Machsupport Forum
General CNC Chat => Show"N"Tell ( Your Machines) => Topic started by: lab auto man on January 05, 2016, 09:50:59 PM
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Here are some picture of the CNC router that I constructed. Like my small routers I posted before I use a lot used biomedical research equipment. All the T-slot aluminum and the white .5 inch plate aluminum came from an old Q-bot. The linear rails came from 3 Sagian 3 meter robotic arm rails and the Z axis from a Sagian Mutiipet. The rack n pinion drive systems came from CNC router parts. The electronics are a USB smooth stepper driving a PMDX-126 and the power supply is also from PMDX.com The stepper drivers are Geckos. I do have more work to do. I want to add a tool touch plate and a rotary axis at the one end and dust collection system.
Regards,
Todd
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Nice work Todd.
If you keep building them bigger and bigger you may have to consider moving house ;D
Tweakie.
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Thanks Tweekie.
I will attach some pictures of items I have made with this router.
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Great stuff. :)
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Hi,
I am adding a fourth axis. It will be parallel to the Y axis, so I will be wrapping the X axis around it. Should it be the A or the B or does it matter? Right now I use the A axis as a slave on my X axis but I can change that to the B or C if needed. It looks like the post processor in V Carve uses the A axis for a rotary axis. Thanks for your help.
Todd
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Hi Todd,
I think it is as you say, changing your slave to B and keeping A as the rotary will make life easier in the long run.
Tweakie.
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Thanks Tweakie,
I have decided to use B as for my axis of rotation for now. I can switch it later, that is no problem. My currant problem is I can not get the rotary axis to move. Below is what I posted on the PMDX forum but have not received any feedback. I now think it may be a Mach 3 setting or something I am missing. The rotary axis has no home switch so I guess Mach 3 never tries to home it? On the Mach page the 4th axis has a red box around it while x,y,z are green after homing, is that why I can not move it? How do I tell mach where home is for the rotary axis? I think I am missing something? Thanks for any help ???
"I have a PMDX-126 run by USB SS and I am trying to get a rotary axis working. The axis is driven by ClearPath SD servo. I have step wire going to pin "16" on J6 and the direction going to pin "17" on J6. The enable is connected to +5 PC and all commons are connected to ground PC. This rotary axis uses the B motor in Mach 3 and is parallel to my Y axis. I believe I have all the settings in Mach correct. If i try to use MPG to move the rotary axis The numbers on the screen change but no real movement. The servo drive is in servo lock. I do not see the LEDs at pin 16 or 17 light or change at all. I do not believe I am getting step or direction signal from the PMDX-126. All my other axis work x,y,z and C slaved to X. Any ideas? what am I do wrong?"
Thanks,
Todd
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Well I got the rotary axis to move. I went into USB SS data monitor and noted that when ever I used the MPG to move the 4 th axis it was the A axis that was active. So I went into mach and switched from using the B axis for the rotary to the A axis and I have movement! This leaves me with a question. I was Googling around about A,B and C axis today trying to figure out if it mattered what one I used. From what I read it looked like A rotary should be parallel to X, B rotary should be parallel to Y and C should run parallel to Z. Kind of made sense when I read it. But my setup will have A parallel to Y, Now I could swap my X and Y around if needed. Any help wrapping my brain around this would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Todd
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My RT is called the A axis but it is parallel to the Y axis - like yours.
It works fine, and there IS an option in Mach3 to tell it what linear axis the A axis is on.
Whether this affects the tool path display I am not sure. I remain slightly puzzled by what the display does sometimes, but I do keep reminding myself that my perspective is NOT the machines perspective.
Cheers
Roger
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Some test cut on the 4th axis.
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I have upgraded to 3.2kw spindle that is water cooled and controlled by Mach 4 via MOD bus.
One question I have is what should I use as the liquid? Right now I am using just water but I believe
I need some rust inhibitor. Any suggestion would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Todd