Hello, I saw John touched some aspects, I'll try to touch a couple more:
> > > Hello, > > I've been asked to evaluate if EMC2 can be used to control > a double carriage gantry machine that it's being built. > > The machine has 5 axes. I tried to design a diagram: > http://www.privatepaste.com/7dQN52pZln looks like an interesting design. If it would be to work semi-independently, then you'll have to name them : X, Y&V, Z & W. > The X axis might in fact have two motors. I did a research in the > archive and it seems this gantry axis setup is supported. gantry axis setup can be done, there is a bit of code missing in order to be able to home it without certain hacks. If you want we can go into further details/specifics, but I don't see a big issue in this direction.. > Y1 and Y2 will share the same rail but have independent motors > and limit switches. call them Y and V, different joints, etc. Again .. there might be parts of emc2 that need some adjustment, but nothing majour (mostly because there aren't that many machines in use with this configuration). > Z1 and Z2 will be set up at the beginning of the workflow > and will stay at a fixed height until the end. ditto: Z and W.. > It will have stepper motors and encoders for all axes and > a bunch of I/O for coolant, buttons and a few other things > and a couple of pwm out for spindle control. steppers and encoders have been proven as functional with emc2, as long as you don't expect to correct position based on the encoder. (in other words: the encoders are mainly used to see when stepping errors appear, and everything is halted). > I should be able to influence the development a bit, so if > there's anything that would make it easier to use it > with EMC2 I would love to hear it. hmm, the things so far are a bit vague to be able to tell.. > I've been suggested to use the 5i20 I/O card.. I guess > that with a couple of them I could do just fine. I've read > they support EMC with drivers so I feel like I'm willing > to buy their products in exchange. I think there are quite a number of people working with emc2 and 5i20, that doesn't mean other cards aren't equally well supported. What is not working at the moment is step generators embedded in the 5i20 FPGA, although that might probably come one of these days. > I'm also planning to write the code to use an USB jog/shuttle > device for manual axis control, if it's not already supported. That's not necessarely needed, quite a few USB (and non-USB) devices are supported by hal_input, and thus are beeing used to jog emc2 machines. > I chatted with some kind folks on #emc and it seems this > kind of setup should work with EMC2, but I need to be sure > before giving the go-ahead to the guys that will build the machine. It's a bit hard to appreciate that from the outside of your project, but so far emc2 has been proven quite flexible. > I would also have to do most of the development without the real > machine, would the "axis" software be able to simulate it? Yes and no. AXIS by itself is just a GUI. You would have to set up a machine simulation, and that can be done by using HAL (lots of simulation components) and vismach (a special tool to visualise/simulate a machine). Look at the sample configs for scara and puma to see how that is done for robots. I think a simulation like this exists for some gantry type machines. > I hope to receive some input from you all and will look forward > to give my contribute to the project. That is always nice to hear. > Thanks in advance > > -- > > Best regards, > > Alessandro Zummo, > Tower Technologies - Torino, Italy Regards, Alex ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Check out the new SourceForge.net Marketplace. It's the best place to buy or sell services for just about anything Open Source. http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;164216239;13503038;w?http://sf.net/marketplace _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
