machine config overview questions

I have a "family" of machines I would like to try EMC on. They are all vertical machining centers, 2 are 3 ax, 2 are 4 ax, all have vector motor spindles, resolvers all around. I also like ladder logic for i/o troubleshooting and sequencing events. I like servo control boards with real dac's and was looking at Vigilant Technology PCI boards. I was hoping to use an automation direct plc for the non real time i/o amd modbus it into emc. so basically the machine:
15kw spindle vector motor with resolver
(3) 30 newton meter servo motors with resolver
(1) 10 newton meter servo motor with encoder( 4th axis)
umbrella style drum toolchanger
chip conveyors
surface sensing and tool length probing
48 inputs
32 outputs

The mesa boards seem more popular but I am leery of not have a dac chip on the board for the 0-10vdc analog outputs. All the boards I looked at, none could handle 80 i/0 points plus the servo/ spindle so I am looking at multiple boards or 1 board and modbus to a plc for the rest. I do like the fanuc i/o rack model A I have on some machines with fanuc 16's, easy to replace 1 module. I am new to both emc and linux. I do have a box loaded up with linux rt and have played with it a bit.

Looking for advise on where to go on the hardware side of this project.

when I spoke to the guys at mesa about their stuff, the 144 io card still would not do 80 io plus 4 ax plus a vector spindle, as each servo took at least 10 i/o spots as I recall. I know they were the ones who said I could use their board for motion and then modbus in the non time critical stuff.

The 3X20 has 144 I/O bits so should be able to control 8 servo Axis (2X 7I33TAs) and have 96 I/O bits left
if you used 4x 7I37TAs with these 96 bits, you would have 32x 1A 24VDC outputs and 64x isolated 4-24VDC inputs.
If you used 4x OPTO22 24 I/O module racks with the 96 free I/O bits, you could have 96 I/O points with a per point choice of AC in, AC out, DC in and DC out.

The 7I48 is now supported in master. It supports 6 Axis on one (24 bit) I/O connector instead of the 7I33s 4 axis. With that you can have more free
I/O = 120 free I/O points with a 3X20

This still may not be ideal since its likely most of your I/O points are not real time so could be done with a modbus interfaced PLC

How does the Fanuc IO rack model A interface? Maybe it can be re-used...

If these machines had fanuc's on them I would not be changing..... the i/o is all on proprietary interfaces boards now... all analog ac brushless servo drives with a vector motor spindle, resolvers all around the 3 axes plus spindle. The 4th axis is an ac analog brushless with encoder and an electrocraft max 430 drive. The rest of the machine is kollmorgens... which have their moments.

I like ladder - my fanuc's all have it and its great for troubleshooting (plus I can edit the ladder in most of my fanuc's if needed). Classic ladder would work, I need to get more into that. I'll look at the boards in PCW's post.