Chinese XK7130 a complete experience Review!

[lcvette]

Other controls such as the one above has fill in the blank setup capability, very user friendly after reading the manual,. No programming required.. servos self tune through the software, than just regular distance setup per axis... For the ATC, there's a series of steps to setup head height and tool pallet height etc very simple and done right through the control interface.

If pathpilot was within my scope of programming I would have a stronger case for sticking it out with Linuxcnc, but I just have not done anything yo date with it because of the controls and know myself enough that it will go another year if I'm stuck having to learn programming in Linux.

Big investment being held up by a smaller investment...lol. My father always says don't let a dime hold up a dollar . This case fits that bill..

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[lcvette]

OK, so i startd screwing around with where i left off with the Linuxcnc configuration and hardware and wiring charts.. I am adding one I did for my lathe as well, even built the cabinet but thats as far as i got before again having to stop due to lack of kowledge on the Linuxcnc programming side of things. the lathe project was another i was supposed to be receiving help on..

[lcvette]

here are some pictures of the lathe CNC Control Cabinet I built and have never powered up :/ has a built in computer and everything, I even installed Linuxcnc but thats as far as i understoof to go and got scared..lol

[AutomatedIngen]

I don't want to steer you the wrong way or cause a whole pile of confusion, but perhaps now that your looking at an industrial controller, it will be a good time to investigate the centroid oak as well.

If I read correctly, the centroid oak has all the same features as the other Chinese industrial controller you posted, as well as nothing but stellar reviews. Centroid offers a flying lead cable so you should be able to plug the servo drives into the oak board, eliminating your need to purchase new servos and drives.

You already have a computer that can probably easily run the centroid software, the only additional thing you may want to purchase is the pendant and build it into your console.

As for your lathe build, once again centroid can come to the rescue with their centroid acorn board.

I'm sure you just as much as the rest of us are anxious to see your mill up and running, whichever controller solution you decide just make sure it is expandable and will cover all future upgrades.

[CNCMAN172]

I agree with AutomatedInge

The Centroid Oak is an industrial controller, the issue with the Chinese stuff is most of the instructions are in Chinese and they always seem to have issues. The Centroid stuff is being used on all kinds of commercial gear. The Oak board costs $1595, and comes with their software.

CENTROID Oak CNC controller for mills, lathes and routers

You could still get the Chinese Servo Drives and Servo Motors, and use the flying lead cables from Centroid. They offer lots of options, but honestly if you have a Windows PC, and a touchscreen monitor you can delay getting many of those options. Check out the link and the video as this is a very robust controller that actually works.

Russ

[lcvette]

I agree with AutomatedInge

The Centroid Oak is an industrial controller, the issue with the Chinese stuff is most of the instructions are in Chinese and they always seem to have issues. The Centroid stuff is being used on all kinds of commercial gear. The Oak board costs $1595, and comes with their software.

CENTROID Oak CNC controller for mills, lathes and routers

You could still get the Chinese Servo Drives and Servo Motors, and use the flying lead cables from Centroid. They offer lots of options, but honestly if you have a Windows PC, and a touchscreen monitor you can delay getting many of those options. Check out the link and the video as this is a very robust controller that actually works.

Russ

That was exciting... Until I started researching and adding up the costs... Unfortunately it's alacarte and when you add up everything it's closer to $4500 that's just for control boards cables and support (probing too which is super expensive at $1790 compared to passive probe in Linux cnc) and all that's needed to run the machine as a true VMC with ATC. That isn't including the PC a monitor motors or drives etc. If I didn't care about that functionality I'm certain I could get far enough in linuxcnc to run the machine as a basic 3 axis mill even if I had to do so switch it over to pulse direction.

I don't want to steer you the wrong way or cause a whole pile of confusion, but perhaps now that your looking at an industrial controller, it will be a good time to investigate the centroid oak as well.

If I read correctly, the centroid oak has all the same features as the other Chinese industrial controller you posted, as well as nothing but stellar reviews. Centroid offers a flying lead cable so you should be able to plug the servo drives into the oak board, eliminating your need to purchase new servos and drives.

You already have a computer that can probably easily run the centroid software, the only additional thing you may want to purchase is the pendant and build it into your console.

As for your lathe build, once again centroid can come to the rescue with their centroid acorn board.

I'm sure you just as much as the rest of us are anxious to see your mill up and running, whichever controller solution you decide just make sure it is expandable and will cover all future upgrades.

No worries, certainly worth a look! The controller I posted can be had for $1100 shipped, this is without absolute encoder motors and drives and will work fine with my existing differential motors and drives in that configuration. The manual isn't the greatest English but I have support access to the control designers and they have been very helpful in answering my questions albeit it requires careful thought in wording them and a few terms need to be explained butt I see it as not much of a problem. I would attach the PDF manual but I think it may be too big for the forum. It's very detailed and completely written in English with see instructions as well.


I will say that if I have one major regret, it's not calling and speaking to someone at GSK about their controller to get the correct information about is functionality and which controller would have worked.. as it stands, for the cost of the GSK installed and operational it would have been less than any of the current options and the machine would have been up and running for coming up on a year now.

Honestly sight is hard to swallow..lol

So to my readers, research controls further unless you are a linuxcnc wiz!

The other appealing aspect on the 1000micb controller is it's literally plug and play for all axis and spindle servo. Just pull cables and plug in. Leaving only the properly to run wires for which is straight forward as they are all terminated to a pass thru screw terminal stop and labeled in the control cabinet.

I think that simplicity along with knowing right out of the gates that their motors and drives and controller will run with minimal setup is the most appealing aspect. Also because the ATC is astafardized Chinese ATC type, all of there pinouts match the ATC inputs and outputs exactly. As well as the lube and coolant setup. At this point that makes this very attractive!

I also just found a thread of someone else using this brand controller and is up and running so there's Hope it can be done!

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[CNCMAN172]

You might also consider the Centroid Acorn which is the hobby version which does include a bunch of the software. The board is $265 and another $100 for the pro-software. I agree the a-la-cart on the OAK board is an issue, they seem to kill you if you want to use the stuff many people need. Clearly their market is the people buying used $100K machines that are 20 years old, but with a new control they are amazing machines. Anyway best of luck to you.

Russ

[HrvojeL]

If you give me mail Ill post you instructions manuals from KND together with mail from guy that is service support. As I understood them (I am no expert by any means) if you produce G-code it will work with their controllers. Also, you can post a question regarding ARCs that has been mentioned in some of the previous posts. Anyway, investigating this route could be useful for more people.

Hey guys I'm still in a holding pattern with deciding what to do with the control situation. In the interim in continuing with the small CNC mill I build almost 8 years ago.

The last few days I've been getting wires for some of the available Chinese controllers. Specifically looking at the newker-cnc NEW1000-Micb-5 (5 axis version for future expandability) with new absolute servos and drives, also waiting on quote for an Adtech CNC controller. So far it looks like it would be around $2600 shipped for everything. Below are some concerns and benefits of I decide to go this direction..

Pros

- plug and play wiring
- ATC support
- Oiler support
- 5 axis linking
- Absolute feedback no homing limit switches required
- Absolute encoders 17bit 130000 lines vs differential 5000 lines
- designed specifically for spindle Servo type Sandler motor with rigid tapping
- Automatic screw error compensation
- User definable macros
- Plenty of user definable inputs and outputs
- Easy step by step box entry machine setup procedure to marry control and machine requirements.

Cons:

- No built in probing routines ( not sure how to add them but guessing its with input for the probe and a macros function)
- cost.. already have servos and driver installed, wasted money, already purchased mesa hardware and computer, more wasted money
- I would list customization but I'm not sure that would be an issue since the controller is already 5 axis capable and allows for macros.
- not alot of reviews on this controller that I've found
- support from China, not super warm and fuzzy feeling

I have enough cash stashed away barely right now to cover the cost of the new controller and Servo/drives etc, but had already earmarked those funds for some other much needed some upgrades.

If I had someone local who was good at Linux CNC it would be an easier decision, but having one person street my decision making on controller and then abandon me when the time arrived has left me a bit gun-shy.

I'm taking the weekend to contemplate this as well as research more on the control and how to use probing as it's an important part of my requirements. It's been excruciating walking around the machine for the last few months especially when wrestling with the small machines shortcomings.

Any experience with these controllers is greatly appreciated if you could share!

Apologies for the delay for those interested!! But hopefully something gets moving shortly!

Best regards,

Chris





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[lcvette]

I'm not looking at one controllers at this point in time, if I were to order a matinee with a Chinese controller, I would choose GSK as they have support in the USA from my recent research findings..

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[the_wildgoose]

I must admit I'm most interested in this machine using LinuxCNC as the controller (nope, not got any experience with LinuxCNC yet, but from the outside it all looks doable?). I wonder if you have all the cards and a PC, why you don't hook the servos up to the Mesa card and have it scoot around a bit? It doesn't seem likely that getting the servos to move looks tricky, hopefully you can get the spindle moving similarly easily. After that you can take a view on how tricky it looks to get indexed spindle, tool changer, etc? I wonder if you could rent some support on the LinuxCNC/Mesa forum to take things further?

[HrvojeL]

I'm not looking at one controllers at this point in time, if I were to order a matinee with a Chinese controller, I would choose GSK as they have support in the USA from my recent research findings..

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What exactly are you looking for?

[pippin88]

lvette, I'm happy to help with linuxcnc (I.e advice and help with config files).

Won't have time till the weekend.

Do you want to start with mill or lathe?

The wiring chart you posted for the lathe is nice (and helpful).

I should hopefully be able to help you get to a working config pretty quickly.

The built in wizards in linuxcnc are pretty good these days.

[lcvette]

I figured by far the easier to start with would be the lathe, but I've got some wiring to finish to run per and some assembly to do, will work on it this week, it tires in to running or for the rotary phase generator as well which the xk7130 will require to per up also.. will pay pictures and updates as they get checked off..

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[lcvette]

ok.. so I am moving forward with getting power to the machine for now and want to get the axis moving around via the drives.. as an update i have made a rudamentary wiring diagram for the 25hp rotary phase converter wiring.. please feel free to chime in.. I am using the wire size and breaker size the converter builder specified for this setup even though i know that #6 wire is only good for a 50A breaker I think he specified the larger breaker for the motor starting draw. Also the length of wire is only 4 foot total conductor length from panel breaker to 25hp motor connection, very very short. See the Wiring diagram below. putting my shopping cart together for lowe.. man wire is expensive now days..lol I am up to $250 just about with conduit, wire and miscellaneous brackets, straps and fittings..

[skrubol]

I think minimum AWG for a given breaker is in the NEC? code. Not sure where to find that info, but if in doubt, go to the next larger wire size. The purpose of a breaker is to protect the wiring after all. Having too large wire with a smaller breaker is fine (other than the additional cost..)

[gwiz]

I spent last night reading this thread end to end. I hope you get the CNC worked out soon Would love to see the mill making chips.

[lcvette]

OK.. soo.. after a day of planning and figuring and schematic making, i finally arrived at a full shopping cart for the Rotary Phase converter wiring... I am adding a 3 phase panel to the shop run off the 25hp RPC so if I have any future equipment brought into the shop it will be as simple as running 3 phase power direct from the new panel. this certainly adds some expense and initial complexity of the wiring but in the end i think it is well worth it! so grand total for wire, conduit, fittings connectors, lugs etc.. $576.00 :/ ouch copper is high ill tell ya!

I need to find some 6awg x 1/4" ring terminal crimps for connecting the 25hp RPC motor. it has 12 conductors which get bundled into 3 connections. I have not found any heavy duty temrinal crimps locally so will have to order them online and no next day option on amazon so far! any thoughts?

OK.. will update once i start mounting panels and running wires!

Thanks for looking in!

Chris

[brian257]

Try Ferrules - Wire Insulated Uninsulated Ferrule - Crimping Tools, Tool Calibration, European Specifications at Ferrules Direct for the connectors. We use them at work and hae had good service and prices.

[lcvette]

Try Ferrules - Wire Insulated Uninsulated Ferrule - Crimping Tools, Tool Calibration, European Specifications at Ferrules Direct for the connectors. We use them at work and hae had good service and prices.

thanks!! i actually went ahead and ordered them from McMaster, they were about $10 for a 25 pack.. better than $50+ for 100 that i'd never use considering I only needed 4. lol

[lcvette]

So here is the Lowe's order.. they made a couple mistakes but I'll get them resolved tomorrow.. getting jazzed again about the machine hopefully things rock and roll the next few days!



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