Thread: New CNC

Nice work, hopefully it will keep going. Any chance of a photo of it.
Kryn

Water cooling an 800w spindle sounds like a bit of overkill to me though

Here it is in its temporary setup.
P_20150512_131730[1].jpg
I have to stiffen the bench under it and build a dust shroud around it
connected to the dusty.
It has been busy today with out fault (excluding the nut running it)

Nawww it's so cute

One day it may grow up. It is only 300 * 400 mm
Actual usable cutting area, allowing a bit to get outside, is 270 * 370
Tad more if limit switches turned off.

Well it certainly looks like you're well into it. Enjoy, they're lots of fun...until your program doesn't run and it won't tell you why

Was it hard to learn the program for setting it out? What sort of time frame did it take to learn the program?
Kryn

Originally Posted by KBs PensNmore

Was it hard to learn the program for setting it out? What sort of time frame did it take to learn the program?
Kryn

I bought Artcam 2015 express and followed the Youtube videos
and included tutorials.

I played around for 2 weeks waiting for the cnc to arrive.

The ships wheel is one of the supplied artcam cliparts and took
only a few minutes to set up ready for machining.
I exported from artcam in TAP format and loaded in to Mach3
to do the cutting.

Hi David,
The machine looks smart and impossible to get better value for money elsewhere.
The TAP format is an abbreviated extension for tape so an old computing format but still used in CNC machines.
The spindle water cooling is for long runs and a precaution against heat build up.
Good to see more join the dark side.

Further report on this machine.
I moved things around a little and started getting unexplained stops.
RnR motion controller disconnections. (usb controller)

It got worse and worse. Even changing my position near the
control box could cause a stop.
Plugging my phone into the usb on the laptop also caused a stop.

Ok: Out with my oscilloscope and start checking pulses and volts.
When I checked the pulses from the motion control card to the
stepper motors, every thing worked without fault.
When I removed the CRO probe the fault reappeared. Head scratch......

I found the +5v supply from the usb, fed to the stepper motors
did not have an earth return path which meant the pulses from the
control card were floating in volts to earth. This made the steppers intermittent.

I added an earth wire to the controller and every thing works fine.

Seems the assembler left a wire out. Terminals are there for the wire.

I don't think they believe in grounding anything over that way , seems the norm did you do a check of the full machine.

Originally Posted by WillyInBris

I don't think they believe in grounding anything over that way , seems the norm did you do a check of the full machine.

Yes - I also found an Active / Neutral reversal on the input 240v resulting in active 240 being all over the place even when switched off.
None of the shielded wires have the shield grounded at source end.

It is as bad as expected but the hardware is good, just the assembly.

Further note:
Since the fix the only two problems I have had was with Microsoft "TrustedUpdater"
taking over the pc. Going to remove PC from the network when working.

Got some nice 6mm 4 flute solid carbide up end mills.
They were cutting at 4600 mm / min with 3mm depth of cut in pine.
Real sweet.

So far it is doing what I needed

Bloody updates and crap, me to tears caused me a few up problems over the years quicker you can get it off the better.