Hey all,

I'm Ken Cameron from Austin Texas. I am a former CNC machinist (mostly early 90's Haas mills), currently a metal fabricator and business owner. Most of what we make is used in our business, as such we are our own customer. This gives us a lot of flexibility when making machine tool purchases. I recently purchased a ~1980 KMB1-M from Brian Greul in Houston Texas. Thank you Brian for all your help getting the machine loaded on my trailer.

I am a complete newb with the the the BX controls that this machine seems to have.

The machine was in pretty rough shape when we got it home. The monitor went out. I was able to hook up an old Sony Triniton TV up to the video out signal to get a functioning screen with out having to buy and OEM replacement for something like $790. We have already replaced the spindle control snubber board for 279$ and fixed a bunch of damaged wires what were burned up when one of the snubbers got extra hot and crispy. Currently, the y and z axis jog just fine, and the spindle turns on and off, and I can move around through the control system. At this point, I seem to be having trouble with the X-axis, getting a motion error when I try to jog the machine in that axis. I'll be working with Shane at Martin CNC to diagnose that one as soon as my new multimeter arrives.


Long story short, I am wondering if it might be a better route for me to try to upgrade the control in this machine rather than struggle through learning it's antique control system, and trying to maintain 35 year old hardware. I am entirely intimidated by the prospect of an upgrade, but I think that I could do it with enough free or cheap advice and support. Learning the control might be a worth while prospect, but I am concerned that I won't be able to make any useful parts on this machine for my business.

When Brian owned the machine he used BOBCAD and some sort of internal windows software to DNC the g-code to the machine. I'm pretty sure that I can do the same once the X-axis issue is resolved.

So in making this decision:
1) I need to learn more about if my x axis is dead in the water, has a loose connection or what.
2) I'd like to better understand what a my machine is capable of doing in its current configuration. (Can I profile out the 2d parts that I have attached? Can it do 3 axis simultaneous interpolation?)
3) If I were to do an upgrade, What would be the best route to go? (replace servos with steppers?, keep servos and use Granite devices drives to control them.
4) Is mach 3 the logical choice in control systems? IS flashcut a good option, if some what more costly.

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, so I've attached a few photos of the machine to give the circle of more knowledgeable folks that I am calling out to some more back ground.

thanks in advance,

-Ken Cameron