Step & direction v Rs232?

[Ross77]

Hi everyone, I need some help please. Im building a 500 x 800mm cnc router for cutting wood and aluminium. Im using servo motors and a belt drive system.

The delta Tau control board I have, can use step & direction or Rs232 data input.

My question is "which is the easiest to use?" and "which is the most accurate" since I need 0.005mm resolution for cutting fret slots in guitar fingerboards.

I believe I can use mach 3 and the step direction control and then feed the amp error output to close the loop.

the other option as i understand is use a g-code generator and feed it directly into the rs232 port, how ever each axis has it own address so im a little lost on how this would work.

Thank for any help. didnt have much luck with my first post

Cheers. Ross

[Zappautomation]

I would either just use Mach 3, and a driver that accepts clock and direction.
There are plenty of drivers brushed and brushless that will close the possition loop on the driver.
Alternatively get a propper CNC controller, and buffer the encoder signals to the controller to close the loop on the controller.

While Delta Tau have some good motion controllers, i dont know them that well, and i dont think you can just send gcode to them.

Originally Posted by Ross77 Hi everyone, I need some help please. Im building a 500 x 800mm cnc router for cutting wood and aluminium. Im using servo motors and a belt drive system. The delta Tau control board I have, can use step & direction or Rs232 data input. My question is "which is the easiest to use?" and "which is the most accurate" since I need 0.005mm resolution for cutting fret slots in guitar fingerboards. I believe I can use mach 3 and the step direction control and then feed the amp error output to close the loop. the other option as i understand is use a g-code generator and feed it directly into the rs232 port, how ever each axis has it own address so im a little lost on how this would work. Thank for any help. didnt have much luck with my first post Cheers. Ross

[Ross77]

Thanks for the reply. Since i posted that question Ive found out quite a bit about the controlers and they are capable of everything mach 3 can do and ive got the program to setup and send gcode direct. Out of interest do the servo controlers you sell have the amp built in? also I need a ball screw for the z axis but dont know what size or pitch to use. what kind of info do you need to specify one for me?

[Zappautomation]

The only servo driver we sell on our website is brushed and works very well with Mach3 and the other soft cnc programs out there.
It does not accept RS232 or any other bus, you could say it is a dumb driver.
I do have access to other driver that do accept commands over the bus though, but they are a lot more costly.
Regarding the ball screw, most people use a pitch of 5mm/turn, and for a Y axis, i would say it will not be that demanding, but if you could advise the following, i could have a look for you.

1) Stroke
2) Speed/ acceleration
3) Load (Weight of Spindle)
3) Backlash requirement.

Unless you are talking about a big machine, then the 1605 ball screw and nut would most likely be sufficient.