Hi, Finished printing all my parts, have most of the other parts just waiting for the wire kit for putting motors in series. Going to buy the hardware / wood tomorrow , still sourcing the steel tube. I have a router, cheapy router that supposedly is rated at 1200 watt, and of course has no speed control so just 30k rpm. I have read all the info on speed controllers on this forum and google. I came across this article on Arduino website and was curious if anyone has used or know if this would be a good option to make. I’m not an electrical engineer just hobbyist. I got 3 raspberry pis an extra Arduino uno, and an esp32 cam that I plan on setting up as my WiFi with web server for controlling an uno with cnc shield v3.
He did a nice build in that article, and has the same fundamentals that any electronic AC motor control uses, TRIAC control with zero cross detection.
My only concern is whether the Arduino Nano that he uses would be able to handle the interrupt rate of a 30000rpm motor. Probably ok but I’d check the MCU’s datasheet.
Hmm, I don’t have a nano but I will check the different ones I currently have in My stock to see if any have this ability , ideally I will try to use the esp32, I know that cnc shield v3 with uno I have has those spindle control and cooling control built onto the board, not sure if I can use any of those ports that are still available / open. But I don’t mind adding a different MCU to talk to current setup. It is running GRBL right now.
I haven’t read the article you link to but I’ve had good luck with the PID speed control kit sold through the V1 store. It includes everything you need except the circuit board on which the Nano is placed, but I was able to wire one up on perf-board in a bit over an hour. I haven’t completed the final hook-up to the GRBL CNC shield with the sensor in place yet, but I have had GRBL turn the router on and off via CNCjs, and was able to add an LCD screen I had from an old Arduino starter kit to display RPMs from the spindle,
Now I just have to get all the brains put together in a single (appropriately protective) container.
I did see that project, I thought it was still not finished / still in dev. But if it works I may look into ordering from the shop, since everything is bundled up and geared towards our specific project.
I think it will be permanently “in development” as there appear to have been (inferring from various comments in that forum thread) business insurance liability/cost issues around selling the custom PC board and declaring it a complete turn-key solution. The other part still “in development” was tuning the PID parameters for different materials, which I expect may be dependent on the specific machine build in many cases.
It’s my understanding the current “defaults” in the Nano sketch are good for wood, which is where I’m planning to start. If I get into metal, I’ll dig into the tuning process at that time.
I see, I noticed on the PID is rated for 500w if this router that claimed to be 1200w is actually anywhere near that rating I’m afraid it will not be able to work properly / safely. That was one of the reasons I did not order yet without trying to verify designs. My father has a nice porta cable router can’t remember what hp was like 1 3/4 or so… and is a lot heavier and seems to have a lot more power even though the “advertised” power rating is about the same… I only live in 1 bedroom house and really no space for Lowrider table setup, but I am currently framing utility closet and was going to do my kitchen, and wanted to see if I could make the cabinets and other bookshelf style entertainment system, so I would be cutting wood, once project was done I was going to print the mpcnc swap the motors and store the Lowrider parts ready to use in the closet. The mpcnc could be kept on the counter I am building for my 3D printer / work bench. But then I would be cutting thin metal for the projects I had in mind, I think that’s when the speed control is going to be critical. I’m a bartender and have been out of work for 3 months, in my area restaurants are opening on the 1st but can’t have any counter bar seating, so it’s going to be sometime until I can get back to work, otherwise I would just buy a dc spindle Once I go to the countertop setup for indoor use. But with all this time I figure I do some diy stuff around the house and the Lowrider design seemed ideal for full sheet work, that I can cad all the designs on full sheets and assemble.
Sorry - I didn’t notice we were in the LowRider forum. I’m building the MPCNC and using the 5 amp DW660, so all my comments are based on that planned configuration.
I’ve seen Ryan’s videos of successful cuts with the DW660 in aluminum much thicker that I can currently seeing myself trying, so I’m not looking for more spindle power, at least until I outgrow this one.
The idea is the same, just the tool I own already, without buying something specific will utilize the same concept and will eventually be used on an mpcnc, waiting for new design to come out to start printing parts. It’s just that advertised power rating I am concerned about being different then the recommended DeWalt. I might give the Lowrider to my dad he has large garage with all his tools from when he owned an FAA repair station, metal and composite, so if he gets involved in that project I would probably throw a pneumatic spindle on that thing and and have a space to keep the Lowrider setup . They live about an hour away so not as easy to just hop on it and mess around. At that point I would have to figure out a Air valve style control system with the MCU
Hmm, so with all this diy house stuff that people are doing in this time, my neighbor was throwing out a ceiling fan, has the basic 3-4 wire speed controller, I understand each wire goes through a different capacitor to control the speed, and wirelessly … a real a/c motor, so with x amount of pin outputs from MCU , theoretically with math I could put different capacitor on each pin and make the basic 3-4 wire a/c controller 32 Wires or pins, without using pwm. Allowing the rpm sensor With code to round up/down to switch to the next capacitor setting it to that specific capacitors output.