X2 Mill Cnc Conversion

shooter123456

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I have been working for a few weeks now on a CNC conversion of my X2 mill. Originally, I was going to stick to manual for a while, but after making a power feed with a stepper motor, a full cnc conversion seemed inevitable.

As with anything, budget was a concern, and any money I can save on the conversion is money I can spend on stock and upgrades. I know its a HF mill so my expectations of it aren't super high. I know I won't be making parts accurate to .0005". If I can hold .003" or better, I will be pleased.

For the controller, I am running linux CNC on an oldish computer my boss and I built from spare parts when I was an intern at my company. It isn't a workhorse computer, but it seems to be good enough. I found an old mac keyboard tucked away in my parents attic and snagged an old 19" monitor from work. I also gutted a very old (Probably around 2000) computer to use the case to house the CNC electronics.

For the motion, I am using 400 oz in Nema 23 motors on all 3 axes, TB6600 drivers, and a 7.3A 48V power supply. I got an el cheapo break out board for about $10 on ebay to interface the computer with the drivers. It is optoisolated, is powered by USB, and communicates with the parallel port.

I ordered some 1605 ball screws on ebay for $160 for all 3 axes and got them installed. I haven't measured the backlash correctly yet, but when I use the DTI and order a .001" movement in the opposite direction, the DTI indicates .001" movement. At the very least, it should be close to 0 backlash. I am using thrust bearings in the X and Y axis, and 2 "angular contact" bearings for the Z axis. I have the X and Y mounted, wired, and moving, and I am working on fabricating the Z axis at the moment.

The ball nut took away some movement in the Y axis. I am getting right around 3.9 inches now. I will break out the grinder and remove some material from the base to get that back. I should be able to get to 4.75 easily, maybe 5 if I really push it. The X is getting 9.75 without overtraveling the ways, and maybe 10.5" while overtraveling one direction safely. When I finish the Z, I should gain 1.5" of travel at the top.

The X and Y have no trouble rapiding at 108 IPM, and when setting up, it was able to get to 5 inches/sec (300 IPM) before it started to stall, but it didn't seem to be going that fast. I may have been losing steps at some point. Though 100 IPM is plenty for me.

I still have a good bit of work to do, and I will have a lot of questions. I am going to do the hoss pneumatic tool changer once I finish the Z axis and I got a 1.5"x36" piece of 4140 for christmas to make a bunch of tool holders.

Here is what I have done so far.
sc61T20.jpg

Here are the parts I have made for the Z axis so far.
MZWOpwe.jpg

Here is the whole set up on the bench.
KwQ82tA.jpg

This video shows the X and Y axis motion.

Here is a facing cut in 6061 aluminum at 60 IPM and .003" depth of cut.

Here is another cut, roughly .5" deep at I think .01" wide. Please pardon the overlay and the vertical video.

Im happy to answer and questions and I am open to tips and suggestions if anyone has them.
 
I got the Z axis stepper and ball screw mounted up and attached yesterday. The ball screw I got for it is oversized, but it doesn't look like it will get in the way of anything so I am not going to mess with it. I couldn't figure out how to remove the Z axis rack and pinion handle to make some measurements for a block to attach the nut and the head. I have a big block of scrap aluminum (the one seen in the test cuts) that I will probably square up and bolt to the side of the head, then take a piece of 3/8" aluminum bar, drill and tap to attach the nut, then bolt it to the protruding block. It will limit (or eliminate) the ability to adjust the Z axis gib screws so I will have to learn to live with that or come up with a better way.

For the Z axis, all thats left is to wire it into the driver, make the coupler, and make the blocks to attach the head.

Here is a picture of the stepper mounted up. I will need to make a small spacer to tighten down the ballscrew to the bearings.
R2Biect.jpg

Here is a wider view of what I have now.
Jv2iMfM.jpg

I plan to come up with a better way to cover the ways sometime soon, maybe something that will protect the motor and coupler as well. Since I have been working on the parts with the ways uncovered and Y ball screw exposed, its going to need to be removed and cleaned. I will grind the base when I do that to get my Y axis travel back and hopefully get a decent increase as well. I plan to make a few parts with it before I do the flood coolant and enclosure. Too excited to wait while I do those... I should probably think of the time as an investment since clean up will not take 15 minutes at the end of every day. I don't think the bench is going to cut it for these machines. When I built it, it had my 90 lb mini lathe and the manual mini mill that I ran pretty slow. When I make cuts quickly with the CNC, the whole table shakes and rattles. When the Y axis rapids, the entire table gets pulled back and forth. Then the 450ish lb PM1030 is too much as well.
 
Shooter, It looks like your moving along quickly. Looks like a nice build.
 
Shooter, It looks like your moving along quickly. Looks like a nice build.
I appreciate that. I have all week while I am at school to think about what I want to do to and with the machine so by the time it comes around for me to head to my parents house to work on it, I have a specific plan worked out for what I need to do. It seems to make things go pretty quick.
 
I am so close I can taste it... I have the Z axis mount done and mounted up, the Z axis stepper coupler machined and ready, the Z axis head block drilled, tapped, and in place, and the clearance hole for the ball screw drilled. Just need to drill and tap 6 holes for the ball nut, and make a small spacer for the lead screw and I should be in business!

I had a bear of a time removing the rack and pinion feed and handle. Once I had removed all of the hardware I could see, I couldn't get the rear cover to budge. I hit it probably a dozen times with a dead blow hammer, I tried to smack a screw driver between the head and the cover and launched a screw driver to the other side of the garage, and spent a good 30 minutes trying to figure out what else was holding it on. Once I concluded after spending a good amount of time online looking at pictures that there was nothing else holding it in place, I got a 10 pound sledge hammer and get it 2 taps and it broke free. Im thinking they stuck in on there while the paint was still wet and that bonded it to the head. Well from there it was just lining up 2 holes then drilling and tapping the head for the mounting screws, and drilling the through hole. I will enlarge it on my lathe because it is slightly misaligned and the largest drill bit I have is .750. It may rub on one side if I don't correct it.

Here are the pictures of the progress.

HAj8fuB.jpg

HAj8fuB.jpg

I had the table off so I got started on grinding away the base with a dremel tool and thats going to take forever. Unfortunately, I can't think of a faster way to do it with the tools I have. I want to get that Y axis travel back.

HAj8fuB.jpg
 
On my PM-932 conversion I added two pointed set-screws 90 deg apart to all my motor couplers and drilled mating dimples on the ball screw shafts. I have had no slipping issues and I'm running 34 size 1800 in/oz on the X & Y and a 42 size 4200 in/oz on the Z.
 
On my PM-932 conversion I added two pointed set-screws 90 deg apart to all my motor couplers and drilled mating dimples on the ball screw shafts. I have had no slipping issues and I'm running 34 size 1800 in/oz on the X & Y and a 42 size 4200 in/oz on the Z.
I hadn't thought of that. That would be easier than trying grind a decent flat. Thank you for the tip.
 
As with any machine build, it takes a good bit of troubleshooting to get everything going.

Im thinking my Z axis design flaw is going to need to be corrected sooner rather than later because when the motor pushes the head down, I can see the ball screw push on the motor shaft and it moves about 3 mm. Thats no bueno. It should be as simple as popping the bearing block off, sticking it in the lathe, and boring it for another bearing underneath. Im hoping that won't be too bad.

I had the Y axis seize up because the ball nut slipped out from the set screw in the apron. I need to get it secured in there better. Same deal with the X axis. The set screws don't hold well enough with just the nut. I haven't figured out how I will address that yet.

In taking some cuts, I have started to get motor oscillations which sounds like it is getting right to the edge of its performance. I also had a bit of trouble with it stalling on me. I am thinking my motor has gotten weaker since I got the mill. I checked the brushes, and as far as I can tell they are fine. I am not sure what else I should be looking at. The reason I think its lost some of its kick is that in January, I was able to drill a .750" hole in 303 stainless from a 1/2 pilot hole. Just recently, I tried to drill a .750" hole in 6061 aluminum from the same 1/2" pilot hole, and it would stall out almost immediately. Im open to ideas for fixing or replacing it. I wouldn't mind sticking a treadmill motor or something similar to it to replace the little 4/5 HP motor it has (though the 120V @ 4.5 amps is a little under 4/5 HP and from what I have read, they don't drive it at 120V).

Im ordering the parts to build a tach for it with the arduino that will be on the control panel. It will be good to know exactly how fast the spindle is moving so I can get my feeds and speeds dialed in better.

I have been working on some of the tool holders for the pnuematic tool changer. Im trying to minimize the runout as much as I can. What would be an acceptable/realistic value to shoot for? I am all about chasing the tiny numbers, but I also need to know when to quit.

I have some videos for your view pleasure.

Here is a video of the Z axis testing. I think it was going 40 IPM at the slowest and 108 at the fastest. You can hear the rough ball screw movement as it runs. I think there is a little bit of eccentricity there that I could improve. The Y axis sounds much better and its the same ball screw.

*******IF YOU TURNED YOUR VOLUME UP TO HEAR THE Z AXIS BALL SCREW, TURN IT DOWN BEFORE STARTING THE NEXT ONES. THEY ARE LOUD*******
Here it is cutting A36 steel. It is .125 deep and probably .02" wide on the cut. Though it does change a good bit since I was just tapping the keyboard to move the X over. I think I had the spindle turned all the way up around 4500 RPM and it was moving about 14 IPM. The bit is a 4 flute carbide .375" in diameter. At the end, I get a little ambitious with the width of cut and stall the motor.

Here it is cutting 6061 aluminum with a 2 flute .375 serrated carbide rougher. Depth is .750" and width is around .025. It had no trouble with this one at all.

Here is the 3 flute high helix .375 carbide end mill. Depth is .750" and width is .015". You can hear the spindle oscillations I was talking about. And this is where the Y axis binds from the ball nut slipping. Though until then it was holding its own.

I am a little suspicious of my motors being 400 oz in as advertised. The 425 oz in I see are all nearly twice as long as these are. These look to be the same size as the 275 oz in ones. I am happy with the performance so far so I will probably let it be for the time being.
 
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