CNC Plasma Table

[Mayhem]

Looking good Greg. Are you going to put a water tray on it?

[f350ca]

Yeh, sheeted in the bottom with 12 gauge steel, will have a reservoir underneath with a fountain pump to flood the table

[f350ca]

Got it sprayed with an etching primer and Tremclad rust paint. See how it holds up. Bit of assembly and wait for the electronics now.

[awemawson]

Pretty as a picture

[Mayhem]

Looking at that picture Greg, I cannot help but think all it needs now is some white lines and a net

[wrustle]

The table is super nice no doubt about that, but damn.......that dog is beautiful!!

[f350ca]

Thanks wrestle but don't be saying that about Saddie, it will go right to her head,

[f350ca]

The electronics finally arrived. Spent an entire day trying to figure out the software but got the steppers to step. Have the steppers mounted and the cables fed through the raceways, sure neat to see it move.
They use partial stepping, 2000 pulses per revolution. With the 20 DP rack I cut the tooth spacing is 0.15708 inch per tooth, I made an 18 tooth pinion so 2.827 in per rev of the pinion, with a 3:1 belt reduction its 0.942 in per revolution of the stepper motor or 0.00047 resolution, more than a bit ridiculous for a torch drive. Still have to wire in the limit and homing switches then add a card to the plasma torch to measure the arc voltage and trigger the unit. May be making sparks in a couple of days.

[stevec]

Sounds Great Greg, (sigh! once again I regret moving further from you than closer )

[f350ca]

For someone who hates computers as much as me this wasn't the project to jump into. Spent the last few days trying to figure out what this thing is doing and getting close to no where. Could get the motors to run so thought I had it then couldn't get the interface to the plasma cutter to work. Reloaded serial port drivers on the computer till my eyes hurt from staring at the screen all to no avail, but I think there was a problem there too. They send a cd with the operating software MACH on it and a bunch of interfaces, two of which lined up to the name of the hardware I bought, with version II and IV, figured it had to be the newest, WRONG version IV is for an ethernet driven system, mine isn't, reloaded the interface and we have lights flashing (when they're supposed to and voltages changing when you hit the test button. So we're closer to making sparks.