Hi guys,
Just introducing myself and my new project. Been surfing this forum and others for education on how to proceed. There is a bunch of stuff removed from the top of the mill so it could fit into my garage. Also the covers are off so I could poke around but it's all there.
I know very little about the machine. Dont know the model# and the year was approx '83. It came with a dc servo spindle and a fanuc6. If anyone knows anything about this machine, please fill em in.
The master plan is to retrofit this thing into a single-phase production wood cutting machine. I have plenty of time and this is not just for hobby use so I dont want to cut corners. I plan on doing Mach3, upgrading to ac servos and changing the spindle. Mostly for higher speed but also because there is little to no info as to specs on the motors I have.
For the motion control, I'm deciding on keeping it simple with bobs and parallel ports or going with something like the galil/kflop or going all out for machmotion type of system. Although 7k sounds a little high for an old beast like this. I've heard people say the parallel ports are unreliable and I've also heard the ss/ethernet systems are also not reliable. Any input?
The spindle is the tricky part. I need high RPMs for cutting wood efficiently. I have a couple of thoughts. Tell me which is the least crazy. 1 - keep the cat40 bridgeport setup and run an ac motor/vfd in the original location. This could get me the rpms I need easily but the belt speeds are way above recomended levels. And since I wont be able to orient the spindle, I'd need to ditch the drive dogs on the cat40. Probably not a big deal with wood. Also, not sure what kinds of bearings are in the spindle and in the gearbox and what they can survive and what they can be upgraded with. Again. very little info online that I can find, and what I do find contradicts itself. 2 - pull of the head and mount a z axis with a hsk high speed spindle that I have already. Very labour intensive and costly.
Long winded but I'm ready to start on this and I'll keep the retrofit updated here. Any info would be greatly appreciated!
-Kevin