I just picked up a Sharp HCV CNC knee mill:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/uy1vg5d0iz33WUFn1
It has:
-a Mitutoyo Millstar CNC control (an old Pentium S PC with a whopping 4 megabytes of RAM) that doesn’t boot; BIOS screen doesn’t show the IDE drive and says boot failed. I hear the drive spin up.
-Mitutoyo linear scales on X (AT-111), Y (AT-102) and on the quill (AT-111).
-Galil DMC-1020 ISA 2 axis motion control card
-Glentek brushed DC a servo drives for X & Y and Glentek power supply.
-Glentek brushed DC servo motors on X & Y
-a new 3HP Gromax variable speed head
Retrofit goals:
-be able to continue to use the mill as a manual mill with DRO readout (leave Mitutoyo scales on), but also switch to using CNC.
-inexpensively get it going as a CNC.
-eventually add quill servo driven axis to make it 3 axis. Eventually add a 4th axis?
Questions:
-Linux CNC? Mach 3? Other?
-Worth replacing the brushed DC servo motors and drives with AC? Sounds like a lot of time and money...
-Recommendations on drives, breakout boards, motion boards, ...? For existing DC motors? Recommendations on swapping out to brushless?
-Cost per axis to stick with existing brushed DC motors?
-Cost per axis to switch to AC/brushless?
My kids have been helping me clean off some of the grit and dirt and rust with Scotchbrite and WD-40. The Y axis definitely shows some wear and a bit of scoring on the ways, but the overall machine is pretty solid.
Anyone have manuals for the Sharp mill?
Docs for Mitutoyo Millstar?
Docs for Gromax 3HP variable speed head?
Recommendations for way oil? Spindle oil? ...
Anybody have a Millstar hard drive that I could clone?
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