The project XYZ-Stepper
This project is designed to build a complete a three-axes milling machine currently under test at conTESTI.eu electronics.
The whole project, including the machine aluminium structure has been divided into several working stages covering all the machine parts. The main project page is frequently updated and reports the state-of-the-art of this project, its evolution and the various tested and released composing elements.
FYI you can read more about the structure design key in the knowledge base area.
Another tested and fixed issue relates to the external power unit, developed and released with the ATX-Power project, working with a common ATX Power Supply.
The XYZ-DC Controller Platform
XYZ-DC Motor Controller was created to be low-cost and efficient to work along with a CNC milling machine.
Project Key Elements
The Controller Platform should:
- Control three unipolar or bi-polar stepper motors, up to 1.5A current driven. Stepper motors are powered by an external voltage source between +4.5V and +30V (actually it works with +5V power) Every motor is interfaced with a Half-Bridge device.
- Control a DC-Motor to be used as the electrical tool on the Z-axis. Currently this motor is powered with +12V and 1.2A current using a parallel couple of Darlington arrays.
- Store data, calibration information and configuration tables on a I2C EEprom. This unit can be simply upgraded with an EEProm array (up to eight devices as described in the Bank project).
- Control heating with a LM35 temperature sensor and automatically manage a fan cooler to reduce the devices thermal stress.
- Output control data and working information to a 16x2 LCD display controlled by a shift register.
- Have a complete software with a set of macro-commands to simplify CNC PC interface.
- Communicate with the PC via the common Arduino USB serial connector.
Last, but not least, the complete board only costs 35.00€. All IC devices are socketed as the same circuit can work with several pin-to-pin compabile devices.