New Tool Day: CNC Router!

[adam.beauchene]

Well, for one thing, you won't be able to use a thumb drive.

Enable in BIOS to transfer files, then restart/disable to run machine- assuming the gains from disabling are worth the trouble. Think I'll disable USB, NIC, and PCI and PCIE if possible, see if those do anything too. Cool thing about the SSD is restarting takes just seconds. I hear a dedicated video card almost always helps EMC too, but I may haved precluded that option with my choice of cases. Gotta look around for a super low profile fanless.

 

[adam.beauchene]

Power supply testing. I know that the frequenters of the LC come from all walks of life, so I feel compelled to first post a disclaimer for the younger, more adventurous, and/or prideful visitors to this here build thread:

MAINS VOLTAGE WILL KILL YOU IF MISHANDLED.
DC AMPS WILL KILL YOU IF MISHANDLED.

If my thread inspired folks to try this at home, either get electrical training, or make a trained friend.

OK, on to testing. Rigged up my meter and a power cord, applied AC voltage. Reading 50v DC on the output:

Got the green light:

Applied power to the driver motherboard to check for green power light, good to go:

Tomorrow I'll bolt together the drivers, heatsink, and motherboard.

 

[adam.beauchene]

Assembled the heatsinks, drivers, and motherboard this morning.

Drivers: 3 x Gecko G213V (similar to the G203V but with 10x microstepping)
Motherboard: PMDX 134. Hosts up to 4 Gecko drivers, I got this one for space for a future 4th axis.
Heatsink: also from PMDX.

Parts:

Applied thermal compound to drivers:

Attached motherboard and installed current-setting resistors:

And ready to go.

Next I'll work on the drive cables.

 

[ian_s]

Re: USB, just don't use those devices during operation. So, for example, copy data to the SSD (which I assume is SATA) or a ramdisk. USB devices rely on the CPU for pretty much everything, some controllers won't even DMA very well.

Return now to your regularly scheduled photos ;-)

 

[adam.beauchene]

Re: USB, just don't use those devices during operation. So, for example, copy data to the SSD (which I assume is SATA) or a ramdisk. USB devices rely on the CPU for pretty much everything, some controllers won't even DMA very well.

Return now to your regularly scheduled photos ;-)

Got it, I noticed that disabling the ports in bios didn't do much. I picked up a few hundred ns in the latency test after disabling the NIC and serial ports, though.

 

[seanm]

Got it, I noticed that disabling the ports in bios didn't do much. I picked up a few hundred ns in the latency test after disabling the NIC and serial ports, though.

You don't need to disable the USB. Like ian_s said, just don't use the USB while cutting. They should take no CPU if there is nothing plugged in.

 

[adam.beauchene]

You don't need to disable the USB. Like ian_s said, just don't use the USB while cutting. They should take no CPU if there is nothing plugged in.

Thanks. Like I said in my post, I figured out that I wan't getting any gains from disabling the ports, so I re-enabled them. Cool to find out why. Nice avatar

 

[adam.beauchene]

Got a box of nice looking Neutrik bits today:

So I'm ready to start the drive cables. Since I'm dealing with a mishmash of wire colors and numbers, I thought it best to first make a plan.

I did the motors first. I terminated the motor wires with some 4-pin molex connectors. I did this pretty early early this morning, snuck down to the man cave before my wife and kids got up, and forgot my camera, so I apologize for the phone pic. I got a nice pair of racheting crimp pliers a few projects ago, from these guys. I highly recommend them.

Next I worked on the Neutrik plugs. I'm using Invalid Link Removed cable, 5 conductor, 20AWG, with shielding, and this stuff is pretty fat. I had to modify the cable clamps to accommodate the diameter of the jacket. Got to soldering and assembling:

I'll take some pics of crimping when I do the other end of the cables. I'll wait to do the jacks until the panels get here.

 

[T-34]

clean job!

 

[pilotjones]

Nice. Wiring charts are the way to go, it would suck to have to de- and reinstall conductors later, especially if you just fried an encoder.

I've never used igus branded cable. Are those robotic duty? They seem fairly coarse stranded.

I'm also surprised to see same gauge conductors for power and for signal wires (assuming two power and two encoder). Hopefully you won't have problems with them both running through the same jacket. I've done applications where they had to be over separate cables, a few inches apart.

 

[adam.beauchene]

Thanks T-34, and thanks Pilot. The cables are made for motion control duty, rated for over a million cycles, IIRC. All conductors are for power to the A and B coils of the stepper motors. There are no encoders in this system... Although there almost were, as recent as three weeks ago I was flirting with servos. I went with steppers mostly because of cost. I could afford a really nice stepper system, or a partly nice servo system.

 

[adam.beauchene]

More cable work. Wanted to show how convenient a good pair of crimp pliers are; I did all three cables in about half an hour.

Done.

Also did the jacks:

Once the panels get here I can put it all together and work on the computer talking to the drivers.

 

[octaedro7]

Subbed!!

 

[slowburnaz]

Subbed!

 

[baskruit]

Subbed!

Ditto! I see myself attempting something similar in a year or two. Should be quite educational.

 

[adam.beauchene]

The panels for my drive enclosure came today:

All of the holes lined up, and everything snapped in place...I'm glad everything matched it's respective data sheet. In all honesty, while designing the panels I wasn't very diligent in making sure the actual parts measurements matched their sheets...:

And here it is all bolted together (need to find some washers for the rack mount screws):

Next step is to wire up the inside of the case, then start configuring EMC2 to the drives.

 

[T-34]

Who did the panels for you?

 

[adam.beauchene]

Who did the panels for you?

Front Panel Express. I designed the panels in their software, based on the data sheet dimensions of each of the parts. Took them about a week to cut them out, powder coat, and engrave them. They are out of Seattle, but they have an Invalid Link Removed for European orders.

 

[AltGrendel]

Have you thought of making a plexiglass bass body on that thing?

 

[adam.beauchene]

Have you thought of making a plexiglass bass body on that thing?

IME, plexiglass does not respond well to heat-generating cutting tools, acrylic might work though. We'll see. I plan on keeping it somewhat simple at first, just one-piece wood bodies, three-piece necks, and pickup parts out of typical fiber material. Once I get my process down I might try gettin' all crayzay.