Epoxy granite vertical mill build log

[Nick]

I'll take some pictures for you to see how they are made up.

That would be great. I've put some rubber sheeting in for the moment.

Do you have any experience of Linux CNC.? If not then get ready for a massive learning curve because with servos and closed-loop it's a different ballgame to Steppers. I'm very experienced with lots of controllers and I'm struggling big time with Linux CNC. Luckily I've got a Linux Guru in my camp working on it, hey Clive S . .

Nope, It's been a massive learning cure. Very slow progress, hours of scanning the Linux CNC forum. You get stuck on silly things like setting up the home switches for what seems like hours. I gave up with stepconf and pcnconf wizard and just played around with the "hal" and "ini" files. I have however got Linux CNC working with steppers via a computer parallel port.



I have made my first chips and broken my first end mill on the servo mount for the X-axis. There were lots of issues milling this the X-axis pulley keep slipping. It looks a bit rough, I left 0.5mm of axial so I had to file it down, no finish pass but I think it will be functional. Waiting for a new belt to try it out.



5mm 2 flute end mill: RPM: 8000-10000 WOC 1mm, DOC 4mm, chip load per tooth around 0.04mm, feed 600mm/min
8mm 2 flute: RPM 8000-10000, WOC 1.6mm, DOC 8mm, chip load 0.05?, feed around 1m/min

I have got the china servo motors (analog) working with Linux CNC on the desk, closing the loop in control, it wasn't too painful to figure out. The mesa 7i77 card is really nicely made, nice manual, lots of IO.

If anyone is interested I will write a tutorial on getting the china servos working with Linux CNC, it might help with small things like I got stuck for a a good few hours before I realised I needed to set Pn146 to 0 on the servo.

Very brief video of first'ish chips

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzXHVFuu-qo