Rapid travels - Was: List goals/aims/results?

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@y..., Drew Rogge <drew@p...> wrote:

> Speaking of 300 ipm, I was down at the Santa Clara machine
> tool show and saw this huge chunk of iron with a tag on it
> that said it's rapid travers rate was something like 2536 ipm.
> Now that's pretty fast.
>
> Drew

One of my customers laser cutters can rapid at 300 metre per minute,
that's 11,800 ipm
Aparently even that is not fast enought for the new laser cutters.
They have to run on 20% power because they can't get the cutting
speed up high enough and keep the tolerances required.
So the stumbling block as regards design isn't software or motors but
managing the inertia of large blocks of metal at fast acceleration
rates. With a laser cutter it's being able to stop the gantry and do
the next move without the beam wandering. Imagine a torch hanging on
a piece of string andtrying to keep it steady.

John Stevenson
Nottingham, England