MAXNC
Makers Local 256 (https://256.makerslocal.org/) owns at some point got two MAXNC mills. One was a MAXNC15 with a closed Loop control system and the other had an open Loop control system. They came with a 4th axis and a lathe chuck. The the company MAXNC is now defunct. The main problem with running these machines was that they used an unusual control system compared to typical stepper driven desktop CNC machines. Apparently it used a quadrature system. I have no idea what that means or how it is different. They use normal stepper motors.
Contents
[hide]Status
Its working. For those that know what they are doing. You don't know how? Git gud scrub!
Running the Machine with Mach3
For minimum cost I want to get it running with the MACNC controller. This means using either the MAXNC software, or using Mach3 which has two special modes for compatibility with MaxNC control systems. I couldn't find the original MAXNC software that would have shipped with the machines. And I am familiar with Mach3, so it was an easy decision.
The main thing I did to make it work was switch from the open loop system to the closed one.
this link has a configuration file: https://www.cnczone.com/forums/benchtop-machines/254426-cnc.html
Wat Do?
Fixturing
buy
- vise & parrallels
- (with vice hold-down thigamagics)
- https://littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=3763&category=
- All thread
- Maybe we should get this. An adapter that would allow us to mound the lathe chuck directly to the mill table. Could come in handing for machining round stock.
- vise & parrallels
make / buy
- T-Nuts
- The MAXNC used a unusial T-Slot. Obnoxiouly I have not been able to find any for sale. We will need to make our own.
- Hold-down Clamps
- 1/4-20 all thread
- 1/4-20 wing nuts
- laser cut some wood holding clamps
- cnc some aluminum ones
- https://discuss.inventables.com/t/clamp-and-work-hold-down-options/8608/18
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKYgI4bcCl4
- http://diyprojects.eu/online-g-code-generator-for-simple-cnc-hold-down-clamp/
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXIPJDy8d-s
- Another thin 1in wrench - 1.006-1.015 opening(1.0105)
- T-Nuts
Rotary Table
- Lathe Chuck Adapter
- The 4th axis is a CNC rotary table. The table itself, is made by Sherline, another company that makes desktop mills. The CNC conversion was done by MAXNC. The table has a though hole in the middle and it is threaded for mounting adapter to allow you to mound a lathe chuck. This is great for holding stock on the 4th axis. It will also be possible to mount the ER-16 adapter for the spindle for holding stock with a collet instead of a chuck. (more precise and easier centering). The part number for this table and chuck and collet adapter we have is: 37090 – 3/8-16 to 3/4-16 Chuck Adapter
- https://www.sherline.com/product/chuck-adapters-rotary-table/?attribute_options=37090+-+3%2F8-16+to+3%2F4-16#description
- T-Slot Nuts
- Sherline sells the very small T-nuts needed for the rotary table
- https://www.sherline.com/product/3056-10-32-t-nuts-set-of-10/#description
wiring box
- 3x home switches wire to be NC
- 2x probes
- reverse from NO to NC
- combine them with a NC relay?
- reverse from NO to NC
- box for electronics
- look into adding limit switches
- laser cut a box
make enclosure make air blower (to block hips. mount to head) make enclosure for the mill
Wire the 4th axis
The wiring from the MAXNC open loop system has different connectors from the closed loop system. There isn't a cable for the 4th axis so we will need to make one. It is a 6 pin conector simular to those conectors for CD drives audio internal to old PC's. (but those had 4 pins.)
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0015917060/3157045
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0015913054/2001994
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0014600064/3121758
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0014562062/313698
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0050579405/115035?s=N4IgTCBcDaIOwAYEDZkFoEEY4E4AEAsgPIAyAogBogC6AvkA
- https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/molex/0050579406/115038?s=N4IgTCBcDaIOwAYEDZkFoEEYAcCAEAsgPIAyAogBogC6AvkA
Collet
The MAXNC uses a spindle from Taig (or maybe Sherline). It has the same collet. Its a small closed ecosytem. The only thing that works with it are the small set off collets from Taig. The alternative is to get an adapter wich converts it to ER-16 collet system. This is a ubiquitous standard and you can get lots of metric and imperial collets. Its the way to go. Also Should we ever convert the spindle, we can get something with ER-16 and we can then keep using all the ER-16 based tools we get. Here is the adapter I got for the Mill.
Review of the adapter
There are three downside of using an adapter.
- The added length reduces vertical space you have to work with. (However in can also be a benefit win machining something deep. (Imagine trying to machine into a deep bowl and trying to not catch the lip on the head of the mill.))
- Adding an adapter will add a small amount of run-out. This not likely going to be much of a problem unless you are using extremely tinny end-mills or engraving bits.
- By adding to the length of the tooling it will slightly reduce the rigidity of the system.
Should these every become a real problem for a machining a particular tricky part we can always go back and get the original collet system.
- https://taigtools.com/product/1041-collet-set/
- https://taigtools.com/product/collet-nut-for-collets/
- https://littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=2317
Here is a link to an ER-16 collet that is drop in replacment for the current spindle. But if we are replacing the spindle I would rather go with replacing the whole head to get something really high speed, like 20,000 RPM or faster.
Probing
Using a height probe allows you to precisely tell the machine where the top of your part is. This is important for not crashing and breaking off your tool bits. This is a pretty descriptive video
I bought a basic pair of probes off ebay. They are nominally 0.75in in height.
Edge Finding
Here is the code for probing (put code here)
E-Stop Button
An emergency button is important for safty. The software has an estop via the mouse interface and the keyboard. But I forgot what ket it is. The hand control will have an estop button on it. But I want a big button that's easy to see. Like this one:
The button should cut power to the mill entirely. Also it would be great if it also sent an e-stop signal to the computer. Other wise it would just keep going. Traditionaly you would sind the signal via a pin in the parallel port. But without a break out board we can't. Instead we can make the e-stop switch also trigger a simulated key press to the computer, like what is done in these projects for keyboard macros via Arcade button.
Other Notes
The lead screw lead is 0.05in
At one point while working on the limit switches i was considering bypassing the MAXNC control system to directly access the computer via the parallel port to send input signals. That would require a parallel port break out board like the following. (I decided against it and instead decided I would wire everything to the one input pin available via the MAXNC system and upgrade to a modern control system if I needed more. (DB-25 breakout board)
Replacement Drive Belt
MaxNc 10 = Gates 3M-212
MaxNC 10CL-B with 1/5hp motor = Gates 3M-218
MaxNc 15 = Gates 3M-265
http://www.royalsupply.com/store/pc/3M-Polyflex-Belts-c1133.htm
http://kscdirect.com/search_results.php?q=Gates%2B3M218
Potential Upgrades and future work
Adding a 5th axis would require a different control system. I'm considering this one. Travis is using it on who of his machines and recommends it.
- rigidising the machine
- y-axis is simple
- z axis is a little more work
- x axis would be just to put a setel plate to its
- replace the control components
Wiring a Stepper Cable
Before I got the original control system working with Mach3 Bradley wanted to replace it with a Geckodrive.
- https://www.geckodrive.com/g540-4-axis-digital-stepper-drive.html
- https://www.geckodrive.com/support/g540-rev-8.html
I'm okay with this option but I would prefer to use something expandable to 5 axis, because I am strongly considering buying a 5th axis. Replacing the control system with something more conventional would require the stepper cables to be rewired. The steppers are 8 wires. Four wire systems are much more common. Most cheap DIY CNC stuff uses 4 wires and so does that Geckodrive in particular. I rewiring a stepper cable to test if the Geckodrive will work with the steppers the machine came with. Bradley has agreed to take the stepper and the new cable to his place of employment to test on a Geckodrive they have there. Bradley swore upon his honor that he would complete this quest. Yet still I wait. The following are my notes I write wile figuring out how to do the wiring.
The steppers the MAXNC came with Powermax 11 Model P22NRXG-LNN-NS-00 steppers
- https://www.kollmorgen.com/en-us/products/motors/stepper/powermax-m-and-p-series/
- https://www.kollmorgen.com/sites/default/files/public_downloads/Nema_P2_Stepper_System_TB.pdf
- http://www.portalnaukowy.edu.pl/allegro/powermax22.pdf
Motor Pins Pin 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 internal connect 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 (The pins that had connectivity) ohm 17.8 17.5 17.7 17.4 Color blue black orange black black red black yellow Cable motor side (indexing from arrow) pin 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 connected 1 6 2 6 6 3 6 4 Cable driver side (indexing from arrow) 1 2 3 4 5 6 - - - - no connector - blue orange red yellow black 9 pin serial port connection 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 case red yellow blue gray black orange purple brown green White Here is how to wire it from 8 pin to 4 pin (with serial Connection) Stepper side 2 and 5 get tied together and terminated 4 and 7 get tied together and terminated Motor Pin | letter | Serial Pin 1 blue | +A | 9 green 6 red | -A | 8 brown 3 orange | +B | 7 purple 8 yellow | -B | 6 orange
Apparently the Serial pins 1-5 gets a resistor put between them. Or at least that what it looks like from the Geckodrive documentation.
But what about the second Mill
I plan to turn that shit to a CNC lathe.
I think we've got one of these chucks https://taigtools.com/product/chuck-4-jaw-3-1-4-dia-3-4-16thd/
Reference Material
Here are some links to where I found information about MAXNC The following are pages from the original company that are available on the internet archive (http://web.archive.org/)
This another page available on the internet archive (http://web.archive.org/)
Here are some other pages
- http://harmoniccycle.com/hc/3d-CNC-MaxNC_FAQ.htm
- https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/MaxNCMill
- https://engineering.purdue.edu/AAECourses/Raisbeck/cnc_equip.htm#maxnc
- https://engineering.purdue.edu/AAECourses/Raisbeck/images/resources/cnc/MAXNCmanual.pdf
- This is not the original manual, but something written as an introductory overview for student at Purdue.
- http://hans-w.com/cnc.htm
I got the parts manual for the mill from this page. Looks a little shady.
YouTuber "Josh AQ" has made many videos about his MaxNC mill
CAM Software Thoughts
prioties in order:
- cheap
- simple to use
- adaptive tool path
- Trochoidal paths areas a "poor mans" adaptive tool path
- lathe option
- multi axis (4th and 5th axis)
- with cleaver use of models and programing your own g-code indexing should be posible bith 3 axis g code generator
- simulation
meshcam (standard and pro)
- $250-500 circa the future year two-thoswand and twenty two
- https://www.grzsoftware.com/
- pro adds
- 3D Toolpath simulation, usefull
- 2D Contour Toolpath odd, thats typically more basic that 3D
- 2D Pocket Toolpath, thats typically more basic that 3D
- Not sure about if it has 4th axis
- no turning
- meshcam for alibre
- half price
- Not sure about if it has 4th axis
deskproto
- https://www.deskproto.com/index.php
- https://www.deskproto.com/support-videos/videos-5axis.php
- $1k for 5th axis. thats a lot less, but I think its jkust indexing
freecad w/ path plugin
- https://www.freecadweb.org/
- https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Path_Workbench
- looks to be verry much in development
estlcam
- http://www.estlcam.de/
- only cheap cam with Trochoidal option that I'm familiar with
- thread milling
360 fusion cam
- Has everything include adaptive milling and 5 axis simultaionious
- subscirption plan
- not itar compliant
- no-one like subscription software
- cheapest is $70 per month
- I may not do that manny 5 axis parts, or parts that reqire adaptive paths, so maybe get it one month make g code then end subscritoion?
- maybe there are education licence the maker space can get
