- Joined
- Dec 27, 2016
- Messages
- 21
So, here is my PM727 CNC conversion experience. I got a lot of info from Youtube and the forums, so hopepfully someone can benefit from my experience. It is not quite done yet and I need to clean up the wiring, but so far so good.
I ordered my PM727 from Precision Mathews on eBay and it was to my house in two days! Pretty impressive. While tinkering with the machine I noticed the spindle was getting pretty hot. With no load on it I was getting temps around 107 in the high speeds after only a few minutes. Matt has excellent customer service and explained 107 is not that hot and told me to get in touch with him if temps get into the 150-160 deg range. I have also read from others that the spindle will get hot during the first several hours of operation.
So I began ordering parts for the conversion. Here is a list of what I used
- 1605 Ballscrews with milled ends and double ball nuts from eBay (800mm for the X axis and a 700mm that had to be cut down for the Y axis)
- BF12/BK12 Bearing supports from eBay
- 1605 Ball nut Housing (28mm) eBay
- 425oz Nema 23 motors eBay
- Gecko G540 Drive with 400watt power supply
- Wood enclosure for G540 eBay (seller jusharrjust)
- DB9 motor cables with motor end connector eBay (seller len1007). These cables are great!
- Aluminum heatsinks for G540 eBay
- x3 - 15 tooth XL (.200") timing pulleys (SDP/SI online)
- x3 - 30 tooth XL (.200") timing pulleys (SDP/SI online)
- x3 - 53 tooth .375 width XL (.200") timing belts (I am using a 3" center distance) (SDP/SI online)
- Spindle light Amazon (this thing is pretty amazing)
I made some motor brackets out of 1/4" aluminum plate I had lying around. They do flex a bit, but nothing that affects the operation of the machine. I would probably use steel if I did it over, but its not really worth changing them. These work fine.
I had to do some fitting and fabrication to swap out the old lead screws for ballsrews. The Z axis was pretty easy to do. What I'm milling does not require more than a couple inches of commanded Z travel, so I attached the Z axis motor to the fine adjustment wheel instead of messing with the Z axis lead screw.
Setting up Mach3 was pretty easy. I used the .xml file from Gecko's website, which sets up the ports and pins. I did have to change a couple things to get the touch probe to work. be sure to go into your computer BIOS and set the parallel port to EPP mode also. There are plenty of write-ups on setting up Mach3 so I won't go into the details.
I also downloaded the Hoss Machining Touch Probe screenset. I haven't had time to really test it out yet, but it is the best auto-zero strategy I have seen so far. I can't wait to start messing with it.
So far I have tuned the motors and ran some GCode to make sure it moves how it is supposed to. tomorrow I will Clean up the wiring and run some milling strategies.
Like a boss.
I ordered my PM727 from Precision Mathews on eBay and it was to my house in two days! Pretty impressive. While tinkering with the machine I noticed the spindle was getting pretty hot. With no load on it I was getting temps around 107 in the high speeds after only a few minutes. Matt has excellent customer service and explained 107 is not that hot and told me to get in touch with him if temps get into the 150-160 deg range. I have also read from others that the spindle will get hot during the first several hours of operation.
So I began ordering parts for the conversion. Here is a list of what I used
- 1605 Ballscrews with milled ends and double ball nuts from eBay (800mm for the X axis and a 700mm that had to be cut down for the Y axis)
- BF12/BK12 Bearing supports from eBay
- 1605 Ball nut Housing (28mm) eBay
- 425oz Nema 23 motors eBay
- Gecko G540 Drive with 400watt power supply
- Wood enclosure for G540 eBay (seller jusharrjust)
- DB9 motor cables with motor end connector eBay (seller len1007). These cables are great!
- Aluminum heatsinks for G540 eBay
- x3 - 15 tooth XL (.200") timing pulleys (SDP/SI online)
- x3 - 30 tooth XL (.200") timing pulleys (SDP/SI online)
- x3 - 53 tooth .375 width XL (.200") timing belts (I am using a 3" center distance) (SDP/SI online)
- Spindle light Amazon (this thing is pretty amazing)
I made some motor brackets out of 1/4" aluminum plate I had lying around. They do flex a bit, but nothing that affects the operation of the machine. I would probably use steel if I did it over, but its not really worth changing them. These work fine.
I had to do some fitting and fabrication to swap out the old lead screws for ballsrews. The Z axis was pretty easy to do. What I'm milling does not require more than a couple inches of commanded Z travel, so I attached the Z axis motor to the fine adjustment wheel instead of messing with the Z axis lead screw.
Setting up Mach3 was pretty easy. I used the .xml file from Gecko's website, which sets up the ports and pins. I did have to change a couple things to get the touch probe to work. be sure to go into your computer BIOS and set the parallel port to EPP mode also. There are plenty of write-ups on setting up Mach3 so I won't go into the details.
I also downloaded the Hoss Machining Touch Probe screenset. I haven't had time to really test it out yet, but it is the best auto-zero strategy I have seen so far. I can't wait to start messing with it.
So far I have tuned the motors and ran some GCode to make sure it moves how it is supposed to. tomorrow I will Clean up the wiring and run some milling strategies.
Like a boss.
