lol :D
I'm still seeing double this morning Robert, surely I did not have that much to drink last night ;)

Cheers
Tony.

I have purchase some heavy castor's for the table today for the table as tony and myself are building the table together here is my table and Tony's in behind
http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showt...&postcount=141

Hopefully we will have Tony's table on it's feet this week-end.


PS the Mechmate wine bottle is to give some size. I will keep on using the same bottle to be consistent but many more will be drunk plus lot's and lot's from spirits for my still as well.

I forgot to say that they are only AUD $99 each incl GST (Goods and Sevice Tax) are are rated to 500kg each

Enjoying this build thread and learning a lot for my project. Thanks for the detail, photos and updates - they're really helping me see where I need to go.

Hey paul,

You will like the big castors on the MM. I move mine around constantly while I work on it. How are you going about attaching them to the table?

Travis

I'm going to mount a 50mmx100mm tube (Mounting plate on the castor is 100mmx175mm) at a 45% angle behind the leg ie between the front and back connect to the bottom rail as this will keep the caster is out of the way and I will not trip over it. I will take a photo when it's done in the next week or so.

Paul

Been working on the spindle Speed Control
 

Well A time of the Electronics update for both Tony (Aus MaDDog) and myself. I have being spending a day a week over at Tony house do the metal work for the so the updates have being slow.

Well wired the spindle to power and made it spin only for short periods of time (30-60s) as I don't have the coolant up and running yet. With Speed control with Mach 3 thanks to MattZee for the plug-in.

The first photo is of the the complete setup with the setup and also the EMI filters that will be installed. Yellow are the the powered coated iron Toroid core (VFD to Spindle) and the Black box with the silver label is the 240V AC EMI filter (Power Source to VFD)

The second photo shows the RS485 Wiring from the (USB converter to VFD) You will see that I grounded one end at the PC end (that's the shield cable)

The Third photo show the the VFD Wiring the black cable from the left-hand side the VFD power source and the right-hind side is the spindle cable.


(This is the test setup and not the final wiring cable types)

I have a lot of old PC power cables that I use for testing purpose


(Also these photos will help me when I finale do it for real as the cables maybe used of other testing etc or come off while moving it around )

Hi Paul

Thanks for the pics - I see exactly what the connections are now.

Regards
Ross

The Jog Controllers have a arrived
 

The Jog Controllers have arrived

An on-line shop was doing a Promotion on the Xbox 360 Wireless Controller for windows and save about 25% or more on the standard price. And will be using the Xbox 360 Plug-in for Mach3 http://www.machsupport.com/forum/ind...c,12753.0.html


Regards

Paul

Paul welcome to wireless control, I have found it to be very easy to setup.

Although we have different systems, one experience I have had immediately comes to mind - be careful with the functions you assign to the buttons on the front of the game pad.
The front buttons are easy to press as you grab the controller, so make sure you assign non critical functions to these if you choose to program them.
Initially I had an estop and pause assigned to two of the four front buttons on my controller and was accidentally pressing them.

You might be less clumsy but good design always considers clumsy in the design !!

Regards
Ross

Forget about the controllers... I like the REAL WOODEN floors..:)

The Mechmate Machined parts have arrived
 

The Machined parts have arrived.

The 3 x Z-slide for Ross (Surfcnc), Tony (AuS MaDDoG) and Myself (skippy)
2x idle arm for Tony (AuS MaDDoG) and Myself (skippy)
12 x Bearing support for Tony (AuS MaDDoG) and Myself (skippy)


Sourced from
Collins Welding & Engineering & CNC Turning & Milling
5/8 Havton St
Stafford 4053
+61 7 3352 4400

Regards

Paul


PS there are some more wooden floor shots for Kobus , The whole house has Hardwood floors and they are about 48 years old. The people in the house before me covered the beautiful wooden floors with carpets. I have ripped up all the carpet and lino and had them polished (only about half as I have about a tonne of Marine Fish tank and it to hard to move)

Nice to see you going Paul.

Concerning your VFD wiring, i noticed that you have wired your
input's ground to the chinese symbol next to 'W'.
However your earth bolt is the one with the ground symbol just below
that terminal.

Sergio

My mistake Paul
I have just disasembled the VFD just to be sure and
that terminal is the ground of VFD.:D

Those floors are really something....wish they were mine.:)

Hey Kobus - the timber is brushbox a tough hardwood species we have here.
The older timber is quite mesmerizing to look at in a polished floor, it can provide hours of entertainment checking out the patterns and colour variations.
The Queenslander style homes are elevated on stumps in order to keep them cool in summer, the downside is they can be pretty cold even in subtropical Brisbane in winter.
Like Paul I have chosen to strip and polish all my previous homes timber floors, just because they look so good !!

Ross

Z slides.
 

Hi Paul

How was the workmanship from Collins welding would you reccomend that I get them to do one or would it be cheaper to do a bulk order.

Did you just supply them with the drawing and they went from there.

and were they reasonable on cost after my last expierence with engineers four brackets costover $200.

Cheers.
Peter

Stepper finshed terminated
 

Sorry

Long time between posts but have being very busy.

Pic 1. All 10 stepper motors have be terminated with Amphenol XLR 4 pin Connectors. the other four are at Tony's house. As well as both flow sensors with mini XLR 3 pin connectors as they will be plumb up inline now so we don't make a mess later as the sensor curcuit will be done later.

Pic 2. You will see the pmdx-125 mounted to our Bob plates and the clear spiral binding that we will use on the stepper motor wires.

Long time between posts
 

Long time between posts

Been overseas for work (Taipei, Taiwan) and interstate as well and just been informed that I will need to go overseas most likely China some were and interstate again with in the month or so. But back to build.

A coupe of weeks ago I had finished installation of of all software drivers etc on the PC then I reboot to a total hard drive failure.:( Windows will not reinstall on the PC with a new Hard Drive.:mad:

So bought two second hand Dell PC that will fit into the controller box we little mod the holding bracket so that I can get to the connectors. This and the OS and interstate trips have set me back about 4 weeks as I have to setup the replacement PC so that I have a testbed again.

Looking on the bright side of this it I'm glad it happen before the machine was working. Lesson learnt building up two PC's with all software and settings so have a hotswap PC just need to move the Mach3 License across to it. Putting all those spare parts to use.;)

Well this weekend will be busy wiring up the tables.

Regards

Paul

Sorry to hear of your delays, hopefully the path ahead is smoother.

Do check that both PC's work as the controller. I also use a Dell Machine (bought two identical GX280's from the local Uni when they upgraded) one runs the machine perfectly, the other just misbehaves and constantly trips the e-stop, like when changing screens etc. Cant seem to make sense of it as they are identical, same MB same chip same RAM everything???

Give the PC interior a good spring cleaning, clean all contacts with alcohol; Uninstall all unnecessary software, then clean the memory, registry cleaner, defrag the hard disk & see what happens...

I remember in the distant pass that Dell have their own version of Windows operating system, it was proprietary to Dell.
I have tried to load a standard version of Windows onto a Dell machine and it would not run no matter what I tried. When I loaded the original Dell disks, everything started to work. There were also some applications that did not run in the Dell environment.
This is when XP first came out, so this was a few years ago, I do not know how it is now.

Lost my cable for the camera so that haven't be able to post pictures so here a coupe old one's plus some new ones.

Pic 1
Show the two USB XBox 360 charge docks for our Xbox 360 wireless controllers
plus two Welding Connectors that we will use for a connect to the control box for the table earth.
And of course the Vectric Aspire 2.5 soon to be Ver. 3

Pic 2

10 x Neutrik USB connectors p/n NAUSB-W USB feed through IP65

Pic 3

Close up of the USB connector both front USB-A and back USB-B this will be use on our control box to connect the keyboard, mouse ,USB memory stick and USB XBox 360 charge dock.

Glad to see you have the correct software..just shout if I must come and help out with it...:D

I have been looking for these USB connectors for some time but did not know who made them. At long last a name to the product - Neutrik.
Do you have an address where I can get a couple of them?

Thanks
Chris

Chris

I found them on ebay the seller that I got them form is "audio-spares" based in the UK

Here is the Link he still has about 20 for sale.
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Neutrik-NAUSB...item2c58f40504

Or you can search for "Neutrik USB" in ebay and a coupe come up.

Regards

Paul

Paul,
Thanks for the info.
Just by luck I went past Altronics yesterday in Melbourne and they had the Neutrik NAUSB-W for almost the same price as from the UK.

For those who are interested Altronics part numbers are :
P 0836 for the silver housing
P 0837 for the black housing

Cheers
Chris

Just got my update for Aspire to version V3 have downloaded it and installed it but have not played with it yet.

Regards

Paul

Mechmate Serial Number 72
 

I've got my Mechmate Serial number it's 72 I'm very happy with that still have a lot to do.

Most of the build of the tables is in this link

http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1919

and here is shot of my my table and control boxes taken awhile ago

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r...k/IMG_1233.jpg


and here is the shot of wiring Control Boxes That Tony's I doing and mine in the background waiting to do

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r...k/IMG_1488.jpg

Regards

Paul (Skippy)

I miss the wine bottle in the pics!

I still have the wine bottle. Just kept it for photo's so you may see it's return soon.:D

Builder's Log Update
 

Skippy,

Congratulations on earning Serial #72. In reading back over your and Tony's threads, I see how wonderful it has been for the two of you to work together to build your MechMates. That's special.

Here is the Updated Builder's Log.

Please review your entry and send me a PM or reply to this thread for any changes you wish to make to your entry.

Still have a lot to do its amazing were the time goes doing all the fiddley bits!!:D

Regards

Paul (skippy)

So what is the Rum to MechMate ratio? :D 600:2 Maybe ??? :D

Paul, Brace yourself, the fiddley bits just started...

Have fun!

Ken

Congrats guys.
Your build among others is what got me inspired to jump in.
Thanks for a nicely documented build.
Red

1 more sleep and the MechMate will be home. I think it is like Christmas.:D The BIG move is on tomorrow. I just hope it doesn't rain (leftover bits from Tropical Cyclone Yasi) i.e. see Ross's Thread (http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showt...&postcount=394)
I can't wait I hope it fits in my Garage with my car as well.

Regrads

skippy

The move went well
 

The Move went well you can see the Move photo's here in Aus MaDDog thead

http://www.mechmate.com/forums/showt...&postcount=391

I wish to give a big thankyou to tangocharlie (Pete) and AuS MaDDog (Tony) for the hand that they gave me. :D

Paul

Touch Probes have arrived
 

The Touch probes have arrived that I ordered from Gary at wildhorse-innovations Touch probe link

I just can't wait to try them out but that will have to wait as I need to rewire the mechmate to try it out.

regards

skippy

Hi Paul,

No good sitting there on the floor :p get to work and get them working!! I also need you to reset up my existing touch tools, as they are no longer working under Mach3 since my little computer issue we had the other week.
Would be nice to get all these little un-finished/outstanding bits and pieces finished:)

Cheers
Tony.