[Coco] Homebrew CNC

[Gene Heskett]

On Monday 07 August 2006 15:26, Joel Ewy wrote:
>The design is by Dan Mauch, and it showed up in Nuts & Volts magazine
>around 199Idon'tremember.  The bulk of the machine is made of plywood.
>It has an X-Y table that moves under the Z axis.  The tool I'm using is
>a Dremel.  I bought the 3-axis stepper controller board from Dan Mauch
>as a kit and soldered it up.  It hooks up to a PC parallel port.  I'm
>currently using DANCAM (different Dan) for DOS to run the motors, but
>I'd like to switch it over to EMC.  To do that I'll have to redefine the
>way EMC uses the parallel port.

The new HAL interface in emc2 can do all that in software as long as the 
hardware can do it.

Emc2 is moving forward at about 5 to 10 commits to cvs a day, and is 
getting very very capable indeed.

>The machine may be able to route PC boards.  I haven't really tried,
>because I need to come up with better software in order to do that.  I
>noticed last time I used it that my (hardware store-grade) threaded rods
>aren't all that straight, so the table moves up and down a little when
>moving on the Y axis.  That would probably play havoc with any attempt
>to remove a thin layer of copper from a PCB.  But that might be fixable
>with better all-thread.  I attribute it more to my sloppy construction
>than any inherent flaw in the design.
>
>The machine can do 8000 steps/in. with the motor controller doing
>microstepping, 200 s/rev steppers, and ordinary threaded rod.
>
>Dan Mauch has a web site at:  http://www.camtronics-cnc.com/
>
>I'll dig around tonight and see if I can come up with the original N&V
>articles so you can look for back issues if you want.
>
>JCE
>
>Roger Merchberger wrote:
>> Rumor has it that Joel Ewy may have mentioned these words:
>>> I've got a homebrew CNC PCB drill press that's just waiting
>>> to punch holes in some copper-clad...
>>
>> Do tell... ;-)
>>
>> Any specifics? Details? Plans? Schematics? Tips?
>>
>> Also - is it strong enough to route? I'm thinking of the odd "winged"
>> ground connections on the CoCo's socket - if they could be auto-routed
>> on a board, that would be *very handy*... ;-)
>>
>> Thanks!
>> Roger "Merch" Merchberger
>>
>> --
>> Roger "Merch" Merchberger   | "Bugs of a feather flock together."
>> sysadmin, Iceberg Computers |           Russell Nelson
>> zmerch at 30below.com          |

-- 
Cheers, Gene
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