[drumsticksplint]

Hi,

I have an old Promecam press brake with a cnc MB control fitted. The control developed a number of problems and after patching it up, it finally died!

Does anybody have any recommendations for a cheap diy type control solution or could help me on what I'm trying out please? I don't want to have a pc to boot up every time I need to bend something, so mach, linuxcnc and the likes are out of the window, unless you could run something like this from a tablet?

I've currently got a plc and hmi i'm messing with that will control 3 axis of motion with step/dir signals. I've messed with it enough to establish that I could have a system whereby I could manually punch in positional values or jog the axes one at a time (which is how I used the old control until it packed up). However, I'm beginning to figure out that if I want to start programming sequences of those positions then I'm looking outside the realms of a plc, or at least the one I have anyway.

I've ditched the lightguards from the machine years ago and its only me that will use the machine, so i'm not to worried about trying to satisfy h&s regulations etc.

Thanks in advance for any help offered.

[Al_The_Man]

PLC's don't usually cut it unless you add a motion control module to enable using closed loop servo's.
Back in the day I used to retrofit with a design I made around the Galil Motion card which sat in a MB slot and ran under DOS.
I retro'd a few press bakes and shears with it.
Al.

[drumsticksplint]

Thanks for your reply Al!

That looks like it was a very good retrofit solution! My PLC supports 3 axis with step and direction signals, but the only closed loop I'll have in the system is between the dc servo's and their drives, not entirely robust but will do for my application. At the moment I'm just lining up the tool to a line by eye.... If I can make the PLC control the axes effectively enough then I'm just looking for either a HMI that will allow me to set up some sort of editable recipe's or a stand alone touchscreen solution that can communicate via modbus. If not, then I'm back to square one.

Thanks

[Al_The_Man]

I have used Maple Sytems HMI to interface to a PLC, they have a driver for just about all the common PLC's.
They make from 1 - 2 line units to PC based complex graphic HDMI.
Al.