Biesse Rover 18 control panel vs floppy help!

[jcb121]

Hey all,

So my father has bought this old machine and I'm trying to get it working, I have boot disks for it so it is functioning.

My problem is putting Gcode onto floppy drives.

I have a usb floppy drive, I also have a internal floppy drive running XP.
I also have some spare boot disks and other floppy disks, These are two hole HD disks.

So there is this page: http://www.cnczone.com/forums/commer...py-format.html
Which isn't helpful and the guy is asking for $400!

TL,DR: CNI and floppy disks are bad.

Has anyone converted a machine like this to a newer control panel? maybe one for a bargain price from China?

The VFD and servo drives should be standard and it'll allow use for GCODE and have other benefits.

What do you guys think?

[JAZZCNC]

Shouldn't be too hard to convert to a new modern controller. Mach3 would easily control this machine given enough I/O to control all the pneumatics etc for tooling. Check out Benny's machine converted to mach3.
Thou warn you it will need someone with experience to write all the macros etc needed for tool changes etc. This will apply to any controller really so not just Mach3 specific. Industrial strength controllers will use PLC and ladder logic but principle is the same still needs to told what to do and what order to do it in.!!

If going Mach3 route Cslabs Controllers are perfect choice for this kind of retrofit because they have I/O modules so can expand has needed. You just need to know a few details about the servos like if Analog or Step direction and how many inputs and outputs you'll need so you can get correct type of controller.