Denford Mirac conversion help

[Hellfire]

Just recently bought a Mirac with tool changer etc.
going to convert it to a more friendly interface.
any recommendations as to which motion control to use.
mach3, mach4, uncc etc or something else.
i have a decent budget for the conversion and think the lathe deserves to be the best it can be.
smooth steppers and bob recommendations would also be awesome.
cheers guys

[m_c]

Support for turn is quite limited from most motion controllers, as it is a fairly small part of the market, so you really need to check on specifics for anything you're considering.
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Mach 3 turn works ok, but has a couple issues. CSS doesn't work correctly. Threading depends on what motion controller you use.
Mach 4 turn is gradually getting there, but there seems to be far more people posting with problems, rather than people running it successfully.
Suitable motion controllers would be CS-labs, Warp9 Smoothstepper, PoKeys something or other (can't remember the name of their motion controller!). Other options for Mach 3 are a Dynomotion KFlop, or UCNC, although I'm not sure how well UCNC supports turn, so you'd need to research that. As well as working with Mach 3, both UCNC and Dynomotion have their own control software (I use Dynomotion's KMotionCNC on my lathe, and although being a pretty basic interface, it just does the job without any issues, which is far more than can be said for Mach 3 :-/ )
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LinuxCNC is another option, which would most likely need some MESA boards.
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There are a few other options, but I can't think of them just now (PlanetCNC?).
The big questions are, how much are you willing to spend, and how good are you at configuring/programming?
You also need to decide on things like, servos or steppers, do you want to run higher voltage (12-24V) controls to help avoid interference problems, how much in/out do you need,
All those will have a bearing on what will be the better options for you.

[Hellfire]

Thanks for taking the time to reply, I would love to do servos with a closed loop if possible. But I am not sure if it is feasible or necessary. Time is my enemy, I spend 7 days a week working which only leaves a few nights for this.
there doesn't seem to be to many places in the uk to purchase the hardware I need.
what I do know, the turret is probably going to give me some grief setting up and the encoder on the spindle is going to be another pain.
The pdmx boards seem a good option as they can plug into each other with ribbon cables etc, but USA supplier. I guess there is no recommended setup, I guess I just want a no nonsense setup.

[John S]

Are the present moment only Kflop, and pokeys can thread inside Mach and for Pokeys it's mach4. Both are a work in progress, a long work IMHO.
Planet CNC can thread but it would be hard to do turret.

Possibly you best bet is Linux CNC but you will need a LOT of help.

[m_c]

I've just had a look at the Mirac lathe specs and realised potentially what turret it comes with.
If it is a Barafuldi TOE80, then you will not be able to control the turret directly via a Mach 3 macro, Mach 4 might just about manage the timing, but I wouldn't be 100% sure about that, as the timing requirements for the turret require fast responses to inputs/outputs.
Something like a KFlop could, as you can programme the KFlop directly to handle the toolchange, and Mach3 would simply command the KFlop to carry out the tool change.
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The other option is to use a PLC to handle the tool change (I used a Click PLC, and you're welcome to the code if you choose that option).
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One thing I should mention, is that even although KMotionCNC does everything I need it to in terms of running my lathe, I do miss the wizards in Mach 3. However, if you have a Mach3 license, most of the code will work, it's just canned cycles where things generally won't.
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Personally, given the Mirac will most likely use 12 or 24V control circuitry already, I'd be looking at something from CS-Labs, or a KFlop+Konnect(IO board)(+Kanalog if you want to run analogue servos with the KFlop closing the loop).
Smoothstepper/Pokeys only work on 5V.
I can't comment on PlanetCNC, but there are suitable MESA boards available for LinuxCNC, but as John says, help can be very hit or miss.

[Mad Professor]

Hellfire: I also own a Denford Mirac, but mine does not have the ATC.

Does your Mirac use the newer control board or the older LCB3?
Mine uses the LCB3, and I am using a Ethernet Smoothstepper in combination with the LCB3.

Best Regards.

[Hellfire]

Thanks guys, I think it is a Barafuldi TOE80 turret.
Regarding the turret, would it be possible to use the positional switch inside for indexing

[John S]

Smooth stepper can't thread yet either, It was promised 4 years ago mind you .........................

[m_c]

If you go to the Denford forums (www.denfordata.com/bb), you can download the TOE80 manual in the Mirac section (it's also in the Cyclone section).
It gives all the details for inputs/outputs and the required timings.
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John, the Smoothstepper can do threading using a single slot sensor as I used it on my old Conect lathe.
It's encoder threading that still hadn't been implemented the last I checked. I suspect the real reason for the lack of progress is the physical hardware doesn't have the capacity to implement it. I know the last discussion I seen about it, Greg was talking about optimising/freeing up resources, so I think it's another case of underestimating the hardware requirements, aka Gecko GREX and various others.

[Hellfire]

Hellfire: I also own a Denford Mirac, but mine does not have the ATC.

Does your Mirac use the newer control board or the older LCB3?
Mine uses the LCB3, and I am using a Ethernet Smoothstepper in combination with the LCB3.

Best Regards.

d411 issue 3 on the control frame, mint 3.28 on the chip