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Here is where we are so far.
Ordered stuff late Wednesday, It all arrived today.

Lily was great to speak with and got the order right out.

Boards are smaller than I was expecting but that is a good thing.

The only problem I have is what do I use to connect the 3 boards together?

I have some 50 pin HD connectors which I think will work.

Mike

Yeah, just 50 pin IDC old school SCSI ribbon cable.

http://www.mcpb.com/html/cin.sc50c.1x1.html

Steve

I got some work to finishh today and maybe tomorrowI can do some work with it.


Getting more excited all the time.

Mike

I managed to sneak in some time last night.
The install was pretty easy. The driver was a little more difficult but nothing too tough.

I have basic communication between the board and my laptop.
The plugiin configuration page looks good and should make the rest of the setup straight forward.

More updates to follow.

Mike

More progress today.
I have the boards mounted and I was able to get the analog signal checked out for the VFD with a volt meter.
All in all it is working well and I am in contact with smurph to iron out any bugs that may appear.

More updates to follow.

Mike

I'm a long time Mach3 user and was communicating with Mike Walace about using my 7i43 to act as a step direction to PWM converter to run a high power servo amp. He suggested I look here. I have a 7i43, SCSI cables and breakout panels, Jon Elson's high current PWM AMP, servo motor and power supply that I was going to use to test this concept. This solution is much more elegant. I would be happy to help you test but I don't have it connected to my mill which is currently running 3 G320's. I'll lurk and volunteer if I see an opportunity to help. I really need 160 volts @ 20 Amp's to run my mill properly.

Roger

Hello,
I'm on the way to retrofit an old milling center I would like to use mesa 5i20 cards but as I will end with 4 axis, a 21 tools rotary tool changer + the spindle speed an direction and many other IO's,
one 5i20 card will not be enough.
EMC is able to drive more than one 5i20 card. Is it possible to drive more than one 5i20 card with mach3 too?
Thanks
Patrick

EMC uses the HostMot FPGA config where EMC handles all of the trajectory control and thus is capable of spreading the work across multiple contollers.  We use the SoftDMC FPGA config where trajectory planning is done by Mach but the control is done on the Mesa card.  So adding axes by adding multiple controllers is not possible.  However, you can use one Mesa card for axes and another Mesa card for I/O.  (I wrote an I/O plugin as well)  Also, there is the 96bit 5I22 (8 axes and 48 bits of I/O) if that might be enough.

With the 5i20, you could do 8 axes and 24 bits of I/O with the motion plugin.  Then you could add another 5i20 for another 72 bits of I/O with the I/O plugin.

The Mesa motion plugin is not tested yet, so it's not ready for prime time.  I've been working too much. 

Steve

Hello, Steve

Thanks for that fast reply.
I will have to see what I will do than.
As all my servo's are driven with +-10v AMC amps and as I'm doing that retrofit as a hobby I would like it not to be too expensive.
I have then two choices:
1) I  go to the mesa and EMC2 (seems very reliable but linux and all the EMC settings scares me a little)
2) I will probably have to choose an other board for mach 3 like the DSPMC but it will be more expensive.
Or do you know of a board that suit the two wolds to try both?
What would be your advice?
Thanks
Patrick