Hi,
My name Andy i,m pretty new to this site and would appreciate some help with my boxford vmc 300 milling machine
I recently purchased this machine with a view to machining small plastic parts ,my reason for this purchase was enspired by some youtube videos on the boxford design cad software which also came with the machine which i installed on a old desktop computer with xp ,loading the software was pretty straight forward and setting up the computer went without any problems so far,however when it came to the machine i powered the machine up ! control panel came on ,work light switches on/coolant pump works/spindle runs backwards and forwards but their seems to be no life in the x y & z when manual mode selected or homing the machine , the doors are shut and all reset buttons are pressed , i removed the cover of the y axis and manually wound the axis by hand then tried to home the y axis of which the axis moved out ok but seemed to go to far were it reached what seemed the over travel part of the slide were it seemed to oscilate backwards and forwards a little at the end, but generally the machine doesn,t respond to any manual axis movements in its ordinary state , i viewed the drop down electrical panel at the back and one of the pcb boards as 3 led lights 1 red which is permanently lit and also 2 greens ( limit 2 & limit4 i think ) which are both permanently lit. i understand you have to reference the z axis first but unfortunately nothing is generally moving at the moment . I have read lots of posts with regard to converting the m/c to mach 3 which i will look into later but i would like to ask for any help with getting the machine to a state were i can reference the axis on power up and what to check for relays/boards led lights / relays as i would like if possible to see what the original software and machine are capable of . The machine as been in storage many years without use but as very little wear and slideways all seem in good condition.
Thanks