Retrofitting my maho mh400c

I am building on a similar machine to your which is Maho 400P. It is only capable of doing 1 axis at a time. I have therefore mounted stepper motor on each axis. This is all I did for now. I plan to use open loop design since 0.1 accuracy is no issue.

I will also need to replace or redesign its leadscrews because there is really a lot of play (backlash) in it. Almost half a turn on the collars.

But I am also stepping at exactly the same problem as yours...

I have 5u glass scales (Haidenhain sine wave output) attached to each axis and would very much love to connect it as a feedback closed system. I don't know if it is possible to use Stepper motor+ linear scale as a feedback.

I would love to hear what other problems you have encountered and also what boards,servos you have used.

So far I am doing 2 projects. I recently bought 1 BZT cnc router which is gonna arrive in a month or so. I bought this for training myself and getting more familiar with CNC operations and GCODES.

1. OLD Agie EDM WireCut. I have a software which is DOS and very limited. I will try using MACH3 software using its feedback pause when sparkgap is optimum. Reverse RUN when shorts detected. This is very crude but I think it will work somewhat. I have seen plans where they only used reed relays as a voltage gap detector hooked on the LPT ports input, so why should this be any worse than using an optocoupler+mach3 for this application? Some guys in CNCZONE also told me that this has been done in EMC2 and therefore I am learning this software also. I am not so sure which topic this is covered... I am currently searching for how torch height (similar to spark gap) is being configured/setup/hardware components perhaps required?


2. MAHO 400P. OPEN LOOP design? But seing this thread makes me more inclined to use my glass scales. The head unit was a TNC121 from heidenhain and purchasing a new unit of this is just too expensive and in my opinion perhaps not worth it anymore. On the system there is an amplifier circuit that has pins DIR, +-10V, Tacho. How to use this setup still is somewhat unclear to me. If someone could point out more documentation and research material i'd gladly dwell more into this.

I therefore ask the same question. Is there a way to convert the haidenhain sine wave signal to quadrature? Is there a PC card for this?

Regards
Franz

I have a friend who has a old EDM that will not operate with original hardware/software. We will be looking to get it up and running with a retrofit.
What DOS software are you talking about? In time we want to research and get it up and running with EMC so we are very interested in finding examples of EDM that have been successful.

Rick G

pirke wrote:

BigJohnT wrote:

If it is a resolver then Pico has a converter for that.

pico-systems.com/motion.html

John

Does anyone have any experience with these converters?

anyone?...