Recommendations on next step.

Afternoon all, 

I have been developing a machine similar to this subject on the forums HERE for the past 18 months.  I have it working with stepper motors and running with three axis, X, A & B with no issues. Unfortunately I cannot get the speed I need on the X axis with the stepper motors, and while they have worked good in the initial concept stage, I would like to change over to servo motors.  

I would like to go to a closed loop system, and would really like some help in understanding what hardware I need to be looking at.  I have calculated that I need about a 400W servo motor, but apart from that, I am trying to understand if I need a Mesa board, or other boards to link up to run through Linux CNC.  I will be removing one servo ( B Axis ) and looking to replace it with a proximity sensor to detect when the X Axis is ready in position to adjust the cuter.  

Anyway, any suggestions on what hardware to use or point me in the direction to start looking would be greatly appreciated.  






 

Morning Tommylight,

Your out of bed early......or are you just getting to bed. The current steppers I have are HERE . Nema 34 with 7Nm of torque. I figure this is probable a little over kill for what I need but I was not sure when I first started as to what size I needed.

Currently the best I can get is around 70 Inches per minute before it stalls out, and I need around 180 Inches per minute.  For the Breakout Board I am using this one HERE . Probably not the best, but again this machine is in the prototype / concept stage.  

Tommylight how do you find the Stepper Motors at 3000 rpm?  Is there much vibration?  I notice that I have a lot of vibration with the current steppers .  

Again thanks for your times. 

Ahh Bugger forgot that. I have pictures of the drivers and power supply but forgot to put the info up.

Drivers are DM860T from Steppersonline HERE
Power Supply is 48vDC 7.3A   HERE

 

Cutter07 wrote:

Ahh Bugger forgot that. I have pictures of the drivers and power supply but forgot to put the info up.

Drivers are DM860T from Steppersonline HERE
Power Supply is 48vDC 7.3A   HERE

 

With the specs from the drive.
Input voltage 18-80VAC or 36-110VDC

You could do with upping the voltage to the drives to 65v AC or 95V DC

Cutter07 wrote:

Tommylight how do you find the Stepper Motors at 3000 rpm?  Is there much vibration?  I notice that I have a lot of vibration with the current steppers .  

Again thanks for your times. 

You don't buy steppers or drives capable of 3000 rpm from steppers on line and you don't run those speeds with a parallel port and software step generation.

Hardware stepgen from Mesa or pico systems is needed.
Higher quality drives are desirable
Industrial quality motors are desirable
Higher voltage is desirable.

Thanks Rod for the time to reply.  

Given that this project is still in the prototype development phase, what would you recommend for Steppers and drives / power supply.  I understand that's this is an open ended question, as it would depend on budget, but what would be a solid choice to ensure good performance up to 180 inch per min.  

Also are there benefits to steppers over Servos in this situation?  

Sorry I have so may questions.  I managed to achieve the basics on the prototype machine through trial and error, but it's getting the point where my knowledge is stretched.  

Kind Regards. 

Probably the best improvement would be to adopt a mesa card as you are struggling to get the speeds you want.
You are meant to be stretched using Linuxcnc
I've been working with ethercat drives and its a whole new ball game!

Tommy and I both use Italian made Lam Technologies drivers and industrial quality drives from Lam, Sanyo Denki, Motion King and Moon. But the costs are exponentially higher.You probably don't need to go there yet!

Your new power supplies are good for 80 volts so upgrading to 60-75 volts would be worthwhile.. 

I'll let others answer your remaining questions