Converting a Mill to a CNC

For many mill owners, do-it-yourself projects provide a relaxing way to escape day-to –day pressures. For some, the idea of turning a manual mill into a faster, more efficient, CNC operated tool seems like the next perfect project. But before jumping headlong into making the conversion to a CNC machine, it’s best to know what to expect of an automated machine in terms of movement, cutting ability, flexibility, and overall efficiency.

Although manual mills can be good for fashioning a single component, when it comes to manufacturing a workpiece that warrants repeated product runs a CNC mill may be a better choice. Because CNC machines offer increased precision and repetition of the automated process, they are often employed in factories that specialize in larger product runs of one specific component. However, a manual mill can be turned into a CNC machine for efficient at-home use.

A CNC mill saves time during production because the cutting movements are fast and precise. In order to achieve the necessary movements, a CNC mill moves along a series of axes, ranging from two to five, to execute the desired cuts. However, a mill used for do-it-yourself purposes is likely to have fewer axes. A greater number of axes increases the degree of flexibility, enabling the machine to achieve otherwise difficult angles, as are common among specialty products manufactured in shops. Programmable software allows the CNC machine to repeat the desired process, which saves time and increases overall efficiency.

Despite the use of software, a programmer still plays an integral role in the success of a CNC mill. In order to begin the process, specify the cutting movements, and run the machine, a programmer must use a coordinate system to enter commands. To ensure the process runs smoothly, the programmer must align the cutter with the “0” point (the designated starting point) before the machine is run.

Many programs offer CNC storage that allow a programmer to save key coordinates, thus eliminating the need to re-enter commonly used coordinates and commands. Such storage spaces are often referred to as offsets. Offsets are a helpful way to specify and save the length and radius of the cutting tool, the depth of the desired cut as well as to designate and save the “0” point.

To learn what’s involved in converting a mill, visiting several websites with step-by-step instructions may prove helpful. Below are several different ways to go about the process.

Converting a Manual Mill into a CNC Machine

When preparing to convert a mill into a CNC machine there are several preliminary steps that should be taken. When dealing with a basic mill, the preparation typically involves removing components so that a CNC system can be configured. On a manual Taig mill, for example, the gibs and the leadscrew must be loosened so that the leadscrew mounting bolts and leadscrews can be removed. The mill tables can be removed and brushings replaced with adjustable brushings. The Z-axis is prepared in a similar manner, by removing and installing a new leadscrew in preparation for the automated components.

The components that distinguish a manual mill from a CNC are not numerous but they are important. The addition of a stepper motor and power supply, a controller, interpreter software, and a CAD/CAM package are the basics elements a mill requires to operate as a CNC machine. However, depending on the kind of mill machine, the exact specifications for these components will vary from project to project.

The CNC Christmas Tree: christmas tree ideas

The real tree did not make it to x-mas day. It was a brown, shedding, fire hazard and it ended up in the front yard on the 23rd. So I wiped up a quick tree on the CNC.

New SINUMERIK 828D CNC

The SINUMERIK 828D is a new kind of CNC, one that may enable progressive job shops to ramp up fast and take the lead, moving forward.

Solves need for new competency, as well as capacity
Adds control from a top-down business perspective
New functionality for higher overall operational efficiency
Empowers job shop owners, as well as operators

Three advantages for job shop owners and managers

1. Remote monitoring for diagnostics and text messaging
2. Video-like preview simulations reduce errors and material waste
3. Residual material detection remembers second-pass tool path

Smart Chopper

Siemens has teamed up with renowned custom motorcycle manufacturer Orange County Choppers to build its first custom electric motorcycle.
Siemens built this unique chopper to raise environmental awareness and reflect what the 69,000 employees of Siemens USA are doing to help America stay on the cutting-edge of tomorrow’s green economy. We are already very much a part of the fabric of America, and our portfolio is one of the greenest in the business. Green is not marketing hype for Siemens; it is in our DNA.
After its appearance at IMTS 2010, the motorcycle will be auctioned off with the proceeds going to a charitable cause that will help benefit the environment.

Thomasnet.com launches New Design for Website

ThomasNet, the leading business to business site are rolling out a new look to their flagship website www.ThomasNet.com, to finish up a great year in 2009.  This redesign is the result of ongoing multivariable testing and conversations with their users results to improve the layout to better designed to serve their users.

Brendan O’Connell the Whois.com contact and admin for the website, sums up the redesign in this way,

“The success of Thomsnet hinges on adhering to the principles of user centric design. Serve and respond to the user and the rest will follow.”

Catalyst Group  New York, the  company that ran a widely reported usability study comparing Google to Bing, was also employed in the redesign process to conduct lab based usability testing with Eye Tracking and “talk-aloud”, to help complete the research picture – supplementing what users “say” with what their eyes “see.”.  This information was incorporated into the new site, making it easier to navigate and search for products.

Another major improvements to the site come with page speed performance.  The new site has been tested to load 50% faster, which is not only good for search engines but for users as well. Google.com recently announced that web page loading speed may become a significant ranking factor in 2010  

Nissan Leaf | Bigger Battery Optional, Instead of Bigger Engine

With gasoline and diesel powered vehicles, one of the biggest option choices facing buyers is engine size. 4 cylinders? A V6 maybe? Or even a V8? That’s an important decision since the engine is at the heart of a vehicle. But when it comes to electric vehicles, the heart is no doubt the battery. This is why Tesla has announced battery options for its upcoming Model S electric sedan, and it is why Nissan is suggesting that it might eventually offer different battery options with its LEAF electric car.

The Detroit Bureau writes:

a senior Nissan planner tells TheDetroitBureau.com that the company eventually give [sic] BEV buyers the electric vehicle’s equivalent of choosing engines, offering an array of different battery packs. That would allow a motorist to choose between a lower-range, lower-cost pack, or batteries delivering perhaps twice the mileage, at a higher price, of course. And, as battery technology improves, eco-minded motorists might also be offered batteries that would add a bit more muscle to their green machines.

This makes a lot of sense because batteries will no doubt change a lot over the next few years. Big breakthroughs could happen, costs could go down faster (or slower) than expected because of mass-production, fast-charging stations could pop up everywhere, auto makers could be misjudging demand for EV, etc. A lot of things could happen, and the best way to be prepared is to plan electric cars that are customizable and modular.

I hope that other auto makers working on electric cars are taking notes and planning to offer different battery options. No everybody has the same needs, and one-size fits all could compromise the success of EVs.

Photovoltaics Might Be Silicon But The Technology Is Not Following Moore’s Law

Photovoltaic specialists met last week, May 12-16, in San Diego under the auspices of the IEEE Electron Devices Society, for their 33rd annual meeting. For the first time the meeting included a two-day breakout session, The PV Accelerator Forum, devoted to exploring how photovoltaics can be kick-started to achieve an earlier commercial breakthrough. There were some substantial surprises.

If you asked a solar expert ten or fifteen years ago what the game plan was for photovoltaics, the gist would have been this: develop silicon cells, relying on scraps and techniques from the semiconductor industry, without expectation of a commercial breakthrough; then turn to second-generation thin-film materials like CIGS and cad-tel, which would be much cheaper and more fit for mass production. By early this decade, however, it seemed clear that PV was not shaping up as planned. The second generation materials were not materializing on schedule, and the cost of solar electricity was still nowhere near competitive. Particularly disconcerting was the 2002 decision of British Petroleum, which was billing itself as the world’s biggest solar company (among other things), to terminate U.S. production of cad-tel and amorphous silicon cells, as reported in the January 2003 issue of Spectrum magazine.

Now there are some new twists and turnsâ¿¿essentially, three very positive developments that would not have been generally anticipated a decade ago. First, silicon-based solar technology has decoupled from the semiconductor industry and is achieving steady cost reductions, so that those following PV discern a kind of Mooreâ¿¿s law at work. In 2005, production of silicon for solar cells already surpassed production of silicon for semiconductors.

Second, the industry has become so confident in that evolutionary path, policymakers and planners have started to set dates when they expect PV-generated electricity to be competitive with the major sources of electricity sold on the grid now. And third, while the incremental path promises a commercial breakthrough within ten years, it’s suddenly looking like second generation technology may be arriving after allâ¿¿in which case wide commercialization of PV could occur much sooner.

In recent years, global PV production has been increasing at a rate of 50 percent per year, so that accumulated global capacity doubles about every 18 months. The PV Moore’s law states that with every doubling of capacity, PV costs come down by 20 percent. In 2004, installing PV cost about $7 per watt, compared to $1/W for wind, which at that time was beginning to stand on its own feet commercially, Last, year, as recently noted in this blog, average global solar costs had come down to between $4 and $5 per watt, right in line with the PV Moore’s law. Extrapolate those gains out six or seven years, and PV costs will be below $2/W, making photovolatics competitive with 2004 wind.

Remember, wind electricity generally is generated in large farms, so that its price has to be competitive with electricity generated from other sources that’s the wholesale electricity cost that accounts for only about half of total electricity costs in a typical customer’s bill. But solar, being distributed, competes with the retail price if the PV generating cost is comparable to the total delivered cost of electricity, which can be as high as 20 cents per kilowatthour in the United States and upwards of 30 cents in Japan, thatâ¿¿s good enough.

Planners and regulator are starting to believe in the PV Moore’s law. The European Union’s PV Tech Platform has set the year 2015 for achieving grid parity the point where solar electricity can be sold competitively into the grid. As early as 2010, solar electricity prices in extreme southern Europe might go as low as 17 or 18 cents/kWh. California also expects to see grid parity within a decade, and Southern California Edison has a program to put subsidized PV roofs on large commercial buildings, predicated on the goal of obtaining PV capacity at a cost of $3.50/W within five years.

So some noteworthy things have happened on the way to this year’s PV accelerator forum. But what was getting the most buzz in the technical conference, which attracted a record number of attendees from around the world, was next-generation PV. Sessions dedicated to next-generation materials like cooper indium diselenide and cadmium telluride were packed to the gills, with people craning their heads in from the hallways to catch snatches of talks. One company is particular has been growing like gangbusters in the last couple of years, with a rather simple CdTe module that it claims to be producing at a cost of barely over $1/W.