Thanks Ray that was pretty much what I was hoping to hear. I'll be
reading everything I can find on line and then. I'll be back asking
questions when I know enough to ask a decent question.
Doug
Ray Henry wrote:
> Hi Doug
>
> On Wed, 2007-10-31 at 11:07 -0400, Douglas Pollard wrote:
>
>> HI All, I am a retired machinist and I have a little experience
>> running and programing CNC. I have a drill press that with a X, Y axis
>> milling vice on it. I do a little milling on little home shop
>> projects. I have morris taper endmill attachments and it don't do to
>> bad . I would like to run the x,y axises with a program like Emc. I
>> have a couple of stepping motors Nema 17 I think. Came out of old dot
>> matrix printer. I thought maybe they would pull the little table for
>> milling maybe geared down with a timing belt drive. If it would feed 10
>> inches a min I would be happy.
>>
>
> Years ago I modified a Griz minimill to ballscrews and little old style
> NEMA 23 MEA motors that were rated about 100 ounce inch. I used 4/1
> belts and 5tpi screws and it was just about unstoppable at 15-20 ipm.
> If you got that belt and ballscrew ratio even higher it might work with
> NEMA 17. You will want to watch the RPM of the motors because torque on
> steppers drops off really quickly.
>
>
>> I have and old computer 155 MHZ I
>> thought maybe to install xubuntu and Emc if the machine is fast enough
>> .
>>
>
> This box would really stretch the low end for CPU. Part of the problem
> with steppers is that the base thread speed you use is what determines
> the steps per second you can get from it and base thread will be slow
> with a 155. Another part of the problem is getting enough memory into
> these old boxes to satisfy the Ubuntu install stuff. I've done that
> successfully with 196 and once with <100 on a laptop but it was a day
> long process.
>
> I was able to run BDI-4xx on an overclocked Gateway 166. I got just
> enough out of it to run the Griz mentioned above at 8-10 IPM. I believe
> that finding something a bit faster at auction or used or picked up
> along the street during junk day would give a better chance of
> satisfaction.
>
>
>> I have some experience with Linux programs but but probably barely
>> past the newby stage. I think it would be fun to play with and I don't
>> expect much out of this but some good learning and experience. Maybe
>> cut some aluminumor plastic parts. Does this sound feasable?
>>
>
> Sure. You don't need great rapids to handle these materials but you do
> need to be careful to get a decent chip load and cooling or you'll have
> trouble with melting and breaking stuff.
>
>
>> I guess
>> I need to know how steep is the learning curve to get Emc hooked up
>> through steppers and motors to run such a thing. I don't really want to
>> have to get a degree in something to do this.
>>
>
> The essential configuration is done for you in any one of several
> defaults. You might have to stretch out base period on a slow box and
> reduce velocity stuff to get round real-time error messages. A bit of
> time on IRC while setting it up after install ought to get you going.
>
>
>> I could buy all this but
>> that wouldn't be much fun.
>>
>
> If making chips is your goal, buy it. If the construction/retrofit
> process as well as chips is your goal, EMC2 is the right place to be.
> I've serviced CNC stuff since about 79 and always thought to myself,
> damn, this could be done with a PC. Since I found the EMC project in
> about 95 I've been able to play to my heart's content.
>
> Rayh
>
>
>
>
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