Need Help!- 5 or 6 axis cnc controller

[macb6497]

I am looking for a 5 or 6 axis cnc controller and cannot find one anywhere.

Does anyone know where to find these kinds of controllers?

[SORCHEROR]

what kind are you looking for?steppers?servos?what size and amps?input power?i could custom make one but need to know all the above info to get a price

[RotarySMP]

TurboCNC
MACH 3
EMC

There are probably plenty of others.

[Al_The_Man]

Depends how sophisticated you want to go, Galil are pretty big in the motion control card business.
They go 8+ axis.
Al.

[macb6497]

Originally Posted by SORCHEROR what kind are you looking for?steppers?servos?what size and amps?input power?i could custom make one but need to know all the above info to get a price

I'm looking for a controller for stepper motors. The size is from 23 to 46. Preferably 23 at a rating of at least 3A.

Input power must be at least rated for 24vdc.

5 axis of course connected by serial/rs232 and is going to be run on win xp.

[RotarySMP]

I am assuming you are looking for a low cost solution, rather than simply paying Siemens $$$$$$$$$

Any of the common CNC Controllers like Mach 3, TurboCNC or EMC can control at least six rectilinear axis.

You should look at Mach 3, a computor with a second parallel port card (forget the Serial port idea), two breakout boards and a set of Gecko drives.

The hard part with five or six axis (as long as the axis are rectilinear) is going to be generating the tool paths. The only low cost soution I know of is the CNC Toolkit
http://www.cnc-toolkit.com/
I played with it years ago when it came out and it a great example of thinking outside the box, but if you are thinking of machine metals you would have to get very good at using it to be able to make usable multi-cut tool paths.

If you are thinking about complex geometry such as a Hexapod or non rectilinear robot, but want to feed it regular Rectilinear G code, you will probably have to use EMC and get really deep into the HAL widgets in that world.

[macb6497]

Originally Posted by RotarySMP I am assuming you are looking for a low cost solution, rather than simply paying Siemens $$$$$$$$$ Any of the common CNC Controllers like Mach 3, TurboCNC or EMC can control at least six rectilinear axis. You should look at Mach 3, a computor with a second parallel port card (forget the Serial port idea), two breakout boards and a set of Gecko drives. The hard part with five or six axis (as long as the axis are rectilinear) is going to be generating the tool paths. The only low cost soution I know of is the CNC Toolkit http://www.cnc-toolkit.com/ I played with it years ago when it came out and it a great example of thinking outside the box, but if you are thinking of machine metals you would have to get very good at using it to be able to make usable multi-cut tool paths. If you are thinking about complex geometry such as a Hexapod or non rectilinear robot, but want to feed it regular Rectilinear G code, you will probably have to use EMC and get really deep into the HAL widgets in that world.

Ok, what I already have is Mach 3 on win xp, alibre cad design standard, and Cambam (can that produce 5 axis code?).

When you said get a second board your saying mach 3 can make that second board act as if it was a Rx, Ry controller embeded into one controller. (The first 3 axis controller)

What I mean by this is Mach 3 able to "mesh board together and make it seem as if they wre one board put together?

[RotarySMP]

Yes that is abouit it. Mach is doing all the thinking, the stepper drivers each get a step and direction signal. They have no idea that they are part of a six axis machine. They just spin the motors when told to.

As Mach needs to control multiple motors at once, they Parallel port is the simplest interface. As the parallel port has a limited number of pins available for I/O, you need to buy a cheap second paralel port card.

Here is a schematic which describes the set up you would need.
http://www.doughtydrive.com/files/circuit.png

LPT 1 is the PC's integrated Parallel port, LPT 2 is the one you add.

What sort of machine are you planning?

[Crevice Reamer]

Just get a second parallel port adapter and connect up two G540s. Mach3 can handle six. OR get a smooth stepper and run two parallel cables from it to the G540s. G540 can handle 50V @ 3.5A. Software will be your bete noire though.

CR.

[macb6497]

Originally Posted by RotarySMP Yes that is abouit it. Mach is doing all the thinking, the stepper drivers each get a step and direction signal. They have no idea that they are part of a six axis machine. They just spin the motors when told to. As Mach needs to control multiple motors at once, they Parallel port is the simplest interface. As the parallel port has a limited number of pins available for I/O, you need to buy a cheap second paralel port card. Here is a schematic which describes the set up you would need. http://www.doughtydrive.com/files/circuit.png LPT 1 is the PC's integrated Parallel port, LPT 2 is the one you add. What sort of machine are you planning?

Ok so let me get this straight. There are two kinds of connections to the motors.

1.) The basic controller from a maker such as hobby cnc where it is rated to about 3A and you only need one parallel cable.
2.) A dedicated controller used when you need the higher current
Correct such as Gecko.


So if I plan to build the 5 axis I have two options.

1) get two 3 axis controllers from hobby cnc and two parallel cables to connect to my computer. The computer will choose which board will control x,y, and z and which board will control the other Rx and Ry axises.

2.) Get 5 gecko boards rated at whatever amps and cut the parallel cables so that I have acess to each individual pin on the cable. Certain groups of pins on the cable are dedicated to controlling a certain axis. Because each parallel cable is "programmed" to only support up to 3 axis, I will "naturally" need another cable for the other 2 axis.

Is this all correct?

So the plan for the machine is the upper section of the mill (ie drill and supports) will move on the basic 3 axis over the cutting area.

The drill will be bolted in between two planks so that it can rotate on the Rx. and and the piece controlling the Ry will hold the piece to be cut in mid air like the machine on youtube (mastura)

[Crevice Reamer]

I think you might find some of this info helpful:

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=78713.#3

CR.

[RotarySMP]

Hobby CNC's driver is simply three low end stepper drivers on a single board. The Gecko G540 is the high end equivalent having 4 on a board. The Gecko single drivers are more powerful and one axis per driver.

Regardless what drivers you choose, you will need more than one parallel port, as a single port simply doesn't have enough pins to provide a step signal, a direction signal, a home input, and an end switch for each of 5 axis. Throw in a spindle on/off, and a coolant on/off and you can see the need for the second LPT card.


If you look at the spec for the parallel port:
http://www.circlemud.org/jelson/soft...ocs/node2.html

you can see that some are only outputs, some are only inputs, and many are only grounds.

I wouldn't muck around cutting open parallel port cables to split out the signals to the individual drivers. Just buy two break out boards for that.

In the MACH 3 set up, you simply tell it which pins are wired to what function. For example you might have step X = pin 2 LPT 1, Dir X Pin 3 LPT 1, Coolant On Pin 14 LPT 2 etc.