Zenbot 1216 CNC
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General
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As of Oct 24 2012 Gerrit and Mike L have been researching this CNC with the goal of getting it working.
Parts that make up this system:
- Zenbot itself (Includes the body, armatures, and the x, y, and z motors and actuation hardware (belts))
- Believed to be a Zenbot 1624, hasn't been absolutely confirmed (Unsure if zenbot stamps model numbers on their products) zenbot 1624 product page
- X, Y, Z motor controller
- Believed to be a Mechatronics 3-axis CNC micro-stepper motor driver mechtronics 3-axis
- Power brick for X, Y, Z controller
- Labeled "PA3290U-2ACA SEB 100P2-15.0". Input 100-240v 2.5A 50/60Hz. Output 19V at 6.3A. Center of connector is plus, outer shield is minus.
- Spindle (the routing part) - Believed to be a Wolfgang Engineering ... um ... spindle? (they don't seem to have any model info on the spindle or historical information on the website)
- Spindle motor controller
- Cytron Technologies MD30B
- Spindle power supply - MISSING
- Documentation for the MD30B controller says that it wants between 10 and 30Vdc with with a peak (output) of 30A (at 12Vdc?). Current product from wolfgangengineering has 200W 12Vdc motor, so 30A peek seems possible.
- Computer running EMC2 CNC control software and that has a parallel port
- Thin dell desktop sitting with the zenbot is believed to be ready to go. There is some debate whether the EMC2 configure is complete. The people with Zenbot have said they have a (non-guaranteed) config that a customer made for EMC2 but thus far they haven't posted or emailed it to us
Log of research (newest to oldest):
Oct 23 2012 - Mike L
Following up on what I found out about the zenbot:
- Chris connected me to Gerrit, he is the writer of the note (that I sent earlier) on the zenbot and seems to be on top of what needs to be done to get it going. (I.E. he does "have the ball")
- Current status
- Believed capable of high precision operation other then a non-operating spindle (the router part) because of multiple missing parts, and likely incompletely configured control software.
- Parts needed to get the zenbot operating:
- Power supply for the spindle motor
- either found by chorgy or an expense of $75-150
- Belts for spindle
- Gerrit had an exchange with Wolfgang Eng (maker of the spindle part) and thinks he may have enough info to order from a parts house (price currently unknown, though expected to be low)
- More bits (there is one with the zenbot now)
- Both Gerrit and chorgy agree that ebay is the way to go. Gerrit's comment was that the reason that ebay bits are so cheap is because they are partly used and have become slightly out of dimensional spec. With effort, the bits can be re-measure there-by enabling them to be used at full precision.
- Config for EMC2? (x,y,z stepper motor control software)
- The current assumption is that the EMC2 on the linux box doesn't have a fully configured config for the zenbot. Gerrit has contacted the zenbot and they have said they will send him a (customer supplied) EMC2 config, though they haven't yet so he is planning on bugging them again.
- Brian W posted that he had x,y,z working a few months back, Brian if you think the config is complete then please reply so Gerrit doesn't have to keep hassling the zenbot folks
- Power supply for the spindle motor
If the zenbot gets up and running, there are number of improvement that Gerrit is already thinking about ("stops" to calibrate the arms - likely requiring a different controller, enclosure for the control systems, vacuum system, etc..)
The consensus seems to be that machine is in good shape, and should really be capable of high accuracy milling if the parts/config are done and the machine is treated gently.
I have some extra time over the next few weeks and I'm going to try and help Gerrit move things forward, I suspect that may not be enough to get the system operational, but if nothing else I'll make sure to document what happens.
