Re: Smart Motor

Hi,

Couple of practical objections to the "smart motor" concept:

(1) Why mount a motor drive that generates heat and needs to get rid
of it against a motor that generates heat and needs to get rid of it
as well?

(2) Why should you replace a good motor when its drive fails, or a
good drive when the motor fails?

It is a cool-looking concept that makes no practical sense. I've had
one motor manufacturer that wanted we build a drive for their motors
that we turned down for those reasons.

Mariss

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@y..., "methadras" <aymani@a...> wrote:
> hi guys,
>
> i'm a big fan of this group and look forward everyday to reading
all
> the new posts to gleen as much info as i possibly can, so i can
sound
> smart to my friends who come over and point at my gear and
go, "hey,
> what's that...?" and then i say, "well, that's a blah blah blah"
like
> the charlie brown teacher... hehehe...
>
> anyway, i've finally decided to delve into converting my knee mill
to
> a CNC powerhouse... well, not so powerful... my idea is at least 3-
> axis (x, y, and knee or should it be on the spindle...?)... so what
> i've been doing is scouring the net and my motion control magazines
> for good ways to make this happen... well, lo and behold i ran
across
> an old memory of the SMART MOTOR made by animatics
> (www.animatics.com)... i find their ad and hit their web site...
i've
> called and left a message for a local rep to call me back... well,
i
> think this would be a good and fairly decently cheap solution for
me
> to convert to... i've a budget for my cnc conversion and its around
> $3k, but it looks like with these smart motors i can save half of
> that... the nema34 625 oz-in. servo motors i'm looking at are
around
> $500 each, but they are totally integrated drivers, servo amps, dc
> power supply, I/O, etc. etc. and you can daisy chain or network the
> motors together...
>
> my only problem in finding out from the rep or you guys is, do i
need
> a pc-based controller like a galil, delta-tau, etc. to send out the
> proper signals to each motor or do i use an msdos based program
that
> turns my parallel port into a multi-axis controller...?
>
> i'm a big boy, so i can take any critiques that you guys may have
> about this setup, but it looks like for me it would be the easiest
> way for not having to build a box full of electronics and maintain
it
> whereas, i can just slap on the motors, plug in the juice to each
> one, connect the communications I/O and that's it... what do you
guys
> think...
>
> Methadras