Thanks Jeff, I've more or less resolved to go the way of a "beige box" with perhaps a Mesa card if get too antsy at the thought of timing jitter. To this end I went to a nearby recycler and acquired a Dell Optiplex 780 with 4G of RAM sans hard drive for the tender sum of 75 Canukstan pesos. It runs LinuxCNC just swell, though of course once I brought it home I can't find the parallel cable I'd have sworn I got with the mill. Seems nobody local carries those anymore, so it might be a couple of days until I can hook things up :/.
Siggi On Fri, 21 Apr 2017 at 16:27 Jeff Pollard <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi, > > If you want to use a BBB as the main CNC processor (including > video/keyboard/mouse I/O), then you might want to take a look at one of the > boards I sell: > > > http://xylotex.netfirms.com/OSCommerce/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=114 > > It has two DB25 ports, with one made for PC CNC control, and the other > with general I/O. Both can be connected to DB25 breakout boards (BOBs). > The xylotex config file sets up the main port for X, Y, Z and A stepper > with 4 inputs for limit switches and 3 outputs for relay signal control. > It has no provisions for the encoders that your system currently has. > Having said all of that, I have absolutely NO idea what the TAIG control > you have requires as far as control signals. > > Jeff > www.xylotex.com > > > On Tuesday, April 18, 2017 at 3:26:51 PM UTC-7, Siggi wrote: >> >> Hey y'all, >> >> I recently had a 4 axis Taig Micromill DSLS 3000 >> <http://www.microproto.com/MMDSLS.htm> follow me home. I'm currently >> driving it with Mach3 and a ThinkPad laptop, through the USB->Parallel port >> module provided by Taig/Microproto, but this is ... sub-optimal. The driver >> box takes what looks to me (a rank n00b) standard DB25 parallel signals for >> XYZA step/dir control and spindle/coolant switching. The DLSL allegedly has >> 1600 CPR encoders that hook into the control box and are supposed to >> "servo" the steppers. From what I read the stepper drivers are half step >> only, however, so I don't know. The only user-visible benefit to this that >> I've seen is that if (when - *sigh*) I crash, the encoders detect it and >> flag on the respective axis "limit" inputs on the DB25. Sometimes it seems >> the USB module takes ... a while ... to bring this to Mach3's attention, >> however. >> I guess it may also help to have an acceleration/speed control loop >> around the steppers? >> >> In any case, I want to kit my mill out with homing switches at least, and >> perhaps limit switches. There are suitable inputs on the control box, but >> they get ORed with the servo loop "limit" gunk, which means the control >> software wouldn't be able to tell home from "limit". I'd also like to >> liberate the ThinkPad from machine control duty. >> >> In any case, I'd like to hook up a BBB with Machinekit to the control box >> I have already, and to hook up the home and perhaps limit switches to it. >> Ideally I'd want a breakout with a DB25 feeding the XYZA axis and the the >> spindle/coolant outputs, as well as the XYZA limit inputs. Screw terminals >> would be ideal for the rest. >> I wonder which cape or breakout board would be best/reasonable for me to >> buy for this (I'm in Canada, in case that makes any difference)? >> >> Siggi >> > -- > website: http://www.machinekit.io blog: http://blog.machinekit.io github: > https://github.com/machinekit > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the > Google Groups "Machinekit" group. > To unsubscribe from this topic, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/topic/machinekit/bZI0e2eceQY/unsubscribe. > To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to > [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/machinekit. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- website: http://www.machinekit.io blog: http://blog.machinekit.io github: https://github.com/machinekit --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Machinekit" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/machinekit. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
