Electronic Lead Screw using Acorn

[1metalguru]

Hi Guys:

Wondering if it is possible to implement an Electronic Lead Screw setup on a lathe using the Acorn or Acorn6 controller. I am working on a lathe design where I would like to eliminate all the gearing and move the carriage with a stepper or servo, using an encoder on the main headstock spindle. The objective is to do threading and machining without having to change gears on the carriage lead screw drive.

Is ther any app notes or other information available on this, if it even possible...

Metalguru

[suntravel]

Acorn is a CNC system that needs a PC to run with far more functions than only a simple ELS and sure you do not need to change gears for threading.

I am working on a video to show that you can make simple operations way faster with Acorn than with an IMHO outdated ELS

Uwe

[1metalguru]

Uwe

I'm not following. I don't mean I'm going to use the Acorn as only an ELS, I mean I want the Acorn6 (in a 6 axis controller configuration) to take the data from the spindle speed and the absolute position from the spindle encoder, and calculate how far the lead screw motor has to turn to keep the pitch in line with the work. An ELS requires some fairly complicated math to translate spindle motion to leadscrew (carriage) motion. Is the Acorn capable of doing this math? I don't see any way to do these calculations on the PC, at least in real time. I don't want to have to write any software, I just need to be able to enter the relative parameters and have the Acorn take care of the calculations and run the motor. Of course, it will also be necessary to be able to set variables like the thread pitch, or the feed per spindle revolution for plain machining, as well as monitor spindle RPM, etc. which would need to be done on the computer, preferably as a macro or whatever in CNC12.

Please let me know when the video is available. Thanks Uwe.

MG

[suntravel]

These functions are build in Acorns motion control, it synchronizes Z axis to the spindle encoder for threading and rigid tapping. Works perfect to any rpm the Z-axis drive is fast enough to follow.

Even on my DIV builds with cheap components making threads with 3000 rpm is no problem.

Uwe

[1metalguru]

Perfect, that's exactly what I needed to know. But I need to synch the lathe headstock to the leadscrew. My lathe design actually moves the headstock via leadscrew rather than having a carriage move with the leadscrew. This is actually a combo machine, with a 5 axis mill head that can machine on the lathe chuck. Now can someone point me to the app note or manual that explains how to hook up the hardware and program the parameters?

Thanks Uwe.

MG

[tblough]

All Acorn documentation is located here: https://centroidcncforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=60&t=3397

Acorn6 installation manual: https://www.centroidcnc.com/centroid_di ... manual.pdf