looks to work well

Done now needs redoing lol

brilliant work lads I am very impressed by this I love the neatness of this conversion, keep the videos flowing