Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Hi Karl,
Looks like you have the wiring on the ICM-1900 side correct. Confirm this by issuing a SHX command and see if the LED on the Crydom comes on. If the logic is inverted, then exchange the 7407 chip for a 7406 to invert the logic. Normally these chips are shipped with the the ICM-1900 so you should have some kicking around.
On the DYN4 side it's a little more complicated.
If you are using the internal 14V supply, you need to connect pin 4 to pin 17. Your connections to the Crydom are correct
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
WooHoo! Life in the new servos. Guess you cannot see motion but it is running in front of the computer in the pic.
Don't think I've mentioned DMM 1.8 KW servos and DYN4 amps were selected for all three axis. DMM | AC SERVO DRIVE | AC SERVO MOTOR | ROTARY ENCODER
Quite a bit of wiring was done in the bottom of the cabinet for the Galil 1900 connect module to the DMM servos.
Next, I'll test if Galil commands can at least move the motors. After this works, the servos can be mounted permanently.
The amp enable circuit is not working - not sure of the problem. Looks like I can proceed anyway as the amps can be set to always be enabled. Will have to get back to this in the future.
Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Nice work, would be interested to see your Servo tuning settings when your done!
Jeff
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
I haven't kept up this thread. Sorry, life gets in the way sometimes.
I had an ABSOLUTELY AWFUL time getting the servos installed and running correctly. Would have given up on the whole project without the assisstance of Jim Dawson. I will bet he is tired of my constant requests.
The issue was run aways. NOT good with big powerful servos. Had more than one problem so fixing one thing didn't help. I'd put it back then try the other, so that trial did not work either. Just for a quick summary:
All the DMM servos want to run what I call backward. When finished, every axis has either reversed encoder or reversed axis direction in the Galil software setup.
The used Galil ICM was defective on the axis I selected to try first. had to replace it. Shopping for parts on eBay does have its disadvantages.
I installed an update to the Galil card and could not get it to respond after the update, so i went to a very old card. Never did get this one to run. luckily, another one came up on eBay. ( I sent the first card to Jim and he could find nothing wrong - then it worked for me when returned) The machine is still running with card number three.
There is a parameter titled max speed. I had set this to a low value for testing. The title of this is extremely poor, it is actually the center of the voltage dead band for servo drift. A value of 65 is for 0 volts.
Biggest issue was with my misunderstanding of how Galil enable/disable should work. I thought is was a 5 volt output. it is acutally an open collector. Wasted a huge amount of time here. I promise to never make this particular mistake again. For DMM servos, connect the sevo enable input though a 2K resistor to the Galil enable output if using external 24 volt to power the servo's enable input. Then remove the RP1 resistor pack on the ICM. this results in backward function. So exchange the 7406 IC for a 7407.
With all this finally resolved, the servos were tuned first under DMM. then again with Galil WSDK.
All the limit switches and home swithes were connected and debugged. An input from the Estop was connected to the galil card. outputs to the spindle knee and coolant were connected and debugged.
Camsoft was kind enough to provide a basic .cbk for this machine. A couple days making minor program edits to this .cbk has the machine up and running WOOHOO!
The machine could certainly be run as is. A great many stop at this point and go to work. But that's not the final goal for this machine. When complete the control will be better than even the newest commercial controls. I can say that because it will work exactly as I want it to.
Screen shots of the DMM servo setups are attached, mostly as a personal backup.
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Spent the last several days mounting an encoder to the spindle. had to get real clever here. Only got about 1/4" of the top of the hollow spindle exposed and it can't get in the way of the tool changer. The pics show the parts and the final completed project.
A spindle encoder really increases capability. It allows the spindle to be treated as a galil axis to control the spindle VFD. S codes for programming spindle speed are now a piece of cake. Rigid tapping can now be done. if a 4rth axis is added, it can be slaved to the spindle to hob gears. By comparing analog command voltage (Galil TT) to spindle speed, it is possible to determine where the adjustable speed pulleys are set.
Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
I see I neglected to explain the concept here. The bushing at far right in the parts pic just slides inside the hollow spindle. I drilled tapped for two #6-32 screws on the end of the spindle. two of the four screws in the bushing fit here. The other two are tapped and function as jack screws for disassembly.
The red bottle in the pic is bearing retaining compound. the lower part of the bushing is coated with this and slid into the top of the spindle. two screws hold it in place. If it ever must be removed it will need to be heated to break the bond. I put a note to this effect on the tool changer. doubt I ever tear it down. The note is for some poor soul in the future.
The pulley in the pic fits on the top of this bushing. The two tapped holes also function to hold the pulley on. I did not use retaining compound here.
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
current work has been the machine operator panel. IMHO, the biggest difference between a profession quality and a hobby quality refit is a great control panel. A lot of thought went into this one to make it exactly as I want. I like to be able to run the machine from the control panel but not have it look like a 747 cockpit airplane control. Some things are better done on the PC keyboard and function hot keys.
This one needs fifty conductors for all the I/O, see the pic of the inside got pretty crowded in there. I also placed it high and ahead of the spindle to keep flying swarf away. It lined up so that I needed to extend the backgear lever. this made it easy to add an input for backgear with a limit switch, see pic.
Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Nice work, I like the panel.
Funny you mention tool length and the knee Z in your opening post.
Just today I was working on adding a knee encoder to my Acer knee mill with 2 axis Anilam.
The Quill has an encoder that reads out on the Z as a DRO, but I want to couple that with the knee so I can adjust for the length difference of the tools.
It’s currently not working exactly like I hoped , I need to make a call to the vendor next week.
I’m definitely following along!
Keith
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Five years ago, I modified the knee to do tool length offsets on my Excello.
here's the build thread
https://www.cnczone.com/forums/camso...74184-cnc.html
I will repeat this on the vectrax
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
ARGH - a step backward.
I lost the eight inputs on the second Galil ICM. Had two working, one was the estop input. Now all eight are dead. I double checked by booting up Galil WSDK. the first eight on 1900 ICM one are fine, second eight on 1900 ICM are all dead. FWIW, have +24 for signal, DC common connected to INCOM.
I double checked manual, see attached pic, they are all opto isolated so 24 volt should be no problem.
See anything wrong? What component is most likely zorched?
Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Walked away and took a summer vacation...
When I got back on this, swapping cables indicated card trouble. OH BOY, don't want to call a Galil card dead. So I took the time to install multiboot and a second operating system on another hard drive. put Galil WSDK on it. Now just hit <ESC> in early boot and select the other drive to get Galil WSDK. I should have taken the time to do this on day one.
IO shows up fine in Galil. Issue is software, if a Galil input number is not used in the .cbk the Camsoft control doesn't look for it. It is a touch flakey here, the inputs from the second 1900 icm fire inputio, inputs from the first do not. Anyway added a whole bunch of commands like:
IF #24=1 THEN MESSAGE 24 IS 1
to STARTUP.FIL for all 16 inputs and things are fine.
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Re: Vectrac CNC Knee mill refit from Fanuc 0M to Camsoft
Worked on the acceleration issue. Its not perfect, but perfect can be the enemy of good enough. I grow and market for a living and harvest starts next week, so I will leave this for now and finish up the machine and put it to work making parts.
Here's a pic of how she looks now. that's a 32" TV for monitor, got two keyboards. Can pull the wired one out for debug work and control programming. Most the time a wireless one sits on the rolling table with the other tucked out of the way.
Right now, I'm about 80% done with all the features on the operator panel.
The rotating switch in upper right on the panel is the BIG one. I call this the machine mode. It must be in RUN to run a CNC program. In the programming several things are set correctly for machine run. For the operator the CYCLE START pushbutton won't work unless in RUN mode. Also the MDI window won't open.
The next mode is JOG. This enables the pushbuttons in the panel center. The middle button is "fast". Hold this in while pushing any direction and the machine jogs rapid. release it and it jogs slow. Camsoft does have programming command for jogging but it had a slight hesitation between touching a button and moving. As I am an official ANAL ENGINEER, I wrote a low level program for the Gali card (attached). This one responds immediately.
The next five modes are the MPG or handwheel for each axis. Only the handwheel and the 1-10 switch work in this mode. 10 is for coarse handwheel => one click is 0.010" 1 is for fine handwheel, one click does 0.0005".
IMHO, the above features REALLY IMPROVE setting up a job.
The balance of the buttons on the control panel let the operator run the machine without using the mouse or keyboard. Its just nicer that way.
I'll just mention a bit about the computer screen. The large black area in the upper left is the viewport, Camsoft's BEST feature. Load a program and you can visually see the toolpaths. The viewport can be zoomed and viewed from any angle.
The dark blue area is the Gcode window, it displays gcodes while running. A HUGE feature of this area is the ability to send the operator any message of interest.
Notice the red button in the machine is a green button on the screenshot. This is just a display of whether the machine is ready to run or in Estop.
There are several lights that just tell limit switches, homed, etc. The grey boxes are user defined functions for the machine. For example, mouse click on the Preset X and a window pops up to enter the X value for the current part.
The bottom area is just a view of the desktop. I have shortcuts to all the configuration files. For example I just programmed an ESTOP enable this morning. I cut the wire to the Estop power and ran it through a spare relay. Then added a simple command (#152=0) in shutdown.fil and another (#152=1) in startup.fil. Now Estop drops if the control is exited and won't enable until the control is up and running.