johnsmachines

machines which I have made, am making, or intend to make, and some other stuff. If you find this site interesting, please leave a comment. I read every comment and respond to most. n.b. There is a list of my first 800 posts in my post of 17 June 2021, titled "800 Posts"

Tag: Mach 3

December 20, 2019

Melbourne Society of Model and Experimental Engineers. Xmas meeting.

The December meeting includes the competition for best model, best workshop tooling, and best engine.  The 3 happy winners were all from Geelong.

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Stuart Tankard, John Viggers, Swen Pettig

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Trevithick dredger engine model by John

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CNC lathe tools, toolholders and toolpost milling attachment by Stuart.

Following is a video of Stuart’s toolpost milling attachment in action.  It has been posted before, but is worth watching again.  It is quite remarkable.

(Photo of the flame gulper to be added.)

But, the best part of the meeting was this demo of a model aeroplane which was made by Don.  The plane weighs 2.5 grams!!!   The wing material is mylar which is 1 micron thick!!!  The flight was cut short by hitting a ceiling projector, but apparently the world record for a flight by a similar plane lasted for over an hour!  This YouTube video has had 360,000+ views in 5 days!

 

 

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July 26, 2019

CNC Mill Upgrade – 6. Where to put the computer?

Not much more to report today, but I have decided how to position the computer.

Not easy, because the computer needs to be protected from flying swarf and coolant spray from the CNC mill and the manual mill which is immediately adjacent.    And I want the computer to be close to the machine.  The CNC mill is NOT in an enclosure.

So this is what I have decided….

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The laptop is just low enough to reach while standing.   The E stop and other buttons are underneath.

And if the swarf is really flying, I can turn the PC away…

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Might need some adjustments.  The laptop is an old Dell ATG.   Said to be resistant to fluids and relatively resistant to shock/vibration etc.   Military specs.   I might add some side protection and perhaps a roof.

 

 

5 Comments
July 25, 2019

CNC Mill Upgrade -5

I have been putting quite a few hours into the upgrade, but not much to show photographically.

Finally got the new servo motors installed.  Replaced the X axis belt.  The most difficult servo to access was the Y axis, and of course that was the only one where the alignment of the timing belt was out.   Finally sorted by using a fibre optic camera to see why the belt was climbing onto the flange of the pulley.  The pulley was 1.2mm too far onto its shaft.  I know that, because I solved the problem by inserting washers under the motor mounts.  1mm washers did not work, nor did 1.5mm washers.  But 1.2mm washes did work perfectly.

Today Stuart arrived and removed more of the old wiring.

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Stuart, doing another CNC upgrade wiring.

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The old 7k computer has been removed, leaving some buttons.  I might be able to use those. The computer enclosure might disappear too.  Not decided yet.

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The old CNC mill has lost some weight.  Those cartons are full of old parts.  Note that the floor has been swept.  Stuart was concerned that we might be infested with snakes, but it is winter here, so we should OK until the weather warms up.

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The rats nest is disappearing.

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July 19, 2019

CNC Mill Upgrade -4

I removed the old XY & Z axis servo motors from the mill.  Each one weighs about 15kg (33lb).

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The old servo motors.  The X and Z were working fine.  The Y was faulty, but I do not know whether the fault was in the motor, the encoder, the controller, or the connecting wires.  I will put them on Ebay as 2 working, one for parts.

Then I removed the belt drive pulley off each motor.  There was a grub screw, which would not budge.  Assuming that it had been Loctited, I applied some heat, judiciously.  The grub screw came out, but the pulley would not budge, so a little more heat, and a gear puller.   Two of the gears came off, but one still would not budge.

I asked for advice, and I was loaned a different type of gear puller. (thanks Rudi).  This time, some movement of the gear on the shaft was noted, and eventually the last motor gave up its gear.

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This one worked.

The shaft of the old motors was 16mm diameter.  The new motors had 19mm shafts.  So I spent some time on the lathe boring out the gears to fit the shafts of the new motors.  The keyways of the old motors were 5x5mm, and the new ones were 6x6mm.  So, I borrowed a 6mm broach (thanks Stuart), and enlarged the keyways in the rebored gears to 6mm width.   The new keyways needed a lower profile, so some time on the mill and surface grinder  to reduce the thickness of the keys to 4.5mm.

That was quite a few peasant hours hours on the lathe, mill, and surface grinder, but the end result was good.

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The new servo motors, with the timing belt gears fitted, with keys in place.  I will set each motor in place on the CNC mill, determine the final exact position of the gear on the shaft, then indent the shaft for the grub screw.  Then, when I am sure that all is correct, the gear, grubscrew and shaft will be Loctited.

Another small issue was that the boss on the new motors was 5mm deep compared to 3.5mm deep for the originals.  So the mounting plate for each motor needed the recess to be deepened by about 1.5mm.

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I used a boring head on the mill to deepen the first one, but it did not produce a good finish, so the next 2 (shown) were deepened on the lathe, in a 4 jaw chuck.

Meanwhile, back to the rats nest in the electric control enclosure….

 

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The bare space top left is where the old servo controllers lived.  They were removed.  Then I spent a half day tracing each wire from the controller to the old servo, and removing it.  That produced a carton full of wires.  The rats nest is now a little less tangled.  A lot more of those wires will be removed as the job progresses.

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The new servo controllers bolted into position.  They are fatter than the originals, so a bit of rearranging was required.  The yellow box top right is the main spindle speed control (VSD) which is being retained.

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And on the right hand side, newly bolted into position today, from the top down, are the smooth stepper, the C11 breakout board, and two C10 breakout boards.   Awaiting some expert wiring.  (Stuart, are you reading this?)

 

9 Comments
July 20, 2016

CNC Lathe conversion -16

The wiring of the lathe is complete.  (Except for limit switches.  They can be added at any time).

Mach 3 is configured.  The wireless hand control is installed and working.  Ezilathe installed and waiting for input.

Some covers to be made.

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Hook ups in progress.  That’s the faulty VSD on top of the electronics enclosure.  The CNC engineer lost his hair trying to figure out the problem.

Still some testing and fine tuning required.

But nothing much will happen in the workshop for the next  3 weeks.

 

 

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