Thursday, 6 April 2017

Fiddly bits

Yuk. Splicing 3 encoder cables onto Ethernet tails. Staggered solder joints, heatshrink sleeving on each joint, heatshrink over the finished items. Good times.


I tested the first 2 by running the servo diagnostics software tool and moving the table. One nice feature of simple brushed DC servo motors is that you can simply drive them with a bench power supply and control the torqque / speed by nudging the current limit up and down. Handy to be able to do that, as there are no handwheels. Certainly, the X and Y axis encoders appear to be connected up correctly. Nice to see some movement in the beast!


The Z axis cable is not long enough to reach the bench where the controller is being built, so I won't be able to test it for the moment. I may speak too soon but if it's like the first 2, it should be fine....



Also fitted a second 25W Mean Well power supply. So now there's a 24V supply for the control relays and soft start and a 12V supply for the servo drives (control circuits) and the cooling fan. And of course the controller itself has a power supply piggy-backed on its back panel, also by Mean Well (5V and 24V). I'm happy - they make decent stuff.

Next - either start to wire up the controller signal harnesses or perhaps try to power up the servo drives (using a bench power supply initially) and see if they can jog the motors in diagnostics mode. Or both if the weekend goes well.

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