Need advice/opinions on retrofitting controls DC spindle motor drive and servos
I have gotten the bug to start work on an old MicroStar N1 lathe.
It has an old Fanuc system 5 controls on it. (1979 vintage) The spindle motor is a 7.33 hp dc drive.
I haven't dug into the servos yet to see exactly what I've got, they are DC but that is all I am sure of.
Do you think I should try to get the existing spindle drive to run or replace it with something else? Do you have any ideas on what type of drive to use on it?
What would you use for the servo motors? They are big about 6" diameter 10-12" long. I would guess 3hp or more.
Any documents on this would be nice also, Ha Ha wishful thinking. I have scoured the web and find nothing. Even Fanuc System 5 information is scarce.
Arnie
Re: Need advice/opinions on retrofitting controls DC spindle motor drive and servos
Quote:
Originally Posted by
aminear
The spindle motor is a 7.33 hp dc drive.
Do you think I should try to get the existing spindle drive to run or replace it with something else? Do you have any ideas on what type of drive to use on it?
That's a huge servo motor. You might consider trying to get that going, replacing it will be expensive.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
aminear
What would you use for the servo motors? They are big about 6" diameter 10-12" long. I would guess 3hp or more.
These are also quite big. You might try dmm-tech.com (I have no affiliation). I had seen some reasonably priced chinese servo's that would be that big, but there's always the risk you get a dead-one in a box, however I think some stuff is getting better. Leadshine has steppers, if they sold servos you might consider them.
To get more information, there are guys out there that know the fanuc stuff pretty well. My understanding is the encoder feedback is the tricky part because in the later 80's they went from quadrature feedback to serial and possibly a proprietary serial protocol. It all depends on red cap or yellow cap, of which, I know nothing. I would look up the part numbers off your drive and motor (if you can) and post specific questions regarding them.
Good luck!
Re: Need advice/opinions on retrofitting controls DC spindle motor drive and servos
Quote:
Originally Posted by
MJ_cnc
That's a huge servo motor. You might consider trying to get that going, replacing it will be expensive.
These are also quite big. You might try dmm-tech.com (I have no affiliation). I had seen some reasonably priced chinese servo's that would be that big, but there's always the risk you get a dead-one in a box, however I think some stuff is getting better. Leadshine has steppers, if they sold servos you might consider them.
To get more information, there are guys out there that know the fanuc stuff pretty well. My understanding is the encoder feedback is the tricky part because in the later 80's they went from quadrature feedback to serial and possibly a proprietary serial protocol. It all depends on red cap or yellow cap, of which, I know nothing. I would look up the part numbers off your drive and motor (if you can) and post specific questions regarding them.
Good luck!
I recently thought about converting an older mazak i recently bought, but decided to give it a shot as it first. Anyway, when i was thinking about retrofitting my plan was also to use dmm-tech ac servos. Good prices, seemed like very good performance/reviews and best of all they have good tech support if you run into problems. Give them a call or email, they can specify servo size based on ballscrew specs and were very helpful to me. I will be using their ac servos on my next retrofit.
