I am going to build a CNC machine, What do I buy?

[northwest]

Right, this is a shot in the dark before I dig deep.

I need four Stepper Drivers, preferably three all the same. I am also looking for a power supply, I would like something 400 amp and up to about 40volts-ish. A decent breakout board to power a spindle? I am hoping one or more of you have bits from previous "projects" lying about?

I would rather pay a bit more for decent gear. Not to sound funny about this but we all know where "cheap+Chinese" gets you!

 

[Hood]

You sure it is 400 amp?

 

[Hood]

BTW a friend of mine likely has some breakout boards that he would sell, I know one is a PMDX and I think it is capable of spindle control but would have to make sure if you are interested.

 

[northwest]

You sure it is 400 amp?

Listen, Pal, you are talking to the guy who put the milk away in the crockery cupboard, allright? WATTS. four hundred WATTS> God I am starting to get worried now.

:-)

BTW a friend of mine likely has some breakout boards that he would sell, I know one is a PMDX and I think it is capable of spindle control but would have to make sure if you are interested.

Please, if you could find out I would be grateful.

 

[Hood]

He thinks he sold off all his old breakouts etc but will have a look but he thinks the only stuff he will have left is the stuff he has just taken off the lathe he is retrofitting at the moment. That is not what you are looking for as it is a CSMIO/IP-A controller which is for analogue servo drives.

BTW what exactly are you meaning by

..A decent breakout board to power a spindle?...

 

[Kram]

I would suggest the NOS telecom power supplies, being industrial kit it should be higher quality than consumer grade and being massively over spec should last forever. Some effort required connecting one up. 40-53v at 50A, roughly 3kw. Just be aware the standard for telcoms is ground and negative 50v, so it'd be wise to stick opto isolators on the driver inputs if the dont already.

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Huawei-R4850G2-Rectifier-Module-53-5V-56-1A-3000W-Communication-Power-Supply/114516217805
Mine is in the post with DHL express,currently somewhere in Germany

 

[northwest]

He thinks he sold off all his old breakouts etc but will have a look but he thinks the only stuff he will have left is the stuff he has just taken off the lathe he is retrofitting at the moment. That is not what you are looking for as it is a CSMIO/IP-A controller which is for analogue servo drives.

BTW what exactly are you meaning by

WEll, as you know I have a Rishton CNC Mill. When I bought it I knew exactly what I was getting and I spent some time and money getting the mechanicals spot on. The electronics though are another matter and the guy who did the conversion knew just enough to be really dangerous.
He used a Routout controller for the X, Y and Z axis and that is it. There is no A or fourth axis controller so for the fourth or A axis I have to unplug one of the other axis and use that, not really the way to go.

I would also like to control the spindle speed and coolant on/off, to do this I really need to replace the controller, the power supply (able to give only 14volts right now max) and get a couple of other connections going. I have an ethernet smoothstepper and now I need the rest of it. But I will not be buying cheap Chinese knockoffs from ebay and not all breakout boards will power/control a spindle, I do have a spindle controller somewhere though, I think.

The idea is to redo the control hardware and keep the present setup in a box, it stands me nothing now so no harm. If (when) i go for a slightly bigger machine I could just revert to as was and someone has something that works out of the box and I have a control package to power a bigger machine. Or not but nothing like options available now is there?

Now that I have worked out how to actually use the machine I want more from it, I was hoping some of you would have some redundant kit lying about and it might save me a few quid. Whatever, come the 4th Jan I will be ordering up the rest of the bits I need and they will not be coming off ebay,with some exceptions, cable possibly a power supply etc. That PMDX stuff looks quality.

I am also on the lookout for a mini form factor computer capable of running Win XP and Mach3. No HDD required. Yes, I had thought about going the all-in-one controller route but I am invested in Mach 3 now and I will be sticking with that.

 

[Hood]

Ok, is the spindle motor an induction motor controlled via a VFD or is it something else?
PMDX are top notch breakouts, all I ever used back in the day, well with the exception of the CNC Building blocks ones I had on the lathe as they could output differential step/dir signals and also had an index homing feature, sadly they are no longer made.
I sold all my breakouts etc to @MCKDAVID a while back, not sure if he used them or not.

I think the PMDX my friend had (possibly still has) was a PMDX 122 which doesn't have spindle control onboard other than relays for on/off, so no speed control but if you already have that then it may be suitable.
For stepper drives I used Geckos mostly but on the coil winder I used Leadshine stepper drives and they were of decent quality and seemed as good as the Geckos with the exception they were about 4x bigger than the Geckos.

I just threw out a Via Pico computer a few weeks ago It was tiny but worked well, I still use one on the Beaver mill.

BTW personally I would be looking at a CSMIO/IP-M instead of SmothStepper/breakouts.
The IP-M is 4 axis, has analogue output for spindles, has analogue inputs for override pots etc and all I/O is 24v, also no need for a breakout board as it is all opto isolated and connects to the PC via ethernet. I think @MCKDAVID ended up going that route with his plasma.

 

[MCKDAVID]

aye have a few boards here and a PMDX 122. didn't use them in the end, still got them in a box. For mine, as hood says, I went with the CSMIO, wonderful bit of kit, turned unreliable BoB garbage to smooth running and easy to set up controller.

if you're interested, pm me, and I'll take some photos

 

[northwest]

Ok, is the spindle motor an induction motor controlled via a VFD or is it something else?

It is exactly this. I am looking at the Leadshine drivers as Zapp supply them. Cannot find Geco drivers at realistic cost here :-( Am looking at using a Lenovo Mini, I will think about it.
I actually have the smoothstepper as it was gifted but I have looked at the CSMIO/IP-M specs and it looks very comprehensive, very PnP.

 

[Hood]

Regarding CSMIO/IP-M and ZappAutomation. Do not go by their description the the IP-M, it is wrong as they have mixed up some of the info with the bigger brother, the IP-S.

 

[northwest]

Regarding CSMIO/IP-M and ZappAutomation. Do not go by their description the the IP-M, it is wrong as they have mixed up some of the info with the bigger brother, the IP-S.

No, I didn't, I was going to buy it direct to be honest.

 

[Hood]

No, I didn't, I was going to buy it direct to be honest.

Aye, thats what I did when I bought the IP-S and IP-A's

 

[MCKDAVID]

aye direct here too

 

[northwest]

With a bit of the uncertainty removed last week, it is a no brainer, direct it is. It doesn't stop there though and all the connectors and sockets will add up to a fair few quid. Ho Hum!

 

[minimutly]

Out of interest, how much would it cost to convert a mill to cnc (excluding the ballscrews etc?).

 

[MCKDAVID]

if you have any industrial electricians in the area, try them and see if you can pick up an old panel / scrapped or whatever. If you can it will reduce costs dramatically, as that'll have the panel, a lot of the terminals and din rail, fans switches etc that you need to get started. I would say that for a scratch built panel I built, major cost wasn't the major kit, but all the daft little things, terminals, rails, fuse holders, fans, grilles, indicator lamps etc etc, all the little stuff soon mounts up...

 

[minimutly]

Hmmm, I'm not sure what kind of panel it needs - like a computer rack or something? With slide in rails and connector strip at the back - or mountings for them anyway?

 

[MCKDAVID]

mine for a plasma is 500 x 500 x 150 and it's a wee bit just. Ideally I would have like a bit bigger say 600 x 600 for more space to manouvre and make installation easier, but that's probably the minimum for a 3 axis cnc plasma.

 

[Hood]

All depends on the complexity of the machine as to what size cabinet you need.
For example on the coil winder I made all of the electronics were housed in the blue part of it, see pic below. It is just steppers which take up a lot less room and are a lot less complex than servos.

All the rest are servos

The Chiron is more complex and it is in a huge cabinet.

The wee Conect lathe was a 2 part cabinet, one that housed the servo drives etc and the top part that housed the controller and computer.

Churchill lathe is a big cabinet as well and I was struggling for space.

Plasma a bit smaller but again struggling for room.

A Bridgeport I did.

I have done quite a few more but the coil winder is the most compact but also most simple, the Conect lathe and plasma are probably about the same but are servos so a lot more complex.