[sharpshooter90]

Just thought I should start a new thread for this project so it doesn't get mixed up with the DC drive story. Will start posting as soon as the VFD gets here.

[dahui]

I just thought I'd preemptively respond to your preemptive post.

[sharpshooter90]

I just thought I'd preemptively respond to your preemptive post.

I love that cold war talk- takes me back to the good ol' days when your enemy was foreign and red- not the banker next door.

[Lucanus]

I love that cold war talk- takes me back to the good ol' days when your enemy was foreign and red- not the banker next door.

That's what we call a false syllogism

[instructor37]

That's what we call a false syllogism

Sadly you are correct. All that military spending and the real enemy was wearing a 3 piece suit and playing golf with the President.
Now try to keep them 3 dollar words outa here- this here is the Shoptask forum where men are men and book learnin' is optional.

[sharpshooter90]

Sadly you are correct. All that military spending and the real enemy was wearing a 3 piece suit and playing golf with the President.
Now try to keep them 3 dollar words outa here- this here is the Shoptask forum where men are men and book learnin' is optional.

OK guys- stand down- or we're liable to get into a hot war of words with each side going to the dictionary and lobbing longer and more obscure words at each other.

Back to the subject-
Big plus is the controller arrived in a couple of days- in one of those US Post office flat rate boxes. Its a nice unit, but the manual is small enough to have been put in a cracker jack box. I literally have to use a magnifying glass to read some of it. Its niceley made in that modern computer sort of way, with clean plastic housing and membrane keyboard.
Big minus- Whoever designed this thing made in such a way that you cannot get a nice clean installation. The keyboard is on top and the manual says to mount it vertically. But all the connections for the AC input, 3 phase output and other options are by screw terminals on the front of the unit. So you end up with all the wires strung out and sort of wrapped around to the rear. If the keyboard faced the other way, you could at least bundle your wires out the back and out of sight. The keyboard is mounted and shaped so that it can not be turned. It turns out that they have a remote keyboard option, but it doubles the cost of the unit. The computer control option will allow me to mount the whole thing out of sight, but I really wanted to have the ability to work the keyboard as well. I've got an old 3 phase motor I'm going to hook up and test-

[dahui]

You should be able to set it up to run with a pot, contactors, and panel mount buttons if you want to mount the VFD remotely. Not sure if that's still an option.

I have a bag full of Allen Bradley start and stop buttons if you are interested.

[flatheadford49]

Here's a pdf manual for the teco fm50. probably be easier to read.

http://www.tecowestinghouse.com/Manu...anual_0405.pdf

Good Luck
Flathead

[sharpshooter90]

Here's a pdf manual for the teco fm50. probably be easier to read.

http://www.tecowestinghouse.com/Manu...anual_0405.pdf

Good Luck
Flathead

Thanks- I had already printed out the more relevant pages. I am thinking about sending it back if they can supply me another unit that has a better design with remote keypad. I would rather pay the freight and re-stock fee than be unhappy looking at all those cables hanging out there.

[sharpshooter90]

OK guys- stand down- or we're liable to get into a hot war of words with each side going to the dictionary and lobbing longer and more obscure words at each other.

Back to the subject-
Big plus is the controller arrived in a couple of days- in one of those US Post office flat rate boxes. Its a nice unit, but the manual is small enough to have been put in a cracker jack box. I literally have to use a magnifying glass to read some of it. Its niceley made in that modern computer sort of way, with clean plastic housing and membrane keyboard.
Big minus- Whoever designed this thing made in such a way that you cannot get a nice clean installation. The keyboard is on top and the manual says to mount it vertically. But all the connections for the AC input, 3 phase output and other options are by screw terminals on the front of the unit. So you end up with all the wires strung out and sort of wrapped around to the rear. If the keyboard faced the other way, you could at least bundle your wires out the back and out of sight. The keyboard is mounted and shaped so that it can not be turned. It turns out that they have a remote keyboard option, but it doubles the cost of the unit. The computer control option will allow me to mount the whole thing out of sight, but I really wanted to have the ability to work the keyboard as well. I've got an old 3 phase motor I'm going to hook up and test-

OK- Here's the latest.
Couldn't handle the funky wiring on the TECO unit, so I sent it back and ordered another from them. They were real good about the exchange and my comments on the design. This new unit is made in China, but its outward quality is the same, with the same basic design as the Teco as to the wiring. The big difference is that it has a cool detachable keyboard and a 15.00 remote cable, so you can put the main box out of sight and mount the keyboard on the front of the machine. You can also order an RS 232 cable to hook it up to a PC and program all the functions from there. Even with all the options added on, its only about 1/2 the price of the Teco with the remote keyboard. Will post some pics after I get all the hookup done.

[PoppaBear10]

Take a look at your documentation, on some of those units that have a 232 programming port, they also have an option to run the unit via RTU modbus control. (some of them have an option for 485/422 as well but thats another story).

At any rate, on most programables that are out lately, you can do "Parameter" block addressing as well. You get to some Really high end, diagnostics, monitoring/status and controls. You can have that data accessable in your Mach3 screen. You can also run it with a small PLC that would also give you access to some more functions. You could then do alot of control from your Mach3, and physical buttons.........

If you get "Noise" that is messing with your Step/Dir stuff to your Axis Drives, consider getting a "AC line reactor" on the input side to your VFD, and "RF filters" on the output side of your VFD. If both of your Mill and Lathe motors are the same, you can use contactors/relay combos to switch between which motor your using at the time.

scott

[sharpshooter90]

Take a look at your documentation, on some of those units that have a 232 programming port, they also have an option to run the unit via RTU modbus control. (some of them have an option for 485/422 as well but thats another story).

At any rate, on most programables that are out lately, you can do "Parameter" block addressing as well. You get to some Really high end, diagnostics, monitoring/status and controls. You can have that data accessable in your Mach3 screen. You can also run it with a small PLC that would also give you access to some more functions. You could then do alot of control from your Mach3, and physical buttons.........

If you get "Noise" that is messing with your Step/Dir stuff to your Axis Drives, consider getting a "AC line reactor" on the input side to your VFD, and "RF filters" on the output side of your VFD. If both of your Mill and Lathe motors are the same, you can use contactors/relay combos to switch between which motor your using at the time.

scott

Thanks for the tips- reading the manual ( which is much bigger than that old " cracker jack box" one) I see a lot of options etc. I suppose they design these things to be multipurpose for machine tools, automation equipment etc, so they put in a lot of features. For a simple machine like the Shopmaster, just the basics will suit me fine. Since there is some time involved changing from lathe to mill, just using the original push button switches serves fine for changing the motors. In fact, I think I can use just one switch for changing from lathe to mill because the controller has a function to reverse the motors. I'm a little bit " old school" when it comes to that stuff, and always sorta skeptical of using software programs that have low volume production- bugs always seem to crawl out from somewhere, negating any advantage they offer. That PC hookup sounds interesting, but for my purpose, the keyboard will probably do everything I need.
My DRO has nice shielded cables, but the CNC cables just have a tin foil wrap under the outer cover- I will definitely watch for noise problems.

[banctecbobn]

Sharpshooter90,

What was the model number, manufacture and price of the VFD you ended up getting?

What is the HP of the 3 ph motors?

Is there a power reduction when using a VFD as when using a standard phase converter? I beleive you end up with 2/3 the hp rating of the motor with a phase converter.

Have a great day,
Bob

[sharpshooter90]

Sharpshooter90,

What was the model number, manufacture and price of the VFD you ended up getting?

What is the HP of the 3 ph motors?

Is there a power reduction when using a VFD as when using a standard phase converter? I beleive you end up with 2/3 the hp rating of the motor with a phase converter.

Have a great day,
Bob

The new controller is a GS2-22PO model from Automation direct. It is rated at 2HP. I got a couple of GE motors from Surplus center- I chose the 1HP motors, figuring they would get max performance out of a 2HP driver, plus I figure after dumping all that mechanism from the original machine and running the spindles direct, 1HP should be fine. Still haven't mounted the motors- got sidetracked on another assignment.

[billmiller]

I just ordered one with ballscrews, dro and 4axis cnc. I hope it doesnt take months to get here. let me know when you get yours and how the setup goes.

[sharpshooter90]

I just ordered one with ballscrews, dro and 4axis cnc. I hope it doesnt take months to get here. let me know when you get yours and how the setup goes.

Billmill,
Actually I've already got the Patriot machine. I bought the early one with regular motors and have been doing my own VFD retrofit- let us know how the factory version looks when you get it.

[bowman1964]

well as soon as mine arives i will post some pictures. i spoke to john last monday and there was a holdup on the stepper motors that arived for the 2010 machine. he was hoping to have mine shipped this week. i have one with 4 axles cnc, dro,and rotary table.it has taken mine 5 months from date of order.but i am sure it will be worth it when it arives.

[billmiller]

I was adimate about getting one in a timely manner and he assured me that he had two in stock. I have seen many threads about how long it takes to get a machine and having the order incorrectly or incompletely delivered to boot. On the flip side John seems to be more than helpful with tech assistance.

[bowman1964]

I was adimate about getting one in a timely manner and he assured me that he had two in stock. I have seen many threads about how long it takes to get a machine and having the order incorrectly or incompletely delivered to boot. On the flip side John seems to be more than helpful with tech assistance.

well i know he told me he ordered a container full of machines.and they arrived around the end of last month. he told me they have to uncrate every machine. add upgrades and run. the steppers that arrived were the wrong specification that arrived and he had to get the manufacturer to reship the correct ones. i know they are dealing with lots of rain he said the last month so they cannt work on machines outside. i have no reason to doubt hin in the least. i told him i was in no hurry,i want mine right so take his time. i am hoping mine will ship next week. i am sure if said he 2 in stock he was refering to the container load. he must have a couple that were ordered for stock.

[billmiller]

I have almost no experience with cnc machining so getting programs to run will be a challenge for me. I am just jumping into this process with both feet. A friend has done the same about 5 years ago and is doing some really cool stuff.
I am fairly good at creating forms in Autodesk Inventor and have a bunch of files created ready to to create tool paths but I am struggling with Edgecam right now. The program is so deep that I keep hiting road blocks. I have not even started to learn Mach 3.
John doesnt supply any software with the cnc unit does he?
A friend has set up edgecam to write code for his retrofitted bostomatic machine. I suspect it will run the same for the Patriot?