Thread: Question About CNC And Software/Hardware

**tarasan** · 08-24-2006, 09:46 PM

I am very new to this so I apologize if I come off ignorant in this area, please bear with me. My company has a HL-90 Tracing System, that is part of a Koike Aronson IK 1200J Cantilever Coordinate Drive Optical Trace Cutting Machine. We want to get CNC set up as everything is manual right now. I've talked with the company and they said the following:

'After we can determine what we are working with we can give an estimate of what will be required to perform the operations you require. You will be looking in the neighborhood of about $16000.00 for the CNC, Interface, Encoders, Basic Software (included free), Isolation Modems, and cables. Plasma select, and any other options will be additional. I have included the software pricing and options list. We will include the basic software at no additional charge if the D11 (Picopath) control is purchased from Koike. This will save about $2900.00.'

My questions are:
1. Is that a fair or accurate price?
2. Is a specific companies hardware proprietary to their software and whatever else needs to be done?
3. Is this something our company could do ourselves and cut the price dramatically?

Any information would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

**NC Cams** · 08-25-2006, 04:02 AM

**tarasan** · 08-25-2006, 04:20 AM

Thanks, this is great information, I'll be visiting this site often.

**derekj308** · 08-26-2006, 12:26 AM

Hi tarasan
First get a number of quotes to determine if Koike are giving you a good deal. In the end the machine is just a skeleton to convert to CNC. You don't have to use Koike just because they made the machine. Since this is a company machine you need to do some cost justifications to work out what potential savings you can make by CNCing it vs. the steep learning curve to be able to DIY.

If your machine is like what I think it is (we had an optical tracing doo-dad on a flame cutter at a company I used to work for) all you need is to tender the manufacture of a control box that can be driven by Mach or some other PC based controller. Basically all you need to do is to spec the current motors and encoders (or buy new) so appropriate drives are selected. A clued up industrial sparky could build it for you and I wouldn't mind betting there would be a few guys in these forums who have built a control box for a plasma/flame cutter who would be willing to share their experiences with you and maybe even give you some specs on how they built theirs.

Cheers

Derek

**tarasan** · 08-29-2006, 02:23 AM

Hi derekj308,

Thanks for your reply. I don't mind doing the DIY but as you said the cost justification for my employers will be the big thing. In the end will I end up costing just as much if not more and screwing the whole thing up in time and wages as if I had a company do it.

The machine is exactly as you say so I'll try to see what I can do. Unfortunately my boss is wanting to do this at a slow time when he doesn't have a lot of money coming in so this maybe an after work project to try and help him.

On an unrelated note I'm curious if anyone has a preference of software and why. Currently I am trying 3, SolidWorks 2005, AutoCad 2007 and Autodesk Inventor 10.

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