Making your own powerful Controller on the cheap side

No, but I’m running open frame with the drivers up.[quote=“PhilJohnson, post:36, topic:33328”]
Mind if I steal the idea and make my own?
[/quote]

Don’t mind at all.

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Yeah, I tend toward the practical side, my artistic skills are rated - needs improvement – needs a lot of improvement.

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And rgb led lighting

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Definitely need to keep the evil spirits out of the electronics!

everyone knows that magic smoke keeps the chips working, If you let the magic smoke out they stop working. :slight_smile:

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2A ramps up and down with smaller steps
2B ramps up and down with larger steps

A really poor analogy would be the difference between a variable speed drill/driver and an impact drill/driver.

One gets you smoother action the other gets you slightly rougher action with a little more umph.

Mine is set at 2A for Z.

I haven’t done any testing with this, but now that you brought it up I may have to take a look at it.

[Edit] - Yes, the stock NEMA 23s are 2.8 amps/phase

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You’re supposed to use cardboard for design tasks like that. Don’t you know that CAD stands for Cardboard Aided Design???

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Yes.

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Keep the updates going Phil, I’m building a component list and watching intently. Need a good setup for my new cnc.

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This will be my next upgrade for sure. Thanks @PhilJohnson

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The current settings on that controller are peak amps. Try the 2.5 setting. If your steppers are running cool, try 3 amps. Assuming a 24 volt power supply. I have .1 " per revolution lead screws. 4x seams to work best on my machine. Our High School Robotics team has been using donated Gerber Dimension router with an Arduino and these stepper drivers. Things are working very well. They do generate heat. We have them mounted in a NEMA enclosure with a power supply. The power supply has a powerful 90mm fan that really stirs up the air in the box. We have a small 40MM fan exhausting the box and the drivers are running cool. We have run some marathon 10 hour jobs and everything is working well with these drivers.

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Follwing this thread with interest, currently rebuilding my DIY-rig and individual drivers (TB6560’s in my case) will be used. Main purpose is to move from Nema17’s to the larger 23’s and be able to utilize their torque potential. (ACME rods all axis)

X/Z Nema 23 / 270oz
Y dual Nema 23 / 140oz
Arduino / GRBL-shield and 4x TB6560’s
:smiley:

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Be ware of the TB6560’s. That chip has some power up requirements that the cheap drivers did not follow. The net is full of people complaining about failed cheap drivers. I wanted to go with drivers that use discrete FET’s. The budget knocked this down to Toshiba chips. Screw shields are the way to go. 3d printed a Arduino mount.

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I recommend the screw shields as well. So much simpler for the connections.

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Yes I am aware of the possible issues with TB6560’s, time will tell how they work for me :slight_smile:
Purchased them a year ago for about $20 for a set of 4 so I wanted to give them a try.

Thanks for the tip on screw shields!

You have a typo in Y2AD micro-stepping switch settings.

Might as well go ahead and hook up A4 while you’re at it.

Looks good.

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A3 is coolant enable (flood), A4 is reserved but frequently used as coolant enable (mist).

M7 is coolant (mist) enable. (compile time option in grbl).

M8 is coolant (flood) enable.

M9 turns them both off.

Basically gives you two signals to turn things on and off with G-code.

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Yep. You can have your spindle on/off (M3/M5) and the other two for whatever. Just keep in mind that you can turn them on individually, but you can only turn them off at the same time.

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Just out of curiosity, but what will you be soldering? When I upgraded to the screwshield, it required no soldering.

Granted I did Tin all of the ends of the wires prior to installing them into the screwshield, but that did not actually qualify as soldering per-say IMO.

Oh ok that makes sense.

That is a different screwshield than what I used. The one I ordered came fully assembled in two pieces. One for each side of the arduino and the Gshield snapped into the top of it.

Here is the Screw Shield for Arduino that I purchased.

https://amzn.to/3p2cmJZ

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