Sean;

Thank for for clarifying those things.

The only this that remains unclear is that since the difference on my X-Axis width at one end of the table is 71" and 71 1/16" at the other end. I guess my question is, when I set the rails, do I make the rails perfectly square or do I make up for the 1/16" on the one end? doing 1/32 extra on each rail on the side where the difference is? If I dont, my M measurement is going to be off by 1/16. Maybe I am just worrying too much about it .

Miguel, you make the rails perfectly square to each other so that the gantry rolls true. That means that relative to the table, there will be 1/16" variation, either at one end, or splitting the difference; it just doesn't matter because your table is close enough.

Think about placing a window or a door unit into a house. A best effort was made to have the rough opening be true, but you use shims to get the final window install perfect. You don't force the window unit to the opening - that would make it operate poorly. You don't worry about the rough opening.

Don't worry, just follow one of the rail setting procedures above or elsewhere, and it will work out.

Brad, Thank you. I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing anything.

"doing 1/32 extra on each rail on the side where the difference is?" Yes, that is it.

Put "square" out of your mind - only think parallel for now. (You sort out square with the adjustable end-stops and then you trim the table top with the machine so that everything aligns up at the end)

Gerald: Thank you, Well put. The Square vs Parallel made it 100% clear for me.

So today I cut two of the rails out (in between my kids football games) using the 15-20 passes as somebody had recommended and worked great!.. It looks like i will be using 1.5 disks per rail. These are DeWalt metal cutting disks. I am sure they are not the best quality but I was able to pick them up for around $3.80 at Loews (Only hardware store open around here on Sunday). after cutting down the two rails I noticed I was cutting them at around 30mm instead of the suggested 28mm but I am guessing that's not the worse thing in the world, right?

Doing the rails at 30mm should not be much of a problem...I was 6mm out and had to adjust the motor bracket slightly... I measured 28mm from the INSIDE of the 6mm thick angle iron and not from the bottom.

Priming Had begun
 

It looks like I got everything pretty much cut, driller, bolted and welded on the table. I took the table apart today (After my commute to work lasted 2.5 hrs instead of the normal 12 minutes because of the torrential rain we had) and primed everything. I probably over killed it but I wanted to get a nice coat before the pain tomorrow.

Tomorrow I will start painting the table and touching up any imperfections.

Welded gantry and painted table
 

Today I finished painting the table and finished welding the gantry. I learned a couple valuable lessons today. Lesson #1 ALWAYS use the right paint mask and safety glasses. Out of stupidity I assumed (felt stupid afterwards) that I would be OK using a regular dust mask when spray painting the table. After about 20 minutes I could taste the paint, so I cleaned my face up and went to the hardware store and invested on a good paint mask $49 and a pair of clear plastic safety glasses. The funny part is that at the end of the day I had more red hair than my wife (and she is a redhead) :). So lesson #2, also wear a hat :)

I wanted to thank everybody on this forums for posting their pictures. Today when I was tag welding the gantry I realized that my one "end cap" that is a little different than the other three was in the wrong size of the gantry. I quickly removed the tag weld and fixed it. No harm done... After leveling my table I used it to mount the gantry. It worked perfectly using SurfCNC (aka Ross) method with the threaded rods. Thanks for the pictures!!!.

I know this may be a stupid question, but which drawing has the distance between the Y rails? or what is the distance between them? I am trying to get them drilled and tapped before the weekend but my cold is not letting me think straight.

It's not on the drawings. Search this thread...
http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showthread.php?t=233

Thanks Steve!!!. That's exactly what I was looking for. I don't have my V bearings yet (coming on Tuesday) but I wanted to get it ready for when they arrive.

Would anybody happen to have a list of the bolts and nuts that I would need for the Gantry and rack/pinions? I am about to place an order with McMaster for the Pinions and I figured I would order whatever else I need to complete everything on the Gantry.

Thanks
Miguel

Sent a PM

Gantry is rolling!!!
 

So today I got the gantry rolling. I received the V-rollers and everything worked perfectly. I need to do a little adjustment with some pvc washers but I think all in all it's sliding pretty smoothly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndPl-VnvJvk

For all of you that are wondering what happened to the red color, WELL, always make sure that your primer is meant for steel :). Within two weeks of painting the machine it was already peeling so I had to sand it down and re-prime it. I bought the primer / paint combination from ebay and you can tell the difference when you apply it with the spray gun. 10 times better.

Tomorrow I will get the Z-car going and getting it ready for the electronics that are coming on Wednesday (THANKS MIKE!).

Hey what gave with the red paint :D ??? ;)

There is more red coming, don't worry :). The problem was that it wasn't sticking the the primer properly.

Where should I get the cable guides from? And does anybody have a specific model that they are happy with ?

There are no hard & fast spec. for the cable chain, as long as
1) it can take in all the stuff you decided to chuck in,
2) the un-supported length is sufficient for your needs
3) fits your bank account.

http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showt...highlight=igus

Specifications and requirements for energy chain.
IGUS, Kabel are good resources.
Ebay often has energy chain for sale if you look for it.

I have had excellent results with the medium energy chain from IGUS.
outside dimensions of:

1.375 thick
2.85 wide
radius of 100 mm (total bend radius of about 4.5 inchs, 9" approx diameter)

Available from IGUS direct or McMaster carr.

Miguel,
Blue paint sticks better to primer, we all know that. :):D:rolleyes:

Heath.

I was wondering how long it would take fore somebody to make that comment.. hahaha!!!

You did open the door with the "wasn't sticking the the primer properly." comment. :)

@Heath: I did open up myself for that comment :)

I have to say I am blown away about the "Same Day Delivery" that McMaster offers. About 3-4 days ago I ordered a few bolts along with a few different things from them around 9am, guess what??? It was at my office doorstep by 3:30pm!!.. The label in the box said "Speedy Same day Delivery!!!!" now that's fast shipping.

I am about to start working on the motor mounting and would love to know if any of you guys have ordered the belt and pulley from McMaster and would happen to have part numbers that could share.

Repainted Table
 

Here are the pictures of the repainted table. After re-priming it, getting a better paint gun and better paint. Starting to put it back together. I welded the 1.5x1.5" square pipe to the table to be able to attach the casters with U-Bolts. It worked out pretty good.

Nice work Miguel. Looks sharp! Great idea to use the square tube to provide a flat surface to mount the casters.

Looking good Miguel. :)

Thanks guys. I do have to say, this is my very first time welding and painting with an HPLV (Spray) gun. Who ever came up with the idea of putting training videos on youtube is a genius.

One of the main reasons I went for a bolted machine vs welded was so I could easily move it when it came time to move from my current warehouse/office BUT it has already showed is advantages. When I was mounting the X rails I noticed the table was about 1" off square which made me almost stop breathing because I hadn't notice this problem while I was building the machine. It ended up being a really easy fix because it was bolted. I loosened the bolts on the crossing beams and within 10 minutes it was back to Square, it was a good feeling!...

I added a youtube video with a bunch of pictures and timeline of the build so far. Hope you guys enjoy it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=se6LFuZdvHs

Great looking machine Miguel. Great music also.
You have a good taste :)
Wish you all the best

Thank you Ahmed!...Hopefully will be making some dust pretty soon. Trying to make my kids a home made skateboard (I may have to get some pointers from Ross/Surfcnc)..

So today I started wiring the electronics. I am attaching a couple pictures of the progress. On the Right hand side of the panel you can see the power supplies, I am hoping they are big enough.

:eek: how many machines you are building? i see 4 transformers each one big enough for one machine.
do some show and tell becouse that cabinet have some xtras that i dont think will be for the MM
but at the end... GOOD WORK

:D Funny !!! All that for a 2x2 machine ???

I really want to make sure that I have everything cover.. hehehe!:) Kidding.

Actually, we are building this MCC (Motor Control Center) for a customer of ours. It will control a car wash and all its machines, sensors, conveyor, parking lot lights, sprinkler system, etc etc etc. Unfortunately I didn't take a good picture of the top/left hand side of the box. There is three phase 480V @ 800Amps coming into this box. Some of the components inside the box are (12) 15HP VFDs, (1) 3HP VFD, (4) 48V Power supplies for the LED lights, (6) 500VA power supplies, 324 (Not a typo) SPDT relays to control the equipement (Soap/water/chemical solenoids), and our embedded controller that makes everything work :)

LOL！！！ You got me!!!
I was beginning to wonder how complicated anyone can make the MM control panel into :D

Z Slide Grinding
 

@Ken: That was the intent:). I wanted a little humor on the thread.

I just realized I had not posted an update in almost two weeks. After reading a bunch of threads about grinding the Z-Plate I decided to finally get it done. I have to say it was a lot easier than I had anticipated. I ordered the plate from McMaster (36") and once received it only took me 30 minutes per side to grind with the skate. I know there are a lot of pictures about the skate mounting and what not but I figured I would take some more. The pictures on this forum has helped me tremendously!!..

The 3kw spindle and VFD arrived today so I will be mounting that over the weekend. I will also be taking some more picture of the machine in the next day or so to post the progress.

Yep, that looks about right.

For the new readers, you can notice that he used a 36" long unit and ground the edge, then trimmed to length.

Quick Update
 

So I have the Z-Slide all drilled and tapped. Motors are mounted. The large black area you see on the side of the table is the area for the control boxes and VFD box to get mounted.. I think I will start wiring this weekend..

So I just wanted to give everybody a quick update. I took some time off for the holidays to get things done on the "Honey Do List". As the old saying goes "Happy wife, happy life".

The table building is all complete as you can mostly see from the pictures above. I have mounted all the electronics, ran all the wires and probably terminated about 75% of all the wiring. Over the next could of days I am going to be finishing wiring the limit sensors as well as the start/stop circuit. So far the contactor, front door start/stop button, gecko drives, BOB and power supply are all wired.

I will be posting pictures within the next day or so.

Looking good !!!

So I am stuck on what it may be a non-issue or just a personal preference but I wanted to make sure. I am getting ready to wire the steppers into the Gecko drives (No BOB). I have the 8 wire KL34H280-45-8A and I am going to be wiring them Bipolar-Parallel @ 48VDC. I have run two cables into each one of the junction boxes (One 8 Conductor shielded and One 4 Conductor shielded). My question is, which one do I use for the steppers? Do I double up each of the wires for the steppers and use the 4 Conductor wire or do I use the 8 conductor wire and then just pair the wires in the box where the Gecko drives are?

Also, just to make sure. I am wiring as follows with a 39k resistor on each Gecko drive.

(A+) Blue & Yellow
(A-) Red & Green
(B+) Brown & Orange
(B-) Black & White