Hello;
I have an older CNC lathe I am rebuilding with modern controls. It has a quadrature A, B, I channel encoder direct to spindle with 1024 pulse/rev encoding. I would like to use this for timing feedback to Mach in order to get good spindle definition feedback. I cannot find much info on how to do this, it seems most feedback for Mach is based on Index pulsing.
I was thinking if this could be done with some sort of configurable quadrature decoder which would take the 3 channel input and output a simple & usable pin signal to mach for timing at a selectable rate, if anyone had any suggestions for this type of decoder.
I realize I could use the I signal directly for index pulse, however I think it will be too short a pulse for Mach to use as it is and I would like to utilize the capability of the encoder I have if possible.
My system setup is Mach3, Ethernet smoothstepper, PMDX 126 breakout board, & Viper servo drives. Max speed of spindle is 2000 RPM.
Finally, is there a good way to interface this too Mach as well, I do have a spare input on the PMDX126, however I am tight on inputs. Not sure if I could do something with the 3rd interface point on the Smoothstepper?
Thank you.
Nick