CNC resumes!

Machine Move, Ballscrew setup

I'm back! I have been so busy with school, internships, work, that until now I've been full up to my ears with stuff! I'm interning for a major northwest manufacturer making metal parts.

Troy's brother has a great shop, and is kind enough to let us work there on our CNC project. I moved all the components out of my room to there! What a relief! My room no longer smells like gear grease!

So at this stage the controller board is working with the 3 stepper motors, and the computer. The same day that we moved the stuff there we bought some shelves and put them in place to keep all the equipment. We spent that time building installing the shelves.

Another week we came in and worked on assembling the ballscrews. They were a really tight fit, the ballscrews were purchased on ebay custom cut to our size. So we were saving money by doing this. Unfortunately, the ballscrew blocks, that hold the bearings were not sized perfectly, they were an interference fit. So we tried heating the blocks with a torch lightly. We found that didn't work that well at all. What did work was forcing them on with force, and properly aligned pressure. So that is what we did.

We had to bore out the insides of the motor mounts as they didn't quite fit on the s

haft, Troy was able to quickly take care of that on his harbor freight lathe. (Paying attention not to break a v-belt.)

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Motor Wiring

Today grant came to work on the machine with us too. He rewired the motors to utilize RJ-45 we have concerns that the wires are not thick enough to carry the current. We looked it up, they have a max spec based on 24AWG of 3.5 AMPS per individual strand. Our motors in unipolar mode will be running at 2 Amps. Our voltage is something like 24 volts? not sure, i'll have to check that later. I'm concerned

that the limiting factor is not just current but power over the line. So we will have to double check that

later.

Troy traded some equipment and acquired a ton of aluminum extrusion, that should work great for a frame. This means we will have to source some connector plates, and design them as well.

Troy quickly worked up a new control board mounting strategy with the motherboard mounting kit I found. He cut, and drill/tapped aluminum scrap to make the mounts. He also he-manned one of the brass screws, and broke it off in the hole, so he had to re-drill and tap to fix it.

If we are good we will need to:

* Purchase Female RJ45 connectors so we ca

n easily disconnect the motors from the control board. (If rj-45 is ok for our CNC motor power)

* Consider shielding options for the motor wires.

* Finish mounting the control board

* Model the frame again with the new extrusions troy got.

* Install limit switches

* Bring more RJ-45 cable for limit switches.

* Explore spindle options

These are the ends, that would be nice to have rj-45 connectors on them. It is easy to pull out a motor's wires at the control board. We also cut and drilled some simple aluminum angle iron to act as a heatsink on the drives. A quick run to the store and we had the right fasteners.