[jkcab]

Mike,

The Lab-volt lathe I have has an optical pickup on on the spindle. There is a disk with 1 slot attached to the back and a bracket holding the pickup attached to the case. If you pulled apart an old inkjet printer you would find one with an optical end coder attached to the paper feed shaft and a liniar one attached to the print head. It looks like a plastic disk with a bunch of radial lines. It can be used as a cheap substitute for a stepper to track position or as a rev counter. You can cobble one up if you are into electronics or you can go to CNC 4 PC and buy one for a reasonable price. Either way if you down load the instructions you will understand the aplication. You can adapt it to the mill spindle and leave it there for feed back to maintain speed under load or you can take it off and put it on the lathe when you are ready so you can thread.
As for were to start I will make the same suggestion. Read the Mach 3 instructions on spindle control and then look at the offerings from cnc4pc. You need to get the lathe steppers under mach control before you get into spindle issues. You still need to look at the whole picture though so you are not purchasing redundent systems. You can purchase driver cards that incorperate almost all the needed features or you can go alacart. Somtimes you end up with overlaping features if you don't plan you progression. Research, list your needs and desires, ask specific questions for clarification and then impliment the plan.
Jeff

[harryn]

Thanks for the replies. Mine has the 10 K rpm universal motor on the spindle from rogers triem. The markings on the spindle speed knob are partially worn off, but I don't see any sign of a encoder or a "computer" label", and it does not look like the picture posted. I guess I need to post a pic.

I don't see any sign of an encoder, but it could be that I just didn't see it.

Mine has 2 small stepper motors from Superior electric, which look like pretty conventional steppers. I need to pull the end knobs off to see the entire plate, but it looks like they take 1 1.7 amps (still trying to read it)

I have some linistepper controller kits s that I had bought for my cncrouter project that are in that power range, so I was just planning to use those along with mach III to do any cnc type stuff.

For now, I am just turning the knobs / steppers by hand to move the x / y, and that is enough for me for this month. Right now, I am just thrilled that it rotates.

Next month, who knows.

[jkcab]

Harryn,

Sounds like you have an older model. There probably is no endcoder on your unit. It was more than likely ran on the old dos system with an ISA card in a win 3.2 or 95 system. You should go to Sherline's site and check out there backlash upgrade before you go cnc. I am not familiar with lin stepper control kits but from what I read I suppose they will do the job. If you want to run the spindle from Mach 3 you will need a few inexspensive items from cnc4pc. You could also check out Homan Designs. When your ready to take the plunge give me a shout and I will try to be of some assistance. Above all have fun!!
Jeff