[Shapenfab]

Hello Everyone, I am finally into my TM 1 build. I got started last week in between work, and now wish I cold get a block of time, with some warm weather to bring it up to actuall running status. This being the first time that I have ever been around, or tried to build a precision machine of any kind, ( I am a structural steel fabricator and welder for the past 27 years), and used to working within tolerances of 1/16" this is all really fun and head scratching at the same time. As I work my way through this thing I have spent almost as much time questioning how things go together and the end results that I am looking for, as actually fitting and welding things together. As you get into one of these things you can really understand the reasoning behind making these machines out of extrusons and not your standard steel mill products like tubing, flat bars, and cold rolled shapes. The close tolerances just arn't there, at least not for a machine that you would want to keep within .000 of an inch tolerences. But no matter, for the kind of things that I will want to do with it, it will be just fine, and make cutting standard structural parts fun and productive in the process. It hopefully will be my stepping stone into the whole cnc tool thing. I am going to first set it up for oxy-fuel use as that is all I do right now and then eventually try to get my Cutmaster XL 80 plasma runnin with it.
Blackhollowmfg's TM 1 build log has provided me with a large amount of helpfull info all the way along, and the pictures he provided online are invaluable. Thanks again Blackhollow.
Some of the things that I am going to need to do now are.

Square the gantry (y axis) travel with the table (x axis) by using shims so as to keep the 1" cam followers running straight the full length of the table, 12' plus. I've got a good shim pack from Grainger that will work fine.

Set the proper gear lash between the drive gears and the racks. This I will just have to experiment with till all runs smooth the full length of the table.

I ordered a couple more brackets to install 4 more cam followers onto the y axis trolley for reinforcement, I just think it will be stronger that way.

I am going to have a water pan broke up for the table that will be 12'-2" long, by 5'-8" wide, by 6" deep. I will run three lengths of inverted 2x2" angle the full length of the pan 12'-2",one on eather side and one down the middle to support the 1/4" by 3" flat bars that will run across the width of the table at a 30 degree angle. These will be set at probably a 4" to 6" spacing for the actual material to set on. This will give me aproximatly a 5" deep water table if i bring the water level up to just under the material that will be cut. I wish I knew how to illustrate this for you and attatch it buy I don't. Sorry. Here are a few picts so far, please jump in with any questions or suggestions, besause I'm open to anything that will make this better. Thanks

By the way, Torchmate has been very helpfull all the way along, anytime that I had a question on something.

[DRL]

Great job so far. Thanks for sharing your build we us. Wish I was a little closer, (Vancouver WA area here), I would volunteer to help for the education.
Keep the pixs coming.
DRL

[DRL]

Well, I'll try again. Posted this reply couple of hours ago and now its gone.
Great job so far. Thanks for taking us along on your build. I wish I was closer (Vancouver WA area here), I'd volunteer to help as the TM 1 is what I've had my eye on.
Keep the pixs coming.
DRL

[millman52]

looks like you are off to a good start. Keep us posted on the progress.

[PlasmaGuy]

Shapenfab,

I have owned a TM1 for 8 years now. I would HIGHLY suggest you follow Blackholes method of improving the y-axis. Cam followers are mariginal at best.

I have to continually clean and adjust mine rig. You are at a point that is perfect for making this improvement. Had someone made this suggestion years ago I would have jumped at it.

TM uses cam followers to keep their price affordable IMO.

I made this suggestion to Blackhole and he followed it and has been well satisfied as far a I know.

Best of luck on your build!

Tom

[millman52]

Yeah I gave Blackhollow a few suggestions on working out other issues in the conversion. I have talked with him a couple times off list he seems pretty satisfied with his table.

I am fairly positive even Mike form TM suggested to someone here on list that they follow Blackhollow's improvement(s).

I agree that most likely TM is still supplying them that way as a entry level cost leader with the cam followers. They will work but there will be constant tinkering with them.

[Shapenfab]

Thanks for all the input everybody, I think the Hiwin's linear slides that Blackhollow installed really look like the ticket, and I will probably do that in the future but for right now I'm just gona try and find the time to finish things to the point that I can actually run it. At present I dont own a mill so really dont have a precise way to drill all of the holes that would be necessary to attatch the rail to the top of the cold roll bar. I will try and get more pictures over the next few days.
Between maintaining my work equipment on the weekends and work itself I can't seem to get an extra minute to finish this and get it running. But Thanks again .......

[plain ol Bill]

Guess I missed something somewhere guys. Could some one put up a link to the improvements by Blackhollow if you could. Thanks --

[millman52]

Guess I missed something somewhere guys. Could some one put up a link to the improvements by Blackhollow if you could. Thanks --

Bill,
http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showth...t=32058&page=3 post # 31 is where discussion begins on adding a linear slide to the Y axis

[Mike@Torchmate]

Well you can put it this way, there is a reason every other table we use runs the Y axis with an slide and cassette.

Anything I can do to help, let me know.

[Shapenfab]

Well I'm getting close now everyone. I now have the table set in place and all leveled up. I'm just waiting for the water pan to get broken up, and then it will get the angle and flat bars for supporting the material. I was working at setting the gearlash on the main X axis rack today and was flustrated with how hard it was to carefully move the bracket up or down without having it just drop into the rack. Even with the 5/16" bolts just snug it was hard to adjust the drive gear up and down. I made a little 1/4" by 1" Flatbar bracket,and drilled and taped it for a 10X32 screw to adjust the up down movement of the bracket. It works perfectly. With the bolts just snug you can fine tune the drive gear bracket up or down and be in full controll the whole time. I also tacked a 3" piece of 1/4"X1/4" square bar along the back edge of the bracket so it will slide up and down without rocking while adjusting things.I'm sure this will come in handy when I inevitabley have to fine tune it in the future. I think the pictures will be self'explanitory. I mounted the Bugo torch mount to one side of the trolly so that in the future I can mount the plazma torch holder on the other side.
I loaded all the software on both computers tonight and hope to actually get things hooked up tomorrow for a trial run around the table. I will let you know how things go tomorrow. Thanks

[PlasmaGuy]

Your vertical adjustment assembly is nice!

Tom

[millman52]

I have a manual adjustment on my torch also. I installed it mainly for torch protection in event of software crashing the tip straight down into a piece of plate.

My question is how is your torch software going to move your torch up for rapids, back down for preheat, up a bit for pierce then ramp back down on your lead in to final cut height?

[Shapenfab]

Hello Everyone, Well I figured that it was probably time to make myself sit down at the keyboard, and update what has happened with my TM 1 build. I recieved all the boxes of stuff from Torchmate in Jan of 2008, got started actually building the table in Feb-April, ( I wasn't going to rush this thing ), then got really busy with my actual work that helps pay the bills, ( I say help, because my wife works as hard at her job as I do at mine,) mobile welding, fabrication, and erection work throught the summer and fall of 2008.
Didn't do anything with it for quite a while except when in the shop, I would walk by and push the gantry around sometimes and just visualize what this thing would eventually be able to do. I got the water pan completed last fall and installed on the table but didn't put any water in it as my old plasma machine took a sh-- on me and I had to decide when the best time would be to purchase a new one.
The bankers and wall street investment jerks put our economy in the tank through last summer and by late fall we decided not to spend any money on anything except what was actually needed for work. Then comes the end of the year and we decided to get the new plasma machine ( Thermal Dynamics A-120) for the table.
I got everything up and began running it in Feb and with the exceptional tech support from Torchmate (Jake, Jack and Mike that I've talked with) I am slowly getting things dialed in on the different plate sizes that I will us it on, mostly 1/8",3/16",1/4",3/8",1/2" and sometimes on 3/4". Everything seems to be falling into place without any major exceptions. I did run into a glitch this week when burning a shape that for the first time took the gantry across the splice joint where the X axis rack joins together. I was burning along fine when the gantry stopped, and I heard kind of a grinding sound for about a second and then the torch continued on and finished the part. I stopped everything, turned off the machine and then proceded to twist the x axis drive shaft by hand till I found the bad spot, (the place where the 2 racks join together).
Last summer I had ran the gantry full length multiple times down the table to check gear lash and everything ran fine. But I did rearange the shop this last fall and had picked up the table with the crane and moved it to the other side of the shop and this must have allowed a little movement in the rack I guess, so I need to adjust it again now that the table is set in it's final place.
I am happy with everything so far except for the amount of shake that I am getting in the 3/4"x2" gantry rail. It is very pronounced when the torch changes in a 90 deg. corner on a part. I went back and studdied Blackhollows retrofit of his gantry last yr,and decided to do the same. The only difference will be that I am going to replace the flat bar also, with a piece of 3" 3030 aluminum extrusion material that I am getting from http://www.automation4less.com/store...s.asp?cat=1118 and will also install new linear rail and block from Hiwin, also purchased from the same companies sister website, http://www.automation-overstock.com/...ies.asp?cat=14 .
I will also spring load the y-axis rack and pinion gear. Once I take it apart I will get pictures of it all and document it so that it might be of help to someone else that is contemplating doing the same thing. My parts should be here in the next few days and since I have already used the table to make new brackets, I figure it will probably take me a day to do the complete change over, and get it all adjusted.Here are a few pictures of thing at the present time.
This CNC website Forum has been invaluable for information about the plasma process. Thanks to everybody here and stay tuned for a new updated TM 1 soon to come, the few weeks.

[Shapenfab]

I just posted a new update to this and it went somewhere, but I don't see it here and don't know where it went, go figure. ?????

[Shapenfab]

OOpppssssss it just showed up , sorry,

[bluewater_fiji]

It seems that everybody had trouble with the Y-axis carriage for the TM1.

No wonder, as it is a rather hopeless design, and sooner or later everybody decided to do something about it.

We did too, using scrap steel lying around and the bits and pieces suppplied by Torchmate, including the dreaded CAM followers!

All we did was to replicate the x-axis design for the y-axis, i.e to build a mini x-axis for the y-axis. The weight of the y-axis gantry is now nicely supported on two rails (not one flimsy one like before) and is of course more balanced. Talk about re-inventing the wheel!

Sure, it looks a bit rough, but it works great! The whole modification from start to finish took us about 6hrs, we had it running by the end of the day.

We were thinking to upgrade to a TM2 or TM3 but we really don't see the need for that anymore. We are getting some really great cutting.


Hope this helps more tormented souls out there.


Chris from Fiji