Does this count for dust on the machine?:D

Greg,
But did the machine make the dust? The telltale jigsaw should be removed from the picture. :rolleyes::)

:(:mad::p:rolleyes:

Greg U got G' this time -

Sorry Greg,
Couldnt resist the temptation. :):eek:

No problem Heath. :)

Things were a little slow on the forum lately so I thought I'd stir the pot a little.:D

I wish it were the machine making that dust. I cursed myself the whole time for not having the machine finished. Hand cutting an entire 4x8 sheet full of small parts. Guess it will help put a little fire under my backside.

At least the table is working....just like mine..:)

Greg M

You might have gotten away with it if you had used a router instead of the jig saw. Gerald might have missed it.

Nah, the sawdust shouldn't only be on one end of the table and the off-cuts should be joined together. :p

I had a chance to get a little work done the past several nights.

I got the table level and square. Drilled and countersunk the bolts holding down the MDF. Installed the cable chains.

Nice!, interesting tables and kit in the background too :)

Greg,
OOOOH, nice projector! That will make a really nice movie room. :eek:

The Mechmate is looking good too! :)

Thanks Alan & Heath,

hmmm www.allen-heath.com....nice mixing consoles (sorry about the bad humor)

Too bad the projector is for a customer. :(

The carts are a design I patented earlier this year. They are the first six, almost ready to be delivered to a customer.:) The bases are what I cut out BY HAND :mad: in my first sawdust photos.

I think it's funny the way the title to the threads change as progress is made.:D

Forgot to paint the control box while it was warm. It's warmer today at 40 degrees so I may fire up the heater in the tent and paint. The alternative....overspray all over everything in the garage.


Shooting for "12"

Alan,
Looks like our little secret is out. :eek: I wish I owned a company like that one. :)

Greg,
I understand your dilema with the cold, its about 37 today and going down to 30 tonight. Gets harder and harder to do stuff if your garage is unheated.:(

Made some progress again today.:)

Pulled the control and prox wires, motor wires, attached the motors, mounted the button boxes, and mounted the control box to the machine. I know it's not the best location to mount the control box. With the limited space in my garage it's the best I can do.
:)

I still need to pull a router power wire. I haven't purchased it yet. I'm sure 12ga would be best but I can get 14ga for real cheap. What are your thoughts?

Greg I found the cheapest way to buy wire like that is to buy a good grade of drop cord from Lowe's, When I cut the ends off I don't need I leave a 2' pigtail for some later project. It's cheaper than buying the bulk wire.

Greg,
You can use the 14 Gauge wire where you have space or flex issues (or have a cheap cord available) and use #12 for the longer runs from machine to panel. At the current the router uses, the overall length and gauge of the wire will be the determining factor in the voltage drop. Dont forget the lines in your shop are probably still #14 unless you are running a dedicated circuit for it. Then use a larger gauge wire for the machine like #12. :)

Thanks J.R. and Heath,

Actually I found some shielded 12ga cable for cheap. It should be here Friday.

Here are some pics of work in process.

Looks good Greg!

I suppose your wife is pushing you to cut some yard ornaments for Xmas? :D

Fantastic :cool:

Greg,


Would you mind sharing your source for the "shielded 12 ga cable for cheap?"

Regards,
John

Greg,
Getting close....very close! Are you expecting a MM for xmas? :D

Thanks guys,:)

Sean, I'm hoping to be cutting by next weekend on a bouncing baby "number 12" Mechmate.:D

John, I'll have to let you know about the cable. My source is a great resource that Sean posted quite a while back, Skycraftsurplus.com. It's a Milspec cable at .35/ft but I'm not sure how flexible it's going to be. It should arrive Friday sometime. I did find some 14ga shielded on ebay. The jacket is not very flexible though I think it would work in a pinch. It was only $8 / 25'.


I'm having some trouble with understanding the e-stop / stop / start button wiring though.:confused:

Using two wires for each of the buttons works out fine with one wire left over in the 7 conductor cable. Although I've been reading that some changes have been made and it is recommended to run two circuits to the e-stop. One 120v to break the contactor and a low voltage one to the breakout board. My concern is that you'd be running a 120v circuit inside the same cable as the low voltage circuit. Plus I'd be one wire short then.:eek:

I'm curious what others have done.

Any recommendations would be appreciated.:)

Hey J.R.,

I took your recommendation and gave it a shot tonight welding up that countersunk hole in the Z-slide. It worked out fair.

I'll post some pics tomorrow.

You must definitely NOT run the 120V inside the same cable as the signals. The 120V e-stop circuit sits in a cable all by itself, exactly for the reason that it will generate noise.

Greg,

Thanks for the response.

So, I will await your conclusions about the flexibility of the 12 ga. I'm probably a couple of months away from needing that cable.

I was aware of the Ebay shielded 14 ga. I bought 100' of that supplier's dual shielded 4 conductor for the stepper motor runs based on JR's experience. I would prefer to run 12 ga for the router. My shop is wired with 12 ga, and I'd rather not drop down to 14 ga, although that is an option. Flexibility and cost figure into this decision.

Regards,
John

Sorry guys...no pics yet.

I spent the last ??? hours working on my wiring diagram.:eek:

Now I'll submit myself to the mercy of the experts and attach my drawing. Actually a reworked version of Gerald's work...Thanks Gerald. :D

If anybody can find any errors please let me know.

Be gentle:p

I see that the 12V DC supply at the bottom for your LV EStop is powered all the time, rather than switched by the contactor. Is there a reason for that?

Mains E-stop must not share cable with 5V signals:

The leftmost two wires in my diagram need to be swapped. The very left wire is the common for all the pushbuttons, ie. ground. But, if you trace it up to the PMDX, it goes to the dedicated e-stop input.

Thanks for your help Gerald,:)

The mains e-stop is only 12v dc. Will that cause problems with the 5v circuits having it in the same cable? I could eliminate one of the prox sensors (don't think the z is that important) and run it in that cable.

Good catch on the e-stop / common swap. It was the last thing I finished up at 1am before I submitted the pic. I'll make that change.:)

Brad,

The transformer is only powered when the mains switch is turned on. It can't be powered by the contactor because it's powers a "NO" relay that the ON/OFF circuit goes through. Kind of a catch 22 - can't turn the power on until the relay is energized but can't energize the relay until the power is turned on. That's why I powered it after the mains switch so it can still be turned off.:)

Greg,
That will not cause any problems. AC signals are the ones that radiate a lot of noise. The shielding on the dc signals is only to keep the ac noise out. Shielding on the ac lines help keep their noise in. :)

Greg, my reading of your diagram is that the estop transformer is NOT part of the "start drives" circuit, and thus could be powered by the contactor, since the contactor is triggered by the start drives circuit, thus energizing the estop transformer as well as the rest of the "stop drives" circuit. No catch-22 ;-)

Sorry Greg, I didn't look at the 12V stuff. Yes, 12VDC in that cable will be okay.

Brad,

Sometimes one can't see the forrest through the trees.:p

I went back and looked at the drawing and told myself he must be crazy..:confused:..and as I repeated your words while running my finger over the diagram it hit me.:eek::o

Thanks......

Heath,

I'm wondering if the second e-stop circuit should be in a different cable anyway. I'm probably waaaaay over thinking this one but suppose the hv e-stop ground were to short to the lv e-stop + very early in the cable (before any of the buttons). As far as the pmdx were concerned everything would be okay. But when you hit a stop button nothing would happen.:eek:

You're quite welcome, Greg. It's a pet peeve of mine; I like knowing that when I hear that 'clunk' of the main contactor cutting out, there is no power at all left anywhere in the machine. (Related issue: providing bleed resistors for anything with big capacitors, though on a Mechmate, as Gerald points out, those resistors are called Gecko Drives). :)

If I understand this right, you are relying on a miniaturised 12VDC coil relay to open 120VAC contacts when you push an e-stop? I don't know if this is standard practice - I would check that relay out carefully to convince myself it is as reliable as a contactor. A contactor has a tough spring to open the contacts and a big coil to close them. That's what makes the satisfying "clunk" :)

Sounds kind of crazy doesn't it.

I tried looking up the coil draw on my contactor the Teco CN-16-F6 and can't seem to figure it out.

Watching closely Greg,

This point of the project is "sleepless nights". Let me re-state that "FUN sleepless nights". If it wasn't fun, we wouldn't be doing it.

Your almost cutting. :D