Retrofit Datron drives (CAN interface)...

Hi guys,

I wonder what would be the right HW approach to re-use the existing servo amplifiers and motors of datron gantry milling machines.
The old controller sends position data via CAN messages to the motor drives.
So far so good... question is now what HW to use to send the data from linuxcnc. Some kernel drivers for CAN are there, not sure which HW they support. Or maybe there is some mesa card which supports CAN (or some RS485 <> CAN transceiver adapter..)...

Any great ideas?

Regards,
Daniel

Little more info - these are small motors from a company called Engel, model GMN2636. 22Watts, 1.7A at 24V, nothing major. Wonder whether the 7i30-4 would be the right way to go, connected to a 7i76e.
Any idea whether this combo would be supported?
Before I order 10 of these cards from US

Regards
Daniel

LCNC does not support CAN. There has been an example of somebody using an EtherCAT - CAN interface since there is support for EtherCAT in LCNC. But that route will require some serious groundwork with only a handful of users being able to provide guidance. Can you give more details about the drives?

I already skipped the idea of re-using the CAN interface, and now just think whether to keep the motors and find a suitable drive (see above maybe 7i30?) or replace them with some JMC integrated servos with nearly same measures...

Regards!

I have a feeling that the General Mechatronics interfaces might:

True, there seems to be at least low-level support:



Kind of hard to find that information on their website if you don't know where to look for it. I wonder if there is somebody here who actually got that to work.