The cnc machine took its first steps today, well a motor waggled about under the power of emc running on linux.
Hopefully I can integrate everything and get a build of emc on something less crucial than my server and maby some opto isolation when i get back from france.
CNC development ground to a massive halt on Sunday. Jeff and Rob, friends from university kindly roped me into a project they are working on – glacsweb. I didn’t know much about it and frankly still don’t, project context if very thin on the ground. Roughly it involves going to Iceland, installing a wireless sensor network in Europe’s biggest glacier and developing all the support tools and infrastructure to get the collected data onto the internet (Effectively a glacier with internet connectivity). After three days intensive hacking, im starting to get a better idea of what im in for.
The Probes containing sensor nodes are lowered down a hole cut in the glacier up to 30m below surface. The holes are cut with the biggest jet washer ive ever seen! 745×1500x600mm estimated at 200Kg plus fuel tank. Normally this would be helicoptered onto the ice. Our helicopter has backed out so we have to do it by person power. For this I have been constructing a winching tool to help pull things around on the ice. Jeff has built some very nice axle assemblies to bolt to the jet wash. We don’t really know how far it has to go or what the terrain is like, yesterday someone mentioned that there might be a river to cross?!?!
The hardware seems relatively together, but I suspect thats largely due to Rob and Jeff’s last minute input. From what I can gather, the software is in a highly sketchy, untrusted state. This is particularly bad in the case of the embedded code which once in the probes, and they are potted, cannot be changed or updated.
Today we meet some more of the geographers who are on the trip. Hopefully we can gain some more information. One of the most satisfying features of the project is one minute I am welding large bits of steel then in the blink of an eye soldering tiny surface mount components
I began the reverse engineering exercise with a short familiarisation task. Tracing all the mains wiring provided many insights into the minds of the guys who designed this and also accounted for a significant fraction of the mass of wires. Schematic to come soon.
It turned out that the majority of the mains is to power the mass of “education friendly” extras this thing came with but have since been removed – cabinet lighting, vacuum work hold down, dust extraction, spindle control, two badly placed fans, a supply for the controlling computer and a couple of other devices I have not fathomed yet.
Modifications begin!
As a first step I stripped out all the extra guff that I wont need in its current configuration. Whist severely simplifying the wiring loom it also increased my confidence of the mains section by removing a couple of devices I do not understand – The vacuum hold-down appears to have about three associated mains thingies, one looks a bit like some sort of contactor, one has some sort of fine adjustment(trip maybe?) and the last looks a bit like some sort of softstart or power factor (angle?) adjustment. I have not actually removed the relays and associated wiring, just the supply cables to the actual devices.
Two very satisfying devices to remove were the safety interlock and the emergency stop button. Both of these devices have caused numerous pain over the many years that boxford have been selling equipment. Whilst I embrace all sensible safety precautions, the configuration of these two devices are such that they cause many unexplainable problems to the inexperienced students (and teachers in most cases). They were also massively corroded from exposure to rain in the scrap yard.
I used boxfords handy contact form to try and get some technical information…..
—–Original Message—–From: nobody@bwsharedweblin01.star.net.uk[mailto:nobody@bwsharedweblin01.star.net.uk]
Sent: 17 July 2008 20:09
To: Sales
Subject: Boxford Contact FormBelow is the result of your feedback form. It was submitted by
() on Thursday, July 17, 2008 at 20:08:54
—————————————————————————
Additional_Requests: We have recently aquired a 500HSR High speed router, it did not come with any literature. Are any technical referances still available for it. Eg User manual/service manual?
Many thanks
Tom
submit: Submit
They replied the next day
Dear Tom
Sorry but that machine as been obsolete for approx 13 years.
The only route for that machine would be an upgrade.
This would require the machines return to Boxford, Halifax.Unfortunately we can only offer the upgrade and software if you are an education establishment, as we are only licensed for education.
Sincerely
Steve Bowers (Customer Service Manager)
Anybody detect a negative note in Steve’s voice? But hey what did I expect from a sales person, an answer the actual question I asked rather than a polite get lost?
Reverse engineering it is then
A week or two ago I was at the scrapyard looking for spares with my friends who are about to set off on the mongol rally. In the car park there was an old cnc gantry mill (Boxford 500hsr) looking a little distressed. Despite sitting in the rain with a smashed enclosure, it appeard to be in relatively good condition. The chap that runs he scrapyard said he wanted £50 !!!!! bargain. I was unable to take it then, but returned yesterday to collect it. I managed to dismantle it into small/light enough parts that i could fit it into two estate cars.
It appears to have come from a school since obviouse parts are labled and there are a few mods which scream of school workshop technician. My gresses are St marys or King Alfreds. Boxford appear to only supply educational equipment. As a result the entire device is coated in saftey features and interlocks. I remember these being a cause of much problem during use at school (We had Boxford VMC’s). A significant “feature” is that the actuall machine is encased in a massive houseing that would likely survive nuclear war.
I have decided to sell the housing “feature” on ebay as it annoys me and is just so big.
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