Will my PM-45 CNC mill fit in this space?

[rmantoo]

Please ignore the mess in the following pics: I have TINY gun and reloading rooms, and most of the contents of the gun room had to be moved out to make room for putting the flooring in and then, maybe, the mill...

I just bought a PM-45 CNC.

This is it, currently sitting in my storage room...


As you can sort of see in the above pic, the electronics and controls are housed in a steel box, currently bolted to the back of the mill.

My plan is to mount it to the wall, above and to the right of the mill, like so (the width is correct on the template, although the height is not...there is plenty of room height wise):


The table is 45" wide, including overhangs for the stepper motor and controls on the end.



The room I'd like to put it in is basically 73" x 89"

I cut out cardboard templates and laid them on the floor...


This is the template for the channeled plate that goes between the mill itself and the stand. The stand and mill itself are a bit smaller, of course... This is on the floor, centered left-to-right, and 6" from the back wall. This gives me 15" on the left and right side of the ends of the table... with 26" of travel, that should be just enough room... If I have to, I can set my limits and make the travel a bit smaller...



I am going to try to keep the storage unit to the left... I'm just going to space the shelves out so that they don't interfere with the table... If it proves too awkward, I'll remove it entirely, but I just don't have a lot of storage room.



The next problem is that getting it into this room is going to be...interesting: Although the doorway you see in the pics above is 36", the door in the foreground of the following pic is only 32"...




So, do y'all think I'm crazy? I know this is tight, and not optimal, but my gun room has HVAC, and since this is Texas, that's basically a must...

Any reasons I should absolutely, positively, NOT do this?

Thanks,
Robert

 

[Boswell]

Yep, it is going to be very tight. My first thought is for the shelves, I realize you can space the shelves so they are not physically in the way but the shelfs and anything on them will sure be chip collector. The Limit Switches on the PM45M-CNC are adjustable and with a little effort can be set pretty much anywhere in the travel so you should be able keep the table from running into the walls. Don't underestimate the work to move the control cabinet to a remote location. Be sure to get it fully running BEFORE you move the cabinet so you know that, after you relocate the control cabinet, that anything that does not work was the result of of the relocation making it easier to troubleshoot. Is the mill still configured using the original control board? I ran into some issues with the board that was supplied. Mostly worked but not optimal. Myself and others have swapped out the original control board for a smooth stepper board. There is a lengthy thread that has information on how to do the swap in the CNC section somewhere.

Good luck and keep us updated on you progress.

 

[rmantoo]

Yep, it is going to be very tight. My first thought is for the shelves, I realize you can space the shelves so they are not physically in the way but the shelfs and anything on them will sure be chip collector. The Limit Switches on the PM45M-CNC are adjustable and with a little effort can be set pretty much anywhere in the travel so you should be able keep the table from running into the walls. Don't underestimate the work to move the control cabinet to a remote location. Be sure to get it fully running BEFORE you move the cabinet so you know that, after you relocate the control cabinet, that anything that does not work was the result of of the relocation making it easier to troubleshoot. Is the mill still configured using the original control board? I ran into some issues with the board that was supplied. Mostly worked but not optimal. Myself and others have swapped out the original control board for a smooth stepper board. There is a lengthy thread that has information on how to do the swap in the CNC section somewhere.

Good luck and keep us updated on you progress.

I realize it's going to be a ton of work to move, but it's literally going to be about 18". I think there is enough length in all cables to do that without having to cut or splice anything.... here it is, as currently configured (not sure if this is OEM or not):


And I'm going to completely disassemble the mill's axes and rebuild/tram as I put it in the room. I'll do an entire thread on that process, all the way to first chips.

 

[rmantoo]

I think this is all the original electronics, but not 100% sure. My basic plan was that if I have any problems with it, I'll gut it and go with servo motors/drivers, and maybe Acorn/centroid... but haven't gotten that far, yet...

 

[Boswell]

This controller is much newer than the one that came with mine several years ago so you are probably good to go. I am surprised that there is even 18" of extra wire but if so then this should be pretty straightforward. And even if not, you should be able to replace the too short wires with longer wires. Overall I have been VERY happy with my PM45M-CNC.

 

[Mitch Alsup]

You might find that you have more room by angling the mill at 45º with respect to the corner you want to stick it in.

 

[rmantoo]

You might find that you have more room by angling the mill at 45º with respect to the corner you want to stick it in.

That won't work in this situation: You can't see it in the pics, but when standing with the shelving unit to the left, and the cardboard mill template directly in front of you, there's a gun safe to the left, and angling the mill to the left hits the gun safe, and to the right will block the door (or vice versa).