[Cocotmm]

Hello all, new here and the proud new owner of some benchtop CNC machines. The one I have a question about is a D&M 5 lathe. It seems to be a fairly nice little machine, ballscrews, variable speed control and RPM pickup, came with a QC tool post, live center, and one indexable tool holder. Seems fairly well built for a ~200 lb machine. I picked up a controller card off of eBay which hopefully will arrive soon, and LabVolt (company who purchased D&M) sent me the old DOS software that runs it.

I was wondering if anyone knew what type of lathe the unit was built around, or did D&M build their own? Also, has anyone done a conversion to use Mach2/3 on one of these machines? I would ideally like to get it running with the old software, and then think about upgrading in the future. Forgive my ignorance here, but would I be able to use the steppers and drivers that are already in the machine if I were to use Mach2/3? I'm thinking I would just have to wire the step and direction inputs into the parallel port, along with the limit switches and the speed pickup. Eventually, I plan on using this machine to help support my habit of rescuing old 2-stroke street bikes from the scrapyards.

Have a good one.
Adam

[Ron Kline]

So did you get your D&M running ??
Ron K

[Cocotmm]

It is up and running, I got a stock control card off eBay and the original software from LabVolt is working. I've turned a few straight parts by manually coding, and the test part that came with the software. The biggest headache is that the some of the pushbuttons don't seem to be de-bounced, so selecting certain options is a pain in the behind.

Motorcycling season is upon me, so I haven't spent much time with the machines in the past few months. I still plan on trying to get it to run with Mach3 when I get a computer that will run it. Seems like a pretty good machine, and adding shims to the gib instead of trying to adjust the 3 set screws on the cross slide seems to have fixed the problems I was having with the slide hanging up.

Anyone have any recommendations on some cheap/free CAM software? I know I should bite the bullet and just learn to code by hand, but I'll admit that I am lazy.

Adam

[cecil1212]

I know this is an old thread but I just started to work with a D&M 5, The interface card coming out of the back of my computer has 2 com ports but I only have one cable going to the lathe. Am I missing something, if not how is it configured?
thanks cecil

[aminear]

Can't help you with that, but I did convert one to run from Mach3. It is just a matter of rewiring the inputs to the stepper driver boards straight to the parallel port.

[cecil1212]

Thanks for the replay, I have already ordered a breakout board because I figured this is my only option, my 0 to 10volt spindle control board works. My guess is that D&M sends a 5volt pulse to the control board (mother) and that converts it to the 0 to 10v going to the spindle control board. Do you know if this is accurate and where I would land the 5volt pulse?
Thanks Cecil

[aminear]

Cecil,

I wasn't able to determine that on the D&M machine. The original dc motor drive board was bad so I put a replacment one in for it. I used the same manual speed control pot on it, but didn't control speed with Mach, only read speed into Mach3.
You could buy a inexpensive pwm to voltage converter like the one Arturo sells on
cnc4pc. I was able to find the controller schematic on the existing dc motor drive.

Arnie

[cecil1212]

Thanks Arnie, I looked on cnc4pc site. It appears to be the headache free option. I have a little bit of experience with mach3 so I’m sure it would be easier to figure out than that DOS stuff. Thanks for your time.

Cecil

[aminear]

glad to be of help. When you go to wire to the stepper drive boards the orange and brown wire are the step and direction inputs.

Arnie

[dougputt]

old post I know but did you ever come across any wiring diagrams for the lathe? I have mach 3 running steppers no problem but trying to get CNC4PC C11G board to work on spindle speed

Doug

[MariaPinto]

Nice thread. I too got my doubt solved here. Have a nice day ahead.

[for7hyp3]

what controller card are you using?

[aminear]

Are you asking about the controller for the spindle motor or controller for the lathe axis?

[for7hyp3]

It is up and running, I got a stock control card off eBay and the original software from LabVolt is working. I've turned a few straight parts by manually coding, and the test part that came with the software. The biggest headache is that the some of the pushbuttons don't seem to be de-bounced, so selecting certain options is a pain in the behind.

Motorcycling season is upon me, so I haven't spent much time with the machines in the past few months. I still plan on trying to get it to run with Mach3 when I get a computer that will run it. Seems like a pretty good machine, and adding shims to the gib instead of trying to adjust the 3 set screws on the cross slide seems to have fixed the problems I was having with the slide hanging up.

Anyone have any recommendations on some cheap/free CAM software? I know I should bite the bullet and just learn to code by hand, but I'll admit that I am lazy.

Adam

what OS did you use? DOS? what version? I came into possession of a D&M 5 lathe and mill and i'm trying to get it working, i have the hardware to run the old software, i'm just not sure what i need software wise, and how to get it running and communicating between the computer and the machine.

[DSpeck]

D&M got taken over by Lab-Volt, who then got taken over by Festo Didactic years ago. Use Festo's contact page to ask for the correct version of software for your machine. Lab-Volt/Festo still makes this size and style of lathe, but it has much more modern controls on it. Model 5500 - see it here: https://www.labvolt.com/solutions/1_...ems_heavy_duty

I went this route with my own D&M 5, when I accidentally toasted the computer running the original software. I bought a fully functional working machine w/original computer, but the hard drive holding the only copy of the software I had, died. I got ahold of Festo, and they sent me the software (level 3 lathe, IIRC), but in the meantime, I had decided I wanted the machine going, so I'd removed the original interface board, and replaced it with a C10 board. This worked fine, and I got the machine running on Mach3, for plain turning. I haven't gotten the spindle index pulse hooked up yet, so no threading on it so far.

The original spindle driver board was a bit hard to find info on, and I've since replaced it with a KBMG-212D from KB Electronics - very pleased with its performance. It will go from full speed (around 3000 rpm) to stop in about 1 second. Braking is regenerative, so no big braking resistor.

I am attaching the software I received from Festo, so hopefully it will help someone else trying to get their lathe going with the original hardware. It runs under Win98, or earlier, I think. From the few minutes I got to play around with it, it's pretty limited in terms of usability, but interesting from an historical perspective, maybe? I will eventually be going with LinuxCNC, which is supposed to be very good for lathe use, especially with threading.

I still have the original boards, including the card for the computer, if anyone is interested...