[RomanLini]

Ouch! Sorry to hear about that!

I guess there'e no easy way out? Ahh well if you remake in aluminium it might be lighter/better? (Trying to sound positive!)

[Benonymous]

Thanks Roman. It helped me get over the horror just writing it down here and sharing it

I bounced back yesterday and bought some aluminium stock to re-do the horizontal beams. I got some 80 x 10mm flat bar and some 25 x 10mm flat bar and intend to make a "C" channel out of it by bolting the 25mm bar to the upper and lower edge of the 80mm bar. I will have to do the Y drive assembly over again so I got some 50 x 50 x 6 angle stock for that too.

Onward and upward! :wee:

[Benonymous]

I have made some progress on the new Y-axis beams. They are made out of one piece of 80x10mm bar and two pieces of 25x10mm bar. Each of the 25mm parts has 24 tapped holes and believe me, I'm not looking forward to tapping 96 holes!



Anyway, with the linear rails bolted on they should be plenty stiff and the weight saving is significant over what I had originally planned.

[bel630]

With no steel to play with, I've started on the electronics enclosure. The IP-6 box is yet another Stig scrounge

It's a tight fit but I will add some fans and a filtered air inlet to boost convection.




I'll need more ventilation than this !

hello Benonymous..

can u share with me how to setup this kit? can control with mach3?

[Benonymous]

Hi Bel630, I haven't actually set the electronics up yet but I'll outline my intended plan.

The servo drives are very agile when it comes to control options. For Mach 3 and the interface board that I have, the servo drives (three in this case) will be run in "step-direction" mode. The shaft encoders fitted to the servo motors will provide feedback to the servo drives only, not Mach 3. Basically, Mach 3 will tell the servo drive what direction and how many increments to turn the motor via the interface board which plugs into the printer port of the PC.

Now, for specific settings on the servo drives, the pn200 parameter needs to be set to pn200.0 to set the drive to "step-direction" mode and the pn000.1 parameter needs to be set to "1" to set the drive to "pulse train reference" mode. With both of these settings in place, Mach 3 will run the servo correctly via the interface board. If you have a manual, these parameters are explained. As for the spindle motor drive (on the far right) I haven't got that far yet. I need to get three phase run to my workshop to even make it go!

I hope this provides you with some of the information you need.

[Benonymous]

Hi All, I have some progress pictures to show off.

I have constructed the new Y axis beams and let me tell you, if I get out of this build without developing a fetish for tapping threads I'll be very lucky!

Each beam is held together with 96, 5mm countersunk cap screws. I t took many hours to get this done and I was actually on the home stretch when I broke the tap off in the last 25 x 10mm part. I was about four or five holes in when it let go and with such soft metal in the aluminum extrusion, getting the broken end out was impossible. So I had to make a new one!



I reconstructed the Y axis drive mountings after I mistakenly trimmed the previous set and they are in place also. This next pic is the gantry assembled
and I've turned the pic on it's side to get a better feel for the final assembled component. The Z axis isn't actually fastened together yet.



Finally, here's a closeup of the Z axis and spindle all balanced on top of eachother. After picking up the pieces of 6061 20mm plate I had cut for this assembly, I began to think I may have overspecified somewhat. But as you see it here it will probably be hogged out a bit to reduce the weight.



I have struck a deal with the Missus that I can use weeknights to forward the machine and work on the house/yard on the weekends. So far it's working well

[RomanLini]

It's looking really sturdy there!

...
I have struck a deal with the Missus that I can use weeknights to forward the machine and work on the house/yard on the weekends. So far it's working well

Hmm, you need to work so hard during the week (on the machine) that when weekend comes you are totally exhausted... So you can relax by the pool while the Missus brings you cold beers.

[Benonymous]

^^^ Too good to be true Roman

[Benonymous]

I bet you thought I'd given the build away and taken up quilting eh?

Nope!

The build has been progressing slowly between work/family/house commitments but progress it has.

A while back I made a commitment to myself to move it along every available day, even if that just meant drilling a few holes or whatever. I have really finished all the major structural components and recently took the plunge and bought a spray painting rig for the workshop. I began brush painting some parts but the results were pretty poor even using hammer-finish enamel. The spray rig has made it much easier and despite my noob status on the back of a spraygun, I got decent results.

With the parts painted I have begun the assembly and when you're just connecting things with bolts into pre-tapped holes, the whole thing goes together like a kit

This post would be useless without pics
....

This is the base, upside down. The linear rails are on and the X axis assembly is part way on.




These are the steel sections that bolt to the carriages and then the gantry bolts to the section. The Stig gave these a zizz on his home made surface grinder to square them up.



Here it is with the gantry beam on and the X screw in place. The karge block of steel on the bench will be the coupling between the double ball nut and the gantry.



I'm only getting a couple of hours a night on this so my dream of chips by the end of summer (it just ended) are gone. However. I believe the kit will come together fairly quickly and the next big hurdle will be the computer control and the drives.

[Benonymous]

Hi All.

Solid progress.



The frame came together very quickly as all the parts were painted, drilled and tapped. The holes even lined up!!!:wee:



The gantry feels very solidbut the legs do woobble around a bit with no diagonal support (will be added)



The legs bolt on with plates and lots of cap-screws.



I made some adjustable feet with 8mm bolts. They were dome heads that I machined conical.



Knowing that I'll be reluctant to go down to the shed and work during winter, I've relocated all the drive electronics and peripherals to a workbench in our spare room. I'll be able to steam ahead with this as it's all single phase. I'll set it up and test it here so that should boost things along.