Well, after many years of lurking on here in the background I thought I'd finally get down to the business of converting my lathe/mill, she's the Chester Model B 3-in-1 machine available over here in the UK, but very similar to the Smithy machines in the US as well as several others...
I'm going to start with just converting the Lathe part of the machine, the reason for doing this is that I plan to buy a seperate mill at some point and convert that to cnc too, the mill head on the chester understandably isn't that great but if you take small cuts and clamp everything rigid then it's possible to get some very good results, the lathe itself is capable of good results though the backlash present in the cross slide needs to be taken into account!
All the parts will be added using exisiting mounting points where possible, I want to ensure that the machine can be returned to its original state should I decide to change machines at a later date.
Steppers/drives: I'm currently in possession of some 12nm steppers and MCP/Leadshine 2278 drives (with internal power supply) both of which where purchased from MCP in the UK. The drives give me peak amps of 7.8 which should be plenty for quick rapids
One problem I've identified already is that there is little room beneath the cross slide to mount a ball nut, so this will need to be mounted to the right instead...
So this will mean drilling new mounting holes in the ends of the milling table, this in itself could be fun as I need to do this on the machine itself!
I have a couple of ballscrews to hand that can be used for the x axis, both are THK precision ground, C1 and C3 accuracy, so should be up to the job
as for teh Y axis I don't have a clue at the moment, it may be that I have to go down the route of buying a rolled one for this unless I can find an alternative on ebay somewhere.
Well that's it for now, I'm hoping to have the wiring sorted soon for the drives & motors, I have a steel electrical cabinet already that will be used to house everything. More pics coming soon :idea:
Kev