Poorly N sick Fadal 15 VMC Will live again!

[magicniner]

If there was money in the budget for it I'd be tempted to go for a Siemens 808D Advanced or other stand alone industrial controller rather than a PC/OS/Software Mash Up, you end up with something that has been developed with industrial requirement pressures rather than developed by a committee, many of whom have never worked in machining.

[Chaz]

If there was money in the budget for it I'd be tempted to go for a Siemens 808D Advanced or other stand alone industrial controller rather than a PC/OS/Software Mash Up, you end up with something that has been developed with industrial requirement pressures rather than developed by a committee, many of whom have never worked in machining.

What kinda money would something like this be?

[Chaz]

This?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/i/26375881019...kaAh6JEALw_wcB

If that was 'all' it cost and no licenses would be needed, surely that would be worth it?

[magicniner]

That's the 808D, 3-axis only, the 808D Advanced does 4 axes.
I'd expect to spend a few grand on the 4-Axis, ideally you also need the extra panel with speed and feed over-ride knobs etc.
Something Fanuc or Fanuc compatible would be equally good for a retro-fit but I favour Siemens as the documentation and support is excellent.

[JAZZCNC]

If there was money in the budget for it I'd be tempted to go for a Siemens 808D Advanced or other stand alone industrial controller rather than a PC/OS/Software Mash Up, you end up with something that has been developed with industrial requirement pressures rather than developed by a committee, many of whom have never worked in machining.

Yes, this and few other more industrial controllers are being considered. However, I'm pretty sure the Sinumerik controllers only work with Siemans drives and motors and it's not worth throwing 8K at the machine this Old. Also, Industrial controllers like Siemens, Fanuc, etc all have hidden costs because features like 4Th axis or Ridged tapping, etc are licensed.

Also, let's be fair the reality is they offer nothing any of the others don't, other than little more Bling.! . . . . I see it like Cheap kitchens.? . . . Good Kitchen fitter can make a cheap kitchen look Bling just using better quality fittings.!

[JAZZCNC]

A quick walk around today showing current state.

[Jonathan]

Sounds like you've decided already - your new years resolution is going to be learning to use LinuxCNC.

In theory the position control loop for your analogue drive could be put on a cheap microcontroller that accepts a step/dir input and effectively converts it to analogue. I wouldn't be surprised if someone's made a widget to do that. I don't think it would make anything easier though, as although you'd save needing to use the mesa cards (as may get away with just parallel ports), it just makes the tuning problem more difficult as you loose the nice interface that LinuxCNC provides (halscope).

[JAZZCNC]

Sounds like you've decided already - your new years resolution is going to be learning to use LinuxCNC.

Not 100% decided and still chewing on it but yes it's looking very much like LinuxCNC is the front runner. ( Thou John S will be turning in his grave calling me all the bastards under the sun ...Lol)