[engnerdan]

This build thread/log will show my process of designing and building a custom operator interface panel for my DIY/Home Hobby CNC mill. My desired outcome is to have a dedicated machine mounted control panel to combine the computer, monitor, and hard wired operation switches into a clean and aesthetically pleasing design.

I have seen a couple others make some nice operator control panels and many people seem to like them, but they already seem to get lost in with a long build thread. So this is a dedicated build thread to just the operator control panel.

Some background to start with.
I have a customized Novakon Torus Pro (build thread here http://www.cnczone.com/forums/novako...-software.html), I bought this machine from Novakon as a bare bones machine stripped off all the controls. The only parts left with wires were the limit switches, the spindle motor and the work light. So I started with the equivalent of something like a RF45 with ball screws already mounted. I did this because of time, at the time of purchase I just didn't have the free time to go through with all the mechanical modifications needed to fit all the ball screws.

The current configuration is
-TECO AC Servos from Mach Motion - (these things are great, very simple to use and setup)
-Fanuc 8000 RPM spindle motor - 3HP continuous 5HP overload for 15 minutes
-Hitachi WJ-200-0055LF VFD for the spindle drive
-KFLOP motion controller with KANALOG card allowing for analog control of the drives and closed loop operation
-Automation Direct D0-More PLC for added IO and easier programming of auxiliary functions.
-Jetway Intel Celeron N2930 Quad Core Dual Intel LAN Fanless - HBJC311U93W-2930-B - For the mill computer

Desired features of the operator control panel
-Contain the computer monitor
-Contain the computer case
-Contain switches for the most common used functions; Cycle start, Feed Hold, Stop/Halt, Restart, E-Stop, Main Power Switch, Computer power switch
-Have room for adding more switches or features in the future for example switches for zeroing axes or override switches for coolant and feed rate override control.
-Contain a lower cost HMI (Human Machine Interface) from Automation Direct or Maple Systems.
-Minimize the cabling between the control panel and the main electrical enclosure

I have already got a start on this so I will have a little catch up to do in terms of posts.

-Dan

[engnerdan]

One of the first steps for me was to get an idea of what others had done and figure out what I liked and didn't like about each. A google search and search here on CNC zone gave me these designs that I saved off copies to reference back to.

Attachment 311632 Attachment 311634 Attachment 311636 Attachment 311638 Attachment 311640 Attachment 311642

Mazak Nexus mill control panel
Attachment 311644

Haas Control Panel and a close up of the keyboard
Attachment 311646Attachment 311648

With those as benchmarks I started kicking around several ideas. One of my biggest limiting factors was that I didn't want to do an entire sheet metal fabrication from scratch if possible. The main reason being I don't have access to sheet metal tools and I don't have a ton of time to spend tinkering with getting fits and finishes just right. I looked at industrial electrical enclosures but they all seem to start at 6" deep or deeper in the sizes that looked promising and 6-10" was just too thick. I looked at used enclosures that I would not mind cutting up and hacking together. I struck out there too.

The next idea was to build a mini panel and leave the computer monitor out of it. I scored a very nice medical device rolling cart that would allow me to mount the monitor (computer) , mini panel and keyboard on it.

Attachment 311650

So this was my first direction, and where I am still currently operating. Right above the computer monitor you can just barely make out what looks like a small computer screen. This is a 6" HMI from Automation direct. I had this left over from some design work I did in the past. It is currently setup to display some basic info like the states of inputs and outputs on my PLC and it displays the analog load outputs from my servos and spindle drive in the from of bar graphs.

So the next step was to design up the "mini panel".

-Dan

[zach540]

Following this! Might try finding individuals who do sheet metal work for a living, exhaust hoods, HVAC, etc, I've found some of their prices to be quite reasonable in the past.

[RustedOut]

Hi Dan,

That's an ambitious project. Took that very thing on myself. My console is over half done and has been functioning for about a year or more. And I absolutely love it. I hated all the mouse clicking while running Mach. I have 4 cables between my all in one and the mills control cabinet, there's the power coming into the all in one, then ethernet out to the control. And two cat5 cables for interfacing from the console directly to the relays in the control cabinet and feed back from the vfd for a load meter. I went with a Cubloc modbus board from Comfile for interfacing to the various switches. Then made Mach brains to carry the signals into Mach. I still got to get the pc mounted into the box, but I decided to upgrade my control electronics first. I had to cut some holes in the cabinet for the additional cable connectors, so what better time to strip it down and rebuild it. That's been going on for the past month and is about done. Then it's back to nesting the pc into the back of the all in one. Here's some pics of it. The back was during the wiring process. That's all wrapped up now.

The sheet metal isn't that big a deal and like Zach mentioned, HVAC shops do this stuff for little money. I happened to have the equipment to do my own. I'd guess finishing mine completely is still a couple months of work out. At this point, I can certainly see why this stuff cost so much to buy it finished. I had the graphics printed on vinyl, but I should have waited as my Mach brains didn't come out matching what I envisioned things would be. So I'll be making some new small overlays to correct the numbers in a couple places.

I might point out, the keypad on mine isn't working at this point and I absolutely hate it. The buttons are so small. I'd like to replace it and am considering making my own. But that's another something I've never done before. I found some larger button keypads, but found it too difficult to deal with the company that made them. That's the way things go when a guy only wants one or two parts. 3/4" buttons would be way better.

Good luck on the build
Bob

Attachment 311768Attachment 311770

[engnerdan]

Following this! Might try finding individuals who do sheet metal work for a living, exhaust hoods, HVAC, etc, I've found some of their prices to be quite reasonable in the past.

You are right and I could have gone that route and maybe should have. I have actually already acquired my sheet metal enclosure, but have not got to posting about that yet. I have actually acquired a 24" manual brake press too since starting this. So bending the sheet metal would not be an issue now.

Hi Dan,

That's an ambitious project. Took that very thing on myself. My console is over half done and has been functioning for about a year or more. And I absolutely love it. I hated all the mouse clicking while running Mach. I have 4 cables between my all in one and the mills control cabinet, there's the power coming into the all in one, then ethernet out to the control. And two cat5 cables for interfacing from the console directly to the relays in the control cabinet and feed back from the vfd for a load meter. I went with a Cubloc modbus board from Comfile for interfacing to the various switches. Then made Mach brains to carry the signals into Mach. I still got to get the pc mounted into the box, but I decided to upgrade my control electronics first. I had to cut some holes in the cabinet for the additional cable connectors, so what better time to strip it down and rebuild it. That's been going on for the past month and is about done. Then it's back to nesting the pc into the back of the all in one. Here's some pics of it. The back was during the wiring process. That's all wrapped up now.

The sheet metal isn't that big a deal and like Zach mentioned, HVAC shops do this stuff for little money. I happened to have the equipment to do my own. I'd guess finishing mine completely is still a couple months of work out. At this point, I can certainly see why this stuff cost so much to buy it finished. I had the graphics printed on vinyl, but I should have waited as my Mach brains didn't come out matching what I envisioned things would be. So I'll be making some new small overlays to correct the numbers in a couple places.

I might point out, the keypad on mine isn't working at this point and I absolutely hate it. The buttons are so small. I'd like to replace it and am considering making my own. But that's another something I've never done before. I found some larger button keypads, but found it too difficult to deal with the company that made them. That's the way things go when a guy only wants one or two parts. 3/4" buttons would be way better.

Good luck on the build
Bob

Attachment 311768Attachment 311770

Bob,
I think you may have just solved a big hangup for me so far. I have been in a desperate search for a high input count MODBUS RTU or MODBUS TCP/IP module for a realistic price point. Can you tell me what parts you bought from Cubloc? I have been looking at Advantech Adam modules, Phoenix Contact Modbus terminal blocks, and making my own Arduino based IO solution. It looks like the Cubloc board might be just what I need, just would be nice if they offered MODBUS TCP/IP. Have you looked at the offerings from CNC4PC.com for keypads? MPGs & CNC Panels - Motion Control

Thanks for sharing.

-Dan

[RustedOut]

Hi Dan,

I bought the Cubase 64M, the cabling pack and the CB290. Think I may have bought a serial cable from them too for programming the chip. Then the keypad later and an interface board. They have relay boards as well, but my up front planning on the whole project had me thinking otherwise on the relays. I planned on putting the relays in the control cabinet and that's where they are today. They run 110v ac accessories like the lights, air and coolant, and I didn't want to be sending ac currents from one box to the other if it wasn't absolutely necessary.

Yep, I looked at them, but they just didn't fit my needs. I tried hard to make the case for some of them, but in the end I couldn't. I'm a stick to my guns sort of guy and once my mind is made up, I'll try real hard to pull things off. I wanted the multi position switches of feed, spindle control and rapid feed rate control. And toggle switches for some functions. The toggle switches didn't turn out as I had envisioned them working though the modbus. They send the signal, then that's done with. So if the switch is left in the on state, turning them off does nothing. They have to be triggered again to cancel the function. But most of the switches in that case are momentary and have an led to show the status of the function.

The programming of the modbus at first seems daunting. I'm a retired cam guy and cnc programmer with many years experience. But not a ladder logic or basic programmer. So I wasn't real sure of things. But what I was thinking that with Mach brains, all I needed was to have the various brains sit there waiting for a pin on the modbus to go high or go low and respond in kind. And that's exactly how it worked out. A switch drives the state of a pin, Mach brains respond and maybe lights an led back through the modbus along with starting some action in Mach. The E-Stop, light switch and coolant switches all go direct to the control cabinet, not through the modbus.

I'm not sure I know what the difference is between TCP and Serial modbus. I set my connection up as Serial as shown in the Cubloc and Mach manuals. The biggest problem I had was with an undocumented require dstatement in the Cubloc file for that particular base and chip combo. And it seemed at the time I was the only guy trying to use the combo with Mach. So the comments by the guys I was asking was basically "what's your problem?" Went round and round with Comfile trying to get the board to talk to Mach. Then I found a statement by a prior employee of Comfile to an end user in their defunct forum. Added that in and it was talking to Mach. Then off to finish the Mach brains.

I'm happy with the whole setup and love the hard switches to control Mach. I wished I had done it long before I finally got around to doing it.

Bob

[RustedOut]

One thing I might add is I did consider an Arduino for this and they have some with as many in and outs as the Cubase 64M. But then that got into programming the Arduino. Decided that much interface through the Arduino was not a good first time project. I'm not an electronics guy, just a hack fabricator that wanted something he didn't have.

Bob

[Al_The_Man]

One XLO mill I retro-fitted a while back, with a console/kiosk type PC behind the touch screen .

[engnerdan]

My next step was to design up a "mini panel" something in a smaller enclosure, which ideally would be purchased off the shelf. While I have spent way too much cash on building my mill I have been trying to keep the operator interface economically priced.

My first approaches were focused around just a panel of switches to do many functions. I already have five 22mm push button switches, purchased from Automation Direct, for use for the 5 most common buttons (E-Stop, Cycle Start, Feed Hold, Stop, Restart). I quickly realized even the economically priced plastic bodied switches from Automation direct would be way too expensive and large to fit 15-30 of them into a panel. So I went on the hunt for economically priced push button switches. What I came up with were some switches form ebay seller "22newcentury". I found I could get the switches for about $2 each, so I bought several different colors and a couple different styles to play around with.

Attachment 311780

At this point I had decided I was going to go with many switches and now I needed to figure out how to get a massive number of digital I/O points cheaply in a form that can work with my PLC (MODBUS RTU over RS232 or RS485, or MODBUS TCP/IP). The cheapest solution I could come up with would be to use an Arduino MEGA with its 50+ digital I/O points along with a RS485 TTL converter board and the MODBUS code I found online. The easiest solution I found was to add a second Automation Direct PLC inside the mini control panel and then use MODBUS RTU between it and the PLC in my main electrical cabinet. But this second option was not cheap and it was rather large and cumbersome. But it was the path I intended to go with as I happened to have a few spare PLC's laying around.

I then started on working up 3D models of panel layouts.

Concept 1 - Fabricated housing with a simple minimalist panel
Attachment 311784

Concept 2 - I expanded on the size and number of buttons
Attachment 311786

Concept 3 - I was thinking about fabricating an entire once piece enclosure to include the computer monitor
Attachment 311788

Concept 4 - I incorporated the small 6" HMI I had and all the switch functions I could thing I needed and got it to fit on the face of a cheap Bud Industries plastic enclosure (less than $40 on amazon). Plus I could fit a PLC inside for the digital I/O
Attachment 311790
Attachment 311792

Concept 5 - I went back to day dreaming about encasing everything into one case, but I was not able to find an off the shelf enclosure that was the size I wanted. So I looked at fabricating it out of some steel or aluminum channel. But this was not going to be cheap.
Attachment 311794


So after the weeks or months of noodling over all of this I settled on the compact "Concept 4" and planned on moving ahead with it. But being I was 200% busy with a semi-impulsive kitchen remodel started the summer of 2015 and I was going to school between part time and full time (started in 2013 and finished fall 2015) all I could do is think about these ideas, spend money on parts and then change my mind. I never had the time to actually build any of them.

-Dan

[engnerdan]

One XLO mill I retro-fitted a while back, with a console/kiosk type PC behind the touch screen .

That's a nice simple design. The console/kiosk monitors/ PC's are crazy expensive unless you stumble upon a deal. It amazes me how much they get for them when they are so simple.

-Dan

[zamazz]

I need to get around to finishing mine (the blue one in the original post).

For mine I'm using an Arduino mega sending simple serial commands corresponding to button presses. I'm using Linux CNC, where I'll write a user space component to make HAL pins corresponding to each button and potentiometer. This will allow all buttons to be on one usb cable.

I'm not very versed in mach 3 or kflop, but you could do a keyboard emulator with an Arduino. Then map the keys to whatever you need. Minimal programming required, minimal cost.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

[Al_The_Man]

I have also constructed my own Kiosk PC from Advantech products, computer on a board that fits into a back plane with PCI slots etc. for compactness
I get a local engraving house to do the panel in reverse-engraved lamacoid, this provides a smooth front surface without grooves as the colours are added on the reverse.
They accept a CAD drawing for them.
Al.

[engnerdan]

Hi Dan,

I bought the Cubase 64M, the cabling pack and the CB290. Think I may have bought a serial cable from them too for programming the chip. Then the keypad later and an interface board. They have relay boards as well, but my up front planning on the whole project had me thinking otherwise on the relays. I planned on putting the relays in the control cabinet and that's where they are today. They run 110v ac accessories like the lights, air and coolant, and I didn't want to be sending ac currents from one box to the other if it wasn't absolutely necessary.

Yep, I looked at them, but they just didn't fit my needs. I tried hard to make the case for some of them, but in the end I couldn't. I'm a stick to my guns sort of guy and once my mind is made up, I'll try real hard to pull things off. I wanted the multi position switches of feed, spindle control and rapid feed rate control. And toggle switches for some functions. The toggle switches didn't turn out as I had envisioned them working though the modbus. They send the signal, then that's done with. So if the switch is left in the on state, turning them off does nothing. They have to be triggered again to cancel the function. But most of the switches in that case are momentary and have an led to show the status of the function.

The programming of the modbus at first seems daunting. I'm a retired cam guy and cnc programmer with many years experience. But not a ladder logic or basic programmer. So I wasn't real sure of things. But what I was thinking that with Mach brains, all I needed was to have the various brains sit there waiting for a pin on the modbus to go high or go low and respond in kind. And that's exactly how it worked out. A switch drives the state of a pin, Mach brains respond and maybe lights an led back through the modbus along with starting some action in Mach. The E-Stop, light switch and coolant switches all go direct to the control cabinet, not through the modbus.

I'm not sure I know what the difference is between TCP and Serial modbus. I set my connection up as Serial as shown in the Cubloc and Mach manuals. The biggest problem I had was with an undocumented require dstatement in the Cubloc file for that particular base and chip combo. And it seemed at the time I was the only guy trying to use the combo with Mach. So the comments by the guys I was asking was basically "what's your problem?" Went round and round with Comfile trying to get the board to talk to Mach. Then I found a statement by a prior employee of Comfile to an end user in their defunct forum. Added that in and it was talking to Mach. Then off to finish the Mach brains.

I'm happy with the whole setup and love the hard switches to control Mach. I wished I had done it long before I finally got around to doing it.

Bob

Thanks for the info. The issue you have with your toggle switches I am guessing must be a mach issue or a Cubloc issue. The MODBUS should just be transmitting the state of the register values (switches) continuously (well every time they are read). So whenever the state changes it should transmit that. I am not using Mach so I have no experience with the "Mach Brains", which I feel thankful for because of all the problems I have heard about with Mach. So the MODBUS TCP/IP Vs MODBUS serial is just the medium the data is transferred over. MODBUS TCP/IP uses ethernet (computer networking) to carry its data. MODBUS RTU uses serial communication to transfer its data, which can be transmitted over several different hardware/electrical configurations. RS485 typically is a 2 wire daisy chained system but can have 4 wires, very popular in industrial settings and very easy to use. RS232 is the serial port most people are familiar with, it is your standard 9 pin connector on an old PC, there are typically 3 to 5 wires in this system.

One thing I might add is I did consider an Arduino for this and they have some with as many in and outs as the Cubase 64M. But then that got into programming the Arduino. Decided that much interface through the Arduino was not a good first time project. I'm not an electronics guy, just a hack fabricator that wanted something he didn't have.

Bob

I may still go the route of using an Arduino, it depends on the free time I have and the patience I have at the time. I am not heavy into electronics, while I understand them and can use them I have very little interest in designing my own PCB boards and designing my own logic circuits. But when it comes to industrial automation electrical work I am at home there, deigning and wiring controls. Which is why I built all the controls for my mill.

I need to get around to finishing mine (the blue one in the original post).

For mine I'm using an Arduino mega sending simple serial commands corresponding to button presses. I'm using Linux CNC, where I'll write a user space component to make HAL pins corresponding to each button and potentiometer. This will allow all buttons to be on one usb cable.

I'm not very versed in mach 3 or kflop, but you could do a keyboard emulator with an Arduino. Then map the keys to whatever you need. Minimal programming required, minimal cost.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

I think I looked at the keyboard emulator as one option. I have now squired a bunch of Arduino hardware from a couple perspective projects in the past. For this I did pick up an Ethernet shield and some prototyping shields. I have the example programs from the internet for things like MODBUS TCP/IP what I struggle with (As in I have no clue what I am doing) is taking the 50+ digital inputs and converting them into data to send out. I need to take 8 bits (8 individual inputs) and convert them into a "byte", or maybe it was 16 bits and convert then into a "word" then I need to send that byte or word out as a MODBUS register. I know it is a fairly simple task but I really struggle to wrap my head around some of the coding concepts, it takes the right day and right person to explain it. If I just knew the term for it I could read up on my own and learn. I think it is either "casting" or the opposite of "casting".

After writing that whole thing out explaining my biggest stumbling block, it just occurred to me I am sitting next to a "Embedded Systems Engineer" who is incredibly smart and very willing to help and teach. He mainly works with the ChipKITS microprocessors (similar to Ardunio), Brian Schmalz from Schmalz Haus LLC. So I could have my answer any time. Doh!

For now I have one Advantech Adam 6052 which is a MODBUS TCP/IP digital I/O block with 8 inputs and 8 outputs. I have a PLC CPU with Ethernet for my Do-More, which is a very expensive solution for most people but the new Ethernet capable CLICK PLC's for $129-$149 are just as capable and would be what I would use if I didn't have the Do-More. Plus my big HMI has Ethernet and I can program all three over the Ethernet so I am going to use that as my main control medium.

-Dan

[RustedOut]

Hi Dan,

The Cubloc modbus card I'm using doesn't have persistent signals. Not that things couldn't have been worked around, I just decided if that's how it'll work, then ok.

I think Mach gets a bad rap from people who go just far enough to get simple functionality, then blame everything that seems odd on Mach. I'm no Mach pro, just persistent. I have no issues with it and have been running it for 8 years. Closest I ever came to laying some oddity onto Mach turned out to be a floating ground adding voltage to various feeds. Got that figured out and been fine every since. But I got away from the old XP system as well as the 32 bit systems. More memory, faster hard drives and a graphic card with it's own memory goes a long ways to solving bottle necks. Then turn all the other crap off and use the pc as a mill control only. Surfing the web and other actions while you're running the mill is just asking for trouble. I don't do anything but have it run the mill. No music, no pictures, no nothing. And no problems.

The big thing for me with the Cubloc was it's size. The modbus stuff I looked at from Automation Direct seemed pretty big in physical size. I wanted to imbed it in my all in one box. So yes, it's standard serial to the pc. I have two ports. I knew I was going to drive the mill via ethernet, so wanted that port free for that. My pc is a smh, so there's no more room to add more cards. I believe the modbus sends the data as bytes in my system. Just the state of the pin is all that was needed.

Bob

[engnerdan]

So where I left off with the last post was I had decided on this design.

Attachment 313900

Now I had to work out the details to make it happen. The first was the enclosure which I had already found, its a BUD Industries NBF-32026 which can be purchased at this time from Amazon for $32.95. The only downside to this enclosure is the premade steel panel to go inside costs nearly as much as the enclsoure. The panel is BUD Industries NBX-32926 which can also be purchased from Amazon for $27.90 right now. I already had come 1/8" aluminum laying around to use for the front panel which would be more rigid than the plastic of the enclosure and I could do a bit of a modular setup. This would allow me to make a new front panel in the future and just bolt it to the existing enclosure, if and when I change my mind on what I want for buttons and features.

So with the enclosure selected, the next order business was figuring out the electrical side of things. This is where things got messy, as it was designed I had 37-41 push button switches in the panel plus I think 8 inputs from my jog pendant. While I didn't have plans in place for all 49 switches yet I figured it would be best to plan to wire them. From what I could figure I had four options

1. Install a remote, in relation to the main PLC in the main electrical cabinet, IO system in the operators control panel
2. Route all the signals back to the main electrical cabinet and wire them all to the main PLC.
3. Move the main PLC to the operator control panel and route all of the signals in the main panel to the operator control panel.
4. Move the main PLC to the operator control panel and place a remote I/O system in the main electrical cabinet.

With these 4 options I started mapping out what I thought the resulting wiring, between the control panel and the main electrical cabinet, would be.

Attachment 313904

Looking at the resulting wiring option 2 of routing all the wiring back to the main control cabinet was out. A high density cable or ribbon cable could handle most of the discrete signals but it was just did not seem like the smartest decision. Plus I did not even account for outputs needed to selectively turn on the back lights of the switches. The first and fourth options seemed to be the best from the standpoint of less wires with the first winning out of the two because it keeps me from rewiring the already in place PLC.

Now the problem with the "Remote I/O" approach was I still didn't have a cost efficient remote I/O system found.

-Dan

[engnerdan]

The next step was to start researching remote I/O options. I started by taking the back cover off the user control panel of the Haas VF-2 at work to see how they are doing it. Haas has a custom made board (expected) to which their custom keypad connects along with any switches or buttons. They have a couple cables connecting to it, one is power and dedicated signals, which i think is a ten pin connector. I assume this handles the power switches and controls power to the board. Then there is a phone type cable for serial communication between the control panel board and the main motion control board in the back. Lastly there is a USB cable that just passes through the board to the USB port on the side on the control panel. This is used for loading programs from a USB stick.

Here is what I came up with, the top row of options are what I looked at when I was working through this a year ago. The bottom row is the options that are available now.

Attachment 313914

At the time I was doing the initial decision making I decided to go with the DirectLogic 06 PLC because if the price point and ease of use. I had bought this PLC off a coworker for $50 cash many years ago and it is brand new in the box. So I was either going to sell it on ebay or use it. I went about picking up a couple 16 point input cards for it from ebay and that is where the project stopped.

At this point I had the PLC, input cards, push button switches, and enclosure.

-Dan

[engnerdan]

After all that work and time put into the control panel life got in the way and stopped any forward progress. During that time I spent more and more time at work running our Haas VF2 and I quickly realized I wanted something more than I had been planning. I started looking back at the concepts I had before and I started looking for a different off the shelf enclosure, in addition to entertaining the thought of building the whole works from scratch. What I ended up finding was a WIEGMANN 24" X 24" X 4" enclosure PN# SC242404NK. While this was a little wider than I wanted/needed I thought the price was reasonable at $108.

So I started working on a design.

Attachment 314444
This is similar to what the enclosure looks like for finish. This is a 6" tall version

Attachment 314446 Attachment 314448 Attachment 314450
Here are some screen shots of the current panel design. I have a 19" touch screen monitor, 10" Automation Direct HMI, Jetway solidstate mini computer, Banner Engineering TL50 indicator light, and some switches modeled.

The 19" monitor is a bit too big and I wish I has bought smaller, but no sense in buying smaller now. One advantage to the large size is that the touch screen actually works fairly well with the Kmotion CNC application.
It is a "BK SEMS 19" TouchScreen Monitor, Windows XP 7, 8, 10 Compatible" from ebay, which I got for $85.00
BK Sems 19" Touchscreen Monitor Windows XP 7 8 10 Compatible | eBay

The 10" HMI would be a bit much for the average hobbyist to incorporate at full cost. I happened to have it left over from a job I did a while back, if it wasn't for that I would not have used it. I would have gone with many more push buttons or a small cheap touch screen and a Maple Systems RMI5010 which would allow me to do the HMI functions on a webpage loaded by the computer (dual monitors on the computer).
The HMI is from Automation Direct
EA9-T10CL | C-more HMI: 10-inch touch screen, color

The Jetway computer is a "Jetway Intel Bay Trail-M Celeron N2930 Quad Core Fanless NUC, JBC310U91W-2930-B" that I have had for a bit over a year
After using misc old junker computers for a year and dealing with the problems with them I looked for the cheapest mini computer I could find that I thought would have enough processing power. This little quad core Celeron has been very impressive and has not disappointed.
Amazon.com: Jetway Intel Bay Trail-M Celeron N2930 Quad Core Fanless NUC, JBC310U91W-2930-B: Computers & Accessories

The Banner Engineering TL50 stack light is a engineering test piece I had from when I worked at Banner. They can be found on ebay for $50 or less at times. I'm only including it because I have it laying around.
Lighting and Indicators

The 22mm push button switches I have modeled are all low cost units from Automation Direct.
22mm Plastic | AutomationDirect.com

I also picked up a 48 pin Amphenol connector pair from ebay for $16.50 (11.35 shipping) to use as a main cable connector between the control panel and the main electrical cabinet.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Amphenol-Mat.../141929888203?
I then machined up an adapter go in place of the missing cable clamp and adapt it to a 1" pipe thread for a flexible conduit connector.
Attachment 314458 Attachment 314460

Then I got 10 feet of 1" ultra flex conduit from McMaster for $28.60
This was more than I wanted to spend on conduit but I could not find any other way to get a 1" conduit for less money.
http://www.mcmaster.com/#8069k14/=11r0ewd

So with all those parts on hand and a basic model I am now working on finishing the mechanical design. I still need to finalize a lockable hinge pivot and a top pivot. I am also trying to make sure to model everything 100% before I start cutting anything. One thing that messed up my plans a bit was the thickness of the monitor I bought. I was anticipating taking the front bezel off and I thought I could get it to under 2" in thickness. Well that was not quite the case when I got it in my hands.


Current new investment has been $249.45, not sure what I have in to the switches as I have had them for over a year. But I think they are about $12-$15 each.

-Dan

[lcvette]

How did the flexible conduit work out, I am looking for a sealed flexible cable carrier and was considering that same part number. Sammy updates on the panel?

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[engnerdan]

How did the flexible conduit work out, I am looking for a sealed flexible cable carrier and was considering that same part number. Sammy updates on the panel?

Sent from my QTAIR7 using Tapatalk

Progress on the control panel has been non-existent until recently, I am getting back to it slowly. I finally finished the design on the mounting bracket and bought material to make it. Since the last update I have also picked up a 8" Rutland Super Spacer that I am turning into a 4th axis which I need for prototyping a product I have been developing, so that is high priority.

As for the flexible conduit, I love the stuff from McMaster it is very flexible and easy to work with. Versus all the other liquidtite and flexible conduits I have used over the years. I forgot to take a picture of how flexible this stuff is, I will try to snap a picture tonight.

Here is what I have settled on for the control panel.

Attachment 336150
Attachment 336152
Attachment 336146
Attachment 336154


Some pictures of the 4th axis build, which will be its own thread at some point.




-Dan

[engnerdan]

Just to show how flexible the ultra flex conduit from McMaster is I took this picture last night. This is a 10 foot piece of the 1" conduit I linked to before, with a little over a foot hanging over the edge of the table and one of the control panel pivots (small piece of steel, less than 1 lb) hanging on the end.

Attachment 336274

-Dan