Shizuoka retrofit??

I have a chance to pick up an older Shizuoka (mid 80's or so) dirt cheap. It has a yasnac control on it, I dont know if it is good or not.

If I get it home and it has control issues, where is a good place to start looking for a control upgrade? Can I keep the motors if they are good and just run it from a PC type control? It doesnt have rs232 so I would have to have a btr type unit. Would I be better off putting that money on a control upgrade?
I have other mills so I am not under time constraints, and could devote some resources to the project should it need it.
I welcome any advice on what might work well for this mill.

Hi spock,
the centroid controls are pretty nice. but not cheap.
billy

I agree, they are not cheap. I am looking for a lower cost alternative.
I read about one guy who had "ahha" controls on 2 shizuoka mills, but they are out of business. Still looking.....

Spock,
Have a look here

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=31601

I just read it, really interesting with lots of info ref mach3.

The yaznac is a very robust control, just like fanuc, mitsubushi etc.
Yaznacs are fitted to matsuura machines as standard, and a lot of hitachi machines had yasnac drives and servos, with the hitachi 'seikos' control front end integrated to it.
I believe seimens bought yasnac, so i wouldn't have thought it a problem for spares if there is something wrong?

I dont know if anything is wrong, machine is at a warehouse and not been under power for at least a year, probably longer. I dont want to bother hand writting programs, and the shizouka has no rs232. I am just researching, I dont want to spend for a btr unit if I can add to that and get a more modern control that will let me use my cam software.

I do love the looks of this machine, super heavy built from what I can tell. I have a series 2 interact 4 (no toolchanger) that I use for single tool programs. I love it. I do my other work on a new mill, but I would like to have another heavy mill to use with a toolchanger, like the shizuoka.

AHHA!
I was that man with the 2 retrofits!
We had a 700 (x700, y340, z350) 1990 and 800 (x800, y430, z400) 1983 models (UK designation).
Both were manual toolchange, ISO 40 taper.

I couldn't fault our shizuoka's. I think they are far better built and stronger than the interacts.
We used to hog steel better (with only 5hp) than on our leadwell v25, because the things are solid way (not linear ways). We would cut aluminium at 60inch feed rates, and the things would be accurate because they had stepper drives so wouldn't cut corners on direction changes.
They would easily hold a thou all day, from a 1983 machine!

By memory, the toolchanger option (32tool?) was a bolt on contraption on the side that was slow and a bit problematic. They were afterall, a manual knee mill that had been converted to cnc.

Both of ours paid for the shiny new leadwell, which in tern paid for more shiny toys until space was the problem and they both had to go.
However, if space wasn't the problem I would have not hesitated in keeping the 800 for tooling and prototyping, and steel work.

Has it got any connector at all on the side? The older controls had 9 way d's by memory, was it RS244 or something??? It is very unusual if it has no way of dnc ing at all?
It's a lot of work to do a retrofit, and if you keep the existing drives and motors, you will need a full (and correct!) wiring diagram of the machine as is.
Alternatively, if money isn't so much an issue, then the centroid kit is probably the best option
http://www.centroidcnc.com/lowcostm39.htm

Whatever upgrade you decide on, it will have to interface with the toolchanger (unless you junk it). So it may be worth looking because i'm not sure that the cheaper retrofits can handle this?

Good luck anyway, and keep us posted!

Hey spock. my brother bought a shizouka mill and had a centroid system installed (it had been stripped), turned out to be one sweet mill.

I looked the centroid site over, they seem to have their stuff together.

I dont know the model #, but it looks to have maybe 16x32 travels, weighs about 9k.
The machine has a 18 station tool changer, arm type. I havnt made an offer on it, but I have been told that I can get it for junk price, and I can move it for almost nothing. I will probably make an offer this week.

spock, did you ever get the control upgraded? if so what did you do and how is it working.