Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
I'm retrofitting my Sabre 408 with the Masso G3 controller ($900 with accessories and shipping) and 12NM NEMA 34 closed loop steppers ($180 each x3), using the existing 74v power supply. To get NEMA 34's to work you'll need to machine new mount plates (x3) and figure out a way to attach the 11mm bore pulleys to the 15mm (or whatever you get) NEMA 34 shaft. I'm trying to find replacement pulleys (just starting that process, so nothing to report yet).
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Quote:
Originally Posted by
DistortedDesign
A friend is looking to change out an older Gerber Sabre 408 controller to something modern. The controller box is massive nearly 2' cubed. He wants to go to something that doesn't require their proprietary software to run. The software is $1000 to upgrade and isn't that good for the money. Trying to find something to change it out with. His 408 only has the large router on it so no speed control or anything. It has pretty big servos they are Parker RX320ER1000
(LINK) They are 54vdc 6.3A servos. This thing surprisingly is screw driven so it only has 1 x motor.
I wanted to make sure my thinking was correct and see if anyone has done anything like this.
I was looking at using Gecko G320X for drivers.
Not sure what is the best controller for Gecko's is? Smooth Stepper?
Not sure how big of a power supply is needed?
Any help would be great.
Stepper might be cheaper, but nowadays we usually use AC servo here.
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Does anyone have the lead screw pitch so I can calculate the steps per rev on my 408?
Need Help with old Controller Change
I’m doing the same was thinking of using the servos, and gecko 320x drivers to run it and maybe acorn controls. Has anyone finished there’s ans happy with whatever they used wether it was servo of steppers thanks
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Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
If you use steppers make sure to use closed-loop steppers with the feed rates of this machine. You would be better off swapping from the OEM motors as they are very expensive to replace like $2000.00 and if you combine that with the Gecko drives it's really not worth it.
My customer decided to waste their money and try and repair the broken Gerber system so I won't be doing their conversion. Here is the info I was given by another Gerber Sabre 408 owner.
Axis,Servo Encoder Counts/Revolution,Servo Teeth,Leadscrew Teeth,Leadscrew Pitch,Counts per mm
X 4000 28 70 20mm 500
Y 4000 28 70 20mm 500
Z 4000 50 40 10mm? 500
The Z axis may be off by a factor of 2 (the pitch may be 5mm or 20mm instead of 10mm, I can't remember).
This is what I was going to use for motors.
X/Y - https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/cl...nd-driver.html
Z - https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/cl...nd-driver.html
The NEMA 34 drives can take 80V DC which is higher than the 68V DC the control box transformer puts out.
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Quote:
Originally Posted by
kingofl337
If you use steppers make sure to use closed-loop steppers with the feed rates of this machine. You would be better off swapping from the OEM motors as they are very expensive to replace like $2000.00 and if you combine that with the Gecko drives it's really not worth it.
My customer decided to waste their money and try and repair the broken Gerber system so I won't be doing their conversion. Here is the info I was given by another Gerber Sabre 408 owner.
Axis,Servo Encoder Counts/Revolution,Servo Teeth,Leadscrew Teeth,Leadscrew Pitch,Counts per mm
X 4000 28 70 20mm 500
Y 4000 28 70 20mm 500
Z 4000 50 40 10mm? 500
The Z axis may be off by a factor of 2 (the pitch may be 5mm or 20mm instead of 10mm, I can't remember).
This is what I was going to use for motors.
X/Y -
https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/cl...nd-driver.html
Z -
https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/cl...nd-driver.html
The NEMA 34 drives can take 80V DC which is higher than the 68V DC the control box transformer puts out.
Yes I completely understand about the motors, when I bought the machine the guy was telling me the same to rebuild them cost 800 and 1800 to 2000 to replace. I’ve been researching and have tossed it bake and forth on using vs replacing. Still on the fence.
The guy that I bought it from, gave me all the paperwork and I was amazed at what they cost new. I’ve had dealing with gerber before and hate their preparatory hardware and software, they have their hands in your pockets for life.
Ive disassembled the machine now and cleaning all the parts, rails, bearing, new belts and roll replace all wiring cause it’s right at 20 yrs old. I’ve been impressed with the rigidity of the gantry and frame. Unlike the new machines out there it’s aluminum but extruded and solid. So I’m looking forward to getting it done.
I’ll look into the motors that you have mentioned and see what they are, I know there’s some post about replacing the factory servos with nema34.
Thank you for your help and information
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Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
If you CNC to retrofit uses step/dir signals to motor drives (step motor or brusless) take a look at:
https://rosettacnc.com/en/
I guess 4 axis board is enough (4 axis could be for A rotary axis or for gantry).
The control software is always free of cost and with very frequent updates to add new features.
Just to buy the board one time.
Here you can view Control Software, with virtual machine and work simulation, at work:
https://www.facebook.com/laboratorio...0187835105616/
The CNC Board is an industrial product running in an embeded real-time OS and run by self all motion algorithms, so PC running control software
is totally free to work with CAD/CAM, web surf or watch a video during CNC work.
Uses LAN interface so in same PC you can control more than one CNC at time.
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Hi.
I just picked up a Gerber 408. I saw the colossal controller box and only being familiar with small stepper machines and mach3; I am unsure on how to proceed. It did not come with the software. I contacted Gerber to see what I need to do to get the software, but no response thus far. I will try again.
Will converting the machine to steppers have any negative effect on accuracy/speed?
Why convert to stepper rather than a servo controller like G320X DC Servo Motor Controller?
Since I have always looked at the more budget attainable machines with steppers and mach3, I am just at a loss as to what would be the wise direction to go.
Thank you for your advice.
-Mike
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Quote:
Originally Posted by
mikeysp
Hi.
I just picked up a Gerber 408. I saw the colossal controller box and only being familiar with small stepper machines and mach3; I am unsure on how to proceed. It did not come with the software. I contacted Gerber to see what I need to do to get the software, but no response thus far. I will try again.
Will converting the machine to steppers have any negative effect on accuracy/speed?
Why convert to stepper rather than a servo controller like G320X DC Servo Motor Controller?
Since I have always looked at the more budget attainable machines with steppers and mach3, I am just at a loss as to what would be the wise direction to go.
Thank you for your advice.
-Mike
Personally I am not a fan of Mach3. If I were to retrofit one of our Gerber Sabres I'd use Linuxcnc and keep the old servos and drives. We just updated to the latest Gerber software, and it seems to be significantly better than the ancient Windows 95 era version we had been using. But it is still way too expensive for it's capability. We only went through with the upgrade because, it was next to impossible to get our old software to run on a new pc, and we have a huge library of old machine files we did not want to loose. That said these routers are treated like an unloved stepchild by Gerber and their support is abysmal, and almost non existent. I have already converted one of our old Greber routers to Linuxcnc (A Dimension-200) I have that one set up so I can run it with both Linuxcnc and the old Gerber software. That would not be possible with the Sabers though. Those would have to be a one way conversion, because too much would have to be changed.
I think there are a few other router software solutions that can run these Gerber routers. One that I know works is Enroute, by SAI (I use it too). But it is almost as expensive as Gerbers Omega software. But Enroute is much more capable for running CNC routers. ArtCAM might be another option. It can also be possible to send generic G-code to the Sabres, but it this feature is purposely crippled by Gerber and doesn't work as well as it could/should.
The biggest barrier to converting one of the Sabres to Mach3 would be the analog servo amps. (Linuxcnc can use/run these though.) You would need to at least replace these with digital servo drives that can accept step/dir signals. That or replace all of the servos with step motors and stepper drives. A third retro fit option would be WinCNC (that would cost you about $5000.)
Another Achilles heal for the Sabres is their lead screw drive system on the axis. The nuts wear out surprisingly fast (especially the Y-axis on 408s.) And when they start to go bad they will start to bind up and cause the control to set servo alarms. I bet 75% of Sabres that get converted because of servo alarms simply needed the lead screws replaced. We used to have to change the Y screw on our 408 about every 2 years. Then I converted it to a Hiwin ball screw about 7 years ago. That screw cost about half as much as the lead screws from Gerber, and the Y-axis has been trouble free since.
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Todd Zuercher
Another Achilles heal for the Sabres is their lead screw drive system on the axis. The nuts wear out surprisingly fast (especially the Y-axis on 408s.) And when they start to go bad they will start to bind up and cause the control to set servo alarms. I bet 75% of Sabres that get converted because of servo alarms simply needed the lead screws replaced. We used to have to change the Y screw on our 408 about every 2 years. Then I converted it to a Hiwin ball screw about 7 years ago. That screw cost about half as much as the lead screws from Gerber, and the Y-axis has been trouble free since.
I agree that the main problem with these machines are the leadscrews, and secondly the reliability of the home/limit switches. I am interested in learning more about this Hiwin ballscrew upgrade... Do you have any details on the part numbers, and any machining you needed to have them do?
I have retrofit two Gerber Sabre 408's with LinuxCNC, and I used the original servos/drives. With one machine we kept the same Yaskawa VFD / "high frequency" spindle, and with another we didn't have a spindle so we put a CNC Depot S30C spindle with Hitachi VFD. In both cases, we used Modbus (either over RS-232 or RS-485) via a USB-to-serial adapter to control the VFD. I wrote a custom "user space" component for LinuxCNC to speak RS-485 to the spindle and manage state. If anyone is interested in learning more about this, feel free to message me (or this thread).
2 Attachment(s)
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Hiwin did all of the machining for us. I cut the mounting flange off of one of the old plastic leadscrew nuts and used that to make a mounting adapter plate for the nut on the ball screw. The only other modification I had to make was to cut a slot in the crossbeam of the gantry under the table for clearance to the grease zerk on the ballnut, so that it could spin without hitting it. I'll try to attach the PDF drawings from the ball screw quote.
Attachment 479948
Attachment 479952
Re: Need Help with old Controller Change
Has anybody successfully successfully converted the Gerber 408 to linuxcnc using the original Servo motors and encoders?
My PC running the gerber software died so I decided it was time to upgrade. With the mesa card shortage, I was able to get a 7i96s and gecko 320x servo drives.
I got the spindle working but am having a heck of a time with the servos. Not sure of the dip switch settings on the drives or any of the info in linuxcnc. I have tried many different settings have had success getting the motors to move but I know the settings weren’t right.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
-Mike