[SSMrob]

Ok, well, upon much research, I bought a used plasmacam dhc-1 that was just sitting around in a friends shop. I NEED THE DHC2 UPGRADE, because the

And, honestly, its made a few parts, I learned the software in about 2 mins, and was up and cutting.. But, I seem to have only two choices right now, and both suck pretty badly:

1) Set the torch to manual on the sheet metal and get some cuts that are not so good and consumables go quick and tram and shim the sheet metal every time to ensure that its perfectly flat in relationship to the table during the cut OR

2) Mess around for 30mins trying to set the DHC parameters, get them working ok, and the thing STILL crashes the material at some point OR it sits too high, or it just freaks out and does whatever the hell, I reset it and use the same parameters, and then its happy?!?

My question is, can I use a proper ohmic height control module and just hook it to the current DHC motor? Or is there another trick possibly to retrofit to some DHC that is more reliable?

Anyone use a standalone THC controller/servo setup and retrofit it onto a plasmacam? This is the route that currently seems the most reliable.. Like this: http://www.ebay.com/itm/CNC-Plasma-T...item417525fa36

Or THIS:http://www.cnc4pc.com/Store/osc/prod...008362ce2eebda

$800 for rock solid torch height control? May need to get this... Its would probably cost me 1k or more to upgrade to DHC2 anyway, and then I have to send parts back?! Pfft..

[AmesMFG]

This height control is pretty easy to set. The tech folks at plasma cam have a really nice cheat sheet that they can give you, if you need it. Just give George a call in tech and he can email it over to you. You might want to check the version of your software too with them too. They can send you the latest version of the older software, if it didn't come with the Designegde already installed.

The DHC model I played with prior to getting a dhc2, was pretty straight forward. I actually liked this arc voltage height control better than the ones on other machines. Just make sure that settings are calibrated to the particular consumable or cutter that you have on it. The main thing that will either adjust up or down is going to be the arc voltage shift. After you get the hang of it you will realize how phenomenally simple setting it is after that.

It is true that the new DHC2 model is completely hands off (all you have to do is check a box or two and it will automatically do all of this stuff for you..it is really sweet!).

Richard

[SSMrob]

Ames, I think I figured this out pretty well after trial and error and some voltage testing with it for a while.. May also put a filter on the voltage output from the Hypertherm to smooth it out a bit...

The main issues that will make this work if I can solve them is:

1) Can you set a minimum height so if, for some reason, the voltage changes, it won't allow the DHC to go below a certain value? This would solve the tip crash problem in some instances, like when it tries to cut across a gap and starts to dive.

2) In curves, the torch starts to dive.. Any way to solve that other than setting a minimum height?

Overall though, so far so good! Made a water table for it, etc.. Sure did speed up some of my projects!!

[AmesMFG]

I have a DHC2 plasmacam, so my process is much more automated. It has been a while since I got to run the DHC. But, do yourself a favor and pick up the phone and call tech to get some help. A lot of these things your are mentioning are entirely your arc voltage shift not matching your preset cut height (ie if your cut height is set to .1" above your material then your arc voltage shift will need to be adjusted, up or down, until your test cuts reach .1 above the material) It sounds like you very possibly are working with a really stone-age version of the software. The tech guys can even send you the latest version latest version of the previous software platform (which is still supported) and video manual that shows you how to do all of this.

They can even send you the ready to go cut file for the water table totally for free.

[kick-n-safari]

be cautious of dealing with plasmacam. I bought a brand new 4x4 table with DTHC 2 couple years ago (my first mistake) with a powermax 65 and got ripped off big time. not only does my home built table cut better. they charged me almost 3500.00 for the pm65 and it has nothing to do with cpc port or voltage divider board inside. (the lowest version hypertherm makes) I recently am putting my plazcam in the closet and going with my home built unit. I don't even use the plazcam for production and already the bearings are wearing out.and metal frame work is week. anyhow, your best bet is to go with candcnc. they are awesome.