[Novakon]

Dear CNCzone Members,

Novakon Systems LTD today unveils its new NM-200 Pro Series 2 CNC Milling Machine. The NM-200 Series 2 has raised the bar in functional design, expandability and performance to meet the growing requirements that are quickly becoming a necessity within the machining industry.

This model’s capabilities match that of the Bridgeport Standard with key new improvements including a 3HP motor, 6000RPM spindle, Novakon's easily maintainable swing out modular cabinet, optional 4th, 5th and 6th Axis for infinitely complex machining capabilities.

The NM-200 Series 2 turnkey package sells for $9,495 USD and includes standard features such as an integrated 3 Axes Gecko driven controller system which also accommodates an internal PC installation, 40” x 12” table, 24” x 15” x 11.5” work envelope, R8 Taper, complete coolant containment system, and a full license of both Mach3 and VisualMILL 6.0 CAD-CAM software packages.

The NM-200 series 2 is a cost effective CNC mill for manufacturing, educational institutions, R & D, Prototyping and both commercial and hobbyist applications. The new Series 2 is a culmination of customer feedback, technological advancements and Novakon's continuing pursuit of perfection.

Available for pre-order now and shipping mid June 2010, please visit Novakon`s NM-200 webpage at http://www.novakon.net/nm-200proseries2.html for more detailed information and accessories.

Novakon Systems LTD.
www.novakon.net

[vishnu]

I would love to have one, if it had an BT 30 spindle with power draw bar & ATC

[rowbare]

I would love to have one, if it had an BT 30 spindle with power draw bar & ATC

I hear you... Though an ATC would probably almost double the price. I would settle for the BT 30 and drawbar for a start...

[kvom]

Looking at the specs and comparing to my NM-200, I have a few thoughts:

1) Larger spindle motor and higher max RPM are good.

2) I'm not sure about the cabinet vs. the current CD-100, esp. if you want the integrated PC motherboard. If you have the mill against a wall access to the cabinet would be a problem. I assume you'd need to open the door to see the panel of the VFD. I also wonder about connecting monitor/keyboard/mouse, as the cables would need to be quite long.

3) The Z axis travel seems to be the same, so if you need to work on small parts in a vise, raising the vise above the table is a requirement.

4) Visual Mill vs. BobCad V21 has got to an improvement.

5) The base cabinet is still the same size, too narrow to admit a standard size pallet jack. To move mine about I need to be able to approach from the side.

Given that the price is about the same it looks like an overall improvement.

[Novakon]

I would love to have one, if it had an BT 30 spindle with power draw bar & ATC

Hello Vishnu,

We are looking into a BT-30 option for the machine now.

There is a power drawbar and ATC currently in development, we hope to make these available in the near future. Both will be in kit form and can be fitted on existing machines.

Thank you for your input!

Best regards,

Novakon Systems LTD.
www.novakon.net

[Novakon]

I hear you... Though an ATC would probably almost double the price. I would settle for the BT 30 and drawbar for a start...

Hello rowbare,

Our plan is to have the power drawbar available first and hopefully the ATC soon after.

We are looking at the BT-30 upgrade now and will update our web page if it is possible without a major redesign.

Thanks for your input!

Best regards,

Novakon Systems LTD.
www.novakon.net

[Novakon]

Hello kvom,

Thanks for your feedback! It's especially appreciated from an NM-200 owner

To answer your questions:

1) We could not agree more, the larger motor and higher spindle speed will be a tremendous benefit.

2) Below is a picture of the controller cabinet. It will house everything that was in your CD-100 including computer, transformer, power supply, breakout boards with Gecko drivers, and the VFD. As you can see, it opens easily via release lock to get at everything inside. The cabinet also swings open to the right by taking out two locking pins if a customer needs to service the switches, Z ball screw, lubrication lines etc. The computer connections including USB, monitor, Ethernet, parallel port, and additional 4th, 5th, 6th connectors will be located where the exhaust filters are for easy access. We will also be releasing a monitor and keyboard arm for the new Series 2 machine. This will be attached to the machine stand and extend out 5ft.

3) The spindle distance is 5.25", about 3" lower than our current R1 NM-200 machines. We believe this still allows for machining close to the table when using appropriate tooling and gives greater range for taller parts.

4) We completely agree as well and made the switch based on customer feedback of VisualMill.

5) Our pallet jack is 27" wide and do not have an issue moving the machine with stand from the side.

Best regards,

Novakon Systems LTD.
www.novakon.net

Looking at the specs and comparing to my NM-200, I have a few thoughts:

1) Larger spindle motor and higher max RPM are good.

2) I'm not sure about the cabinet vs. the current CD-100, esp. if you want the integrated PC motherboard. If you have the mill against a wall access to the cabinet would be a problem. I assume you'd need to open the door to see the panel of the VFD. I also wonder about connecting monitor/keyboard/mouse, as the cables would need to be quite long.

3) The Z axis travel seems to be the same, so if you need to work on small parts in a vise, raising the vise above the table is a requirement.

4) Visual Mill vs. BobCad V21 has got to an improvement.

5) The base cabinet is still the same size, too narrow to admit a standard size pallet jack. To move mine about I need to be able to approach from the side.

Given that the price is about the same it looks like an overall improvement.

[kvom]

5) Our pallet jack is 27" wide and do not have an issue moving the machine with stand from the side.

From the side is no problem; from the front it's too narrow.

How about sending a copy of Visual Mill to those of us who got BobCad with ours? I've had some success using V21 for some CAD drawings, but the CAM ergonomics are "less than optimum".

[ihavenofish]

2) Below is a picture of the controller cabinet. It will house everything that was in your CD-100 including computer, transformer, power supply, breakout boards with Gecko drivers, and the VFD. As you can see, it opens easily via release lock to get at everything inside. The cabinet also swings open to the right by taking out two locking pins if a customer needs to service the switches, Z ball screw, lubrication lines etc. The computer connections including USB, monitor, Ethernet, parallel port will be located where the exhaust filters are for easy access. We will also be releasing a monitor and keyboard arm for the new Series 2 machine. This will be attached to the machine stand and extend out 5ft.

i think what he means is that to open the cabinet you will need some room behind the machine.

if you are tight on space this could be quirky i guess.

you still need a little room behind the old nm200 as it is to get at the vfd and such, but its only about a foot or so really. you need at least 2 feet to open up the new cabinet im guessing.


doesnt really bug me much. the nm200 in my shared space is already 3 feet from the wall. the new 145 coming soon will get pushed up alot closer to the wall but i consider it "movable" for maintenence. you shouldnt need to open the cabinet much after initial setup anyhow.

[CROSSHATCH]

I'm still interested!

[g29cc]

ATC and Draw bar for sure !

[fourwheeler]

The new machine has quite a few improvements over the "old" machine. Well done Novakon!

[D..]

I hope your new machines really are new. The machine you sent me last summer had swarf all through it even in the ball nuts. There were oil stains everywhere and the drive belt was completely worn out. On rapids it sounds like someone is hitting the castings with a twelve pound sledge hammer every three inches of travel as the balls in the ball screws bind. This is with plenty of lubrication and it happens on all three axises. Everything I machine has ripples in it with the same pitch as the ball screws. I have complained about these problems since day one and John the owner of Novakon says he won't do anything about it until something breaks.

Today the Z axis locked up on a rapid traverse. Since it is stepper not servo everything was way out by the time the axis released and the part was completely trashed before I could hit the stop button.

Tomorrow I'll post the serial number of my machine. Maybe some of you that purchased a Novakon mill last summer can compare your serial number with mine.

I purchased the coolant containment system, the fourth axis and all the latest Bobcad and Alibre software with all the bells and whistles. Before I could get the mill repaired and operating at all Alibre came out with a new version. I have to pay for a full upgrade to get it to run on my Windows 7 computer. There are always upgrades of course but when you pay for the latest version and then can't get help from the manufacturer to get the machine to operate for 8 months it is frustrating.

[ihavenofish]

ill stay out of this for the most part as im not familiar with any of your issues, but:

the "clunk" in the axis movement happens on the one i use too as well as novakons demo i played with before. it may be the ball screw return, im not sure. it does NOT seem to have any impact what so ever on machining finish or precision, as in it does not "shake" the tool relative to the table.

second, on the stalling. this is an issue that relates specifically to the timing of pulses out of mach3 and the gecko drives. the default settings from novakon (75 ipm, 25k kernel) usually work well, but if you try to up the speed you need to experiment a little to get it stall free. mine runs at 100ipm right now with a 45k or 60k kernel and it almost never stalls. unfortunately every drive and pc combo is subtly different it seems and you cant necessarily just copy the settings from another machine.

my only "real" issue with the setup is i cant seem to get continuous velocity mode to work. i think theres something wrong with the mach version on the machine, maybe its onder. cv mode works flawlessly on my nm070 with a gecko g540 and a pc i built and set up myself. cv mode is purely mach software and the machine, drives, breakout cant be at fault.

[D..]

There is metal coming out of the ball nuts onto the ball screws and there is a five per inch ripple pattern in everything I machine. Edge milling, end milling and fly cutting. Same pitch as the ball screws. This is with plenty of oil in the ball nuts and light climb cutting (.002") finish cuts.

I have not tried to speed up the rapid traverse speed, and the pulse timing is exactly where Novakon set it.

The drive doesn't stall it keeps humming away while the shaft has seized up. It sounds like hitting a hard stop at full speed with the motor still pulsing but it is in the middle of the travel. Unless that is what a stall sounds like.

There is no serial number on the machine. Two of Novakon's technicians said it is an older machine made before they were even putting serial numbers on them.

When I placed the order Khai said it would be a few weeks before a new shipment came in. A few days later I got an email saying my machine had been shipped. I can only imagine someone peeked quickly into a box and shipped an old machine by mistake. Most of the cover panels had been put on and off so many times that many of the screws were stripped and several were missing. The paint was worn off under the screws. The spindle drive belt was worn out. The Mill was inside a crate but not bolted in like a new mill would be.

[ihavenofish]

There is metal coming out of the ball nuts onto the ball screws and there is a five per inch ripple pattern in everything I machine. Edge milling, end milling and fly cutting. Same pitch as the ball screws. This is with plenty of oil in the ball nuts and light climb cutting (.002") finish cuts.

I have not tried to speed up the rapid traverse speed, and the pulse timing is exactly where Novakon set it.

The drive doesn't stall it keeps humming away while the shaft has seized up. It sounds like hitting a hard stop at full speed with the motor still pulsing but it is in the middle of the travel. Unless that is what a stall sounds like.

theres 2 states for a stepper, "powered" and "stalled". the noise it makes when stalling it pretty unmistakable.

its slightly different than when it hits the hard stop as it doesnt "bounce" back and go again. instead it stops dead and makes a horrible noise.

you can get stalling from binding in the ways, but those motors are pretty unstoppable below 100ipm. i find its more likely that the pulse timing causes the stalls, especially if they are totally random.

i upgraded mach3 to the latest version last night on the ones im using and its helped a bit. i tuned the pulse timings in motor tuning to 3(step) and 5(dir) and im stall free at 130ipm using the stick 25k kernel which seems to work best. i also managed to bump the acceleration to 60. you can try these setting if you like, but the sensitivity varies form system to system ive found to you may need to tweak further.

i also got the CV mode working finally, its a setting burried in the mach3 xml. i guess it was off by default on older versions of mach. if you are having jerky motion, find the machmill xml file and search for "cvspeed". change the value to 0 instead of 1. i now get steady contouring at 100ipm, quite nice for curves and contours.

if youre getting ripple relating to the ball screw that sucks. i dont get that, i tried to listen close to the clunking, and i think it IS the ball return in the screws, but it doesnt seem to have any impact other than noise. i dont feel a vibration when it happenes and its not "timed" with the screw in a precise fashion, happens roughly every 3 inches.

again, i will stay away from commenting on the other things cause i know nothing about that.