Wiring import plasma for CNC use

Good morning all,


Lurking here for a few months, so small introduction:


I'm building some aftermarket jeep parts and recently went "all in" on a plasma table to hopefully become more efficient (efficient=$=less time)

With that said, I'm still techically a "hobbyist", but make a few bucks to fund my tool fettish. The more I produce, the more tools I can purchase. This preface brings me to the here and now.



I have a chinese inport cutter and will hook this up to the table. Here is what the table needs:


CNC Interface Cable Requirements

• Arc Voltage 20:1 Arc voltage readout is preferred; Line voltage also will work with minimal additional wiring by the installer.
• Plasma OK Signal This is a relay that is built in to the plasma cutter electronics, it will need to handle 12v at .08 amps.
• Plasma Start Controls the starting of the plasma system, control box can handle 120 volts at 8 amps for this circuit.




Now...I'm not as concerned about the Arc Voltage because I know it's for the ATHC and I've seen very little online success regarding setting that up. I'm also fully aware of the grounding requirements. My first order of business is to get this going, even if it means manual height, so I can start cutting parts to get projects moving. I've got a line of customers, and no parts at this point. Not good. This plasma cutter is a means to an end, which is to get these projects out the door so I can generate some income to buy a hypertherm.

I've managed to aqquire a wiring diagram (full, not the drawings in the manual) after a month of requests, but don't want to post and infringe on copywrite (although there is nothing on the page that says it's copywrited).

I am NOT an electronics savvy person, so when I say I need help....it needs to be pretty specific. (Needs to be "that little spot next to X" rather than "output to torch" and I always looked at pics more than read in school)


As for the Plasma Cutter, it's a Simadre 80SP. There are no CNC ports on the back, so this is going to be "wired in" rather than plugged in. It is pilot arc start and 80 amps. It comes with both the hand(won't use) and I purchased a machine torch with it. It still has the cheapy zip-tied trigger on the side of the machine torch. I've watched several videos and blogs that have showed users both leaving that on and taking it off(cutting off the trigger and using the 2 wires)


Ok, enough rambling. Need some help, and I know 99 percent of you are smarter than me on here(other 1 percent were spambots) so I know I'm in good hands. Thanks in advance for any information.









Again, any help is appreciated.


Scott
TSOffroad

I set my table up initially (before I bought a Hypertherm) with a 40A , contact start cutter. At least you have the pilot arc so that's an advantage.

I did several things to minimize / eliminate noise interference.

(1) Ran my motor cables with shielded, twisted pair, with a drain wire.
(2) Moved my PC at least 20' away from the table or it would go bonkers and ruin a job.
Also covered parallel port cables in grounded, flexible metal conduit.
(3) Install separate earth ground for the table, cutter case, electronics box, etc.
(4) Ran limit switch cables in metal conduit. It also protected them from mechanical damage.

Your table probably has most of this done but this eliminated my problems with the noise from the cutter.

If you are going to be cutting parts for money, you'll definitely need a THC. CandCNC has a low cost system, LCTHC, that can be hooked up to a import cutter. It only costs a few hundred with the necessary components (for Arc voltage, Arc OK, torch start, etc). I can vouch that it will work with an import cutter. I used it for over a year before switching to the Pmax65 and now I am using it with that. He also has some higher level systems that should work fine.

I'm sure I've forgotten some things that other folks can suggest.

Good Luck.

Willy

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by flyinwilly

I set my table up initially (before I bought a Hypertherm) with a 40A , contact start cutter. At least you have the pilot arc so that's an advantage.

I did several things to minimize / eliminate noise interference.

(1) Ran my motor cables with shielded, twisted pair, with a drain wire.
(2) Moved my PC at least 20' away from the table or it would go bonkers and ruin a job.
Also covered parallel port cables in grounded, flexible metal conduit.
(3) Install separate earth ground for the table, cutter case, electronics box, etc.
(4) Ran limit switch cables in metal conduit. It also protected them from mechanical damage.

Your table probably has most of this done but this eliminated my problems with the noise from the cutter.

If you are going to be cutting parts for money, you'll definitely need a THC. CandCNC has a low cost system, LCTHC, that can be hooked up to a import cutter. It only costs a few hundred with the necessary components (for Arc voltage, Arc OK, torch start, etc). I can vouch that it will work with an import cutter. I used it for over a year before switching to the Pmax65 and now I am using it with that. He also has some higher level systems that should work fine.

I'm sure I've forgotten some things that other folks can suggest.

Good Luck.

Willy

---

Thanks for the info !

You said you used a CUT40. Where in the plasma cutter did you tap into to get the above mentioned components (Arc voltage, Arc OK, torch start) ??? These are the big ones I'm needing....and I'm certain the bulk of cutter boards are designed the same...


Thanks again for any info !


-Scott

The LCTHC has a sensor board that you connect the inputs to.

The ARC voltage is tapped directly off the torch leads inside the machine and connected to the sensor board.

On the cut 40, it used a 2 wire plug for the trigger which screwed into the front of the machine. I disconnected the torch plug and connected a plug from the new torch relay.

As for the ARC OK, the LCTHC uses a transformer on the input AC leads to the machine (one of the leads is wrapped around the transformer) and this senses the increase in current when the arc is on.

Sounds weird but it worked OK.

Your Simadre is a lot newer than the CUT40 so it may have places where you can connect these inputs to. I had no luck getting the info for the Cut40 from the vendor and just pieced it together by hit or miss (luckily there were no misses).

Willy

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by flyinwilly

The LCTHC has a sensor board that you connect the inputs to.

The ARC voltage is tapped directly off the torch leads inside the machine and connected to the sensor board.

On the cut 40, it used a 2 wire plug for the trigger which screwed into the front of the machine. I disconnected the torch plug and connected a plug from the new torch relay.

As for the ARC OK, the LCTHC uses a transformer on the input AC leads to the machine (one of the leads is wrapped around the transformer) and this senses the increase in current when the arc is on.

Sounds weird but it worked OK.

Your Simadre is a lot newer than the CUT40 so it may have places where you can connect these inputs to. I had no luck getting the info for the Cut40 from the vendor and just pieced it together by hit or miss (luckily there were no misses).

Willy

---

Now we're gettin somewhere !

I'd bet the technology to get the power (IGBT?) is different, but I'll bet the output boards to the torch, etc are not much different.

I have the same "2 wire" connection on the front of the plasma cutter. Since it comes with a hand torch and I will have no use for the switch on the machine torch, I'm thinking I can just cut the switch off the two wire lead and use those wires as the "Plasma ON" connection on the controller ?? That would take care of #3 on my list.


For the "Arc OK"....seems I need to find out a little more about my controller and find out what it senses.

From your description of the "Arc Voltage"....if it's detection off the leads...it must be "raw voltage" ? If so, I'll get ahold of my mfgr to work on getting that into usable form (20:1 divided).




Keep it comin !!!


Scott

Well....


Seems I may have a solution that will get my import plasma cutter as well as my THC going....for less than $20 bucks.

I don't want to put the horse before the carriage, so more to come after saturday !

Hello guys

I think I'm having the same problem. I bought a Lotos LPT5000D, which has pilot arc feature, I even bought a machine torch that has pilot wire too. I have no idea how I should I connect the plasma to my cnc machine. I have a 6 axis breakout board and Im using Mach3 as controller.
please direct me.

There are some THC's that can use chinese plasma cutter such as neuron THC, maybe if you use them you can ask them or you can go to their website. They have support forum. Usually US made THC only works well for Hypertherm.

my plasma is LOTOS, US made. I have proma THC sd model, Poland made. I have a 6-axis chinese breakout board and Im using mach3 as a controller.

I need your help on connecting these parts together, to ensure the torch to work automatically.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by flyinwilly

The LCTHC has a sensor board that you connect the inputs to.

The ARC voltage is tapped directly off the torch leads inside the machine and connected to the sensor board.

On the cut 40, it used a 2 wire plug for the trigger which screwed into the front of the machine. I disconnected the torch plug and connected a plug from the new torch relay.

As for the ARC OK, the LCTHC uses a transformer on the input AC leads to the machine (one of the leads is wrapped around the transformer) and this senses the increase in current when the arc is on.

Sounds weird but it worked OK.

Your Simadre is a lot newer than the CUT40 so it may have places where you can connect these inputs to. I had no luck getting the info for the Cut40 from the vendor and just pieced it together by hit or miss (luckily there were no misses).

Willy

---

Willy: after years of selling the LCTHC and it's bigger brother the MP3000-DTHC we have seen most of our business move to the high speed DTHCIV and the Ethernet connected boxes.. We sold off the LCTHC designs and the MP3000 parallel port version to
CNCElectronics They also have some other THC models (upgrades to the old THC301D) .

We are evolving our products into LINUX and our CommandCNC ...Free and .no more Windows issues.!

TOMcaudle
Home

Tom:

You've certainly been at the forefront of developing affordable and reliable THC systems for us hackers. It's been a long time since I purchased one of your first LCTHCs and promptly blew it up trying to hook it up to the CUT40 cutter but the replacement is still running perfectly. We are running for several hours per day during the summer season and have hundreds of cut hours on the system. I can certainly vouch for it's reliability. We still cut mainly16 GA (with a little bit of 10 GA occasionally) so I seldom change the settings so "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Good luck with your new line of equipment.

Willy