What do i need.

[Ali Kat]

Hi, and welcome to the world of CNC. Like yourself, I was totally bewildered by the elctronic side of things when I started and even paid someone to wire together my first little CNC machine! Oh what a fool I feel now when I realise what help there is on forums such as this one and how simple it really is once you have done some basic homework.

There is no single correct answer for your question "What do I need". A dozen people could respond to this thread, all giving different options and all would be correct from a certain point of view. For my own recomendation I am going to go with the Gecko G540. This is an "all in one" break out board and 4 axis driver unit that will comfortably drive NEMA 23 motors for the mill that you want to convert. There is an established xml file already in existence so Mach 3 is simple to set up. It is contained in a nice small aluminium enclosure which is fairly easy to mount anywhere you fancy. I think the maximum voltage supply is 48v for this unit so motor speed should be fine.

Next week I might recommend something different but I have just retro fitted a Denford novamill with a G540, using the original NEMA 23 motors and a power supply from ZAPP Automation. A few evenings of wiring and I ended up with a nice setup that is currently cutting anything that I can throw at it (repaired an outboard last night with a small machining job that took 10 minutes but would have cost me over £50 from Johnson / Evinrude).

Hopefully others will contribute to this thread so that you can get a feel for the different options that are out there. But most importantly, remember that we all started somewhere and I would bet that most of us have made our choice of system work to a greater or lesser degree. I wanted to get into CNC to make more accurate parts quickly but now I find that I enjoy building or converting machines as much as I do machining parts.

Good luck and continue to throw your questions at us -I for one will be more than happy to help and I'm sure that there's a lot more out there with a similar feeling.

Ali Kat