Machsupport Forum
General CNC Chat => Show"N"Tell ( Your Machines) => Topic started by: CNC-AL on April 22, 2011, 03:10:31 PM
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Hi ,
Im new to the forum. I have built 3 cnc's so far. An engraver. A wood router and my latest was this Oxy Profile cutter
Ive been using it to cut plate for earthmoving attachments etc.
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Looks real nice. Thanks for sharing!
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I've just started work on an oxy fuel cutter too. It's 6 x 30 meters. It will be my first machine of this kind. So far I've done mostly mills.
What are you using for torch height adjustment. Is it manual?
Zafar
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Hi Zafar and good luck with your project. would be real nice to see some pics as you progress. My torch height is a manual setup. It has a rack and pinion with a handwheel on the side. if you look close you can see the silver colour handwheel on the 2nd pic. Works fine can just wind it up and down as the machine is running. Was thinking of automating it but have found that there really is no need for it. Cheers and thanks for looking at my machine.
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Thanks for your wishes. I'll take photos as I progress with that project. That machine was originally working on copy templates (1:10 ratio). About 8 years ago somebody installed dc servos and a nc control on it. Now that is dead too and they want me to upgrade it to cnc. I am going to replace DC servos with AC servo motors and give them better rapids and other bells and whistles.
What's the typical cutting speed you set for 1/2" and 1" thick mild steel plates.
Zafar
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Hi Zafar. I have a good chart at my workshop which has all tip sizes, cutting speeds and kerf sizes. Ill scan it and post it for you soon.
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Thanks a lot CNC-AL. That would be great help.
Zafar
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Hi Zafar sorry I took so long to get the charts.
Here they are.
Hope this helps.
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Thanks a lot for the charts. These will be of great help for setting up my machine. The hardware is all ready and I'll start working on the retrofit from next week. I'll post photos as it progresses.
Zafar
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The retrofit is complete. Cut our first profile yesterday. Next 3 days will be spent on training the operators and programmers for the use of new control. I'll post more photos later.
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Wow, that must be the biggest CNC I have ever seen under Mach control, impressive!
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Zafar,
Nice machine! In the USA, Smith Equipment manufactures OXY / FUEL torches that mix the gas in the tip. Check out oxy / propane tips. They work well and the cost to operate is much less than acetylene. The cut is also cleaner. Here is a link to their catalog page that shows the specs for tips. I used to sell their product and it is excellent.
http://www.smithequipment.com/products/pdfpages2010/page33.pdf
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It's been quite some time since I updated on my machine. It is in full operation now.
Some things I would like to share about shortcomings of Mach3 for oxy/fuel cutters. For a big machine like this we can't align the work pieces to the axes. So Mach axes had to be rotated for alignment. I used G68 for it. But another thing I learned that for big machines like these you need reverse run too. Sometimes the flame stops cutting in the middle of cut and then you have to pause and then reverse run the gcode to reheat the work piece and start cut again. And then what. I discover that reverse run doesn't work with rotated axes :'(. Reverse run doesn't work with tool compensation (G42, G43) too. That can be catered for in the cam software (a little inconvenient for the operator, but doable). But reverse run and rotated axes not working together was a pain.
Luckily I found a free utility on net for g-code manipulation called grecode.exe. This neat little software runs from command line and you can move, rotate, make arrays etc. of your g-code with it. Put it in a few macros and wizards and we are all set for job setup on machine that is easy for operators.
There were some more minor things which came up during this project. My designed screens with dark grey background looked very nice in the workshop environment but when I installed them in a space where it was bright daylight then suddenly it appeared that the screen contrast makes it unreadable. Changed graphics to a light grey scheme and that fixed it.
Anyways, I learned a lot about Mach and the flame cutting process with this project. Next project is a plasma cutter with THC.
Zafar
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Here's a photo of the machine from overhead crane.
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Wow. Wouldn't fit that one in my shed. :o
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Hello guys,
My name is Abed from Israel , 6 mounths ago i have started with cnc world. or with mach3 lets say ;)
I have maked a small cnc plasma machine with very standard parts, like TB6560, nema 17, all things were very standard, and i have succeeded with it to cut many pieces and many complicated pierces also.
The very improtant thing for me was that i have succeeded to run the machine, to know many things on mach3, vb, or scrren set, or macro, ok i cant say every thing on mach3 but many principles things!
Now I have started with the next table, it's 2.2m×1.1m
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Here is the new machine that I have started to making!