Re: RF-45?

Peter,

I am refering to the older RF-30 mill/drill as the engraver. This weekend
I used the RF-45 a lot and here is what I have found:

The RF-45 is a nice machine. It seems very solid compared to the round
column mill/drills. You can make cuts that you never would have dreamed of
on the older mill/drills. Being able to move the head up and down while
changing tools is also a very nice feature. I saved a lot of time while
working on a project just by being able to do that. You can move the head
up high enough to change to a drill chuck after using an R8 collet. I am
using this machine to cut brass and aluminum and it seems to do what I need.

On my conversion: There is one glaring problem that I need to take care
of- the X and Y ballscrews. I used the McMaster Carr rolled thread (non
precision) type ballscrews. The finish on them seems a bit rougher than
the precision rolled ballscrews that I got from Rockford Ballscrew a couple
of years ago. So, I don't think that I am getting the efficiency of better
ballscrews- I can hear the balls making a lot of noise during rapid
traverses. I am going to correct this with precision rolled screws.

Servo Lite: The kit went together pretty well. The cards look to be well
made. Everything works well. Dan Mauch was very helpful via the phone and
email, with all my questions before and after buying the kit. He made it
pretty easy to put toghether. I am using servo motors from tape drives
with HP encoders. The motors on the X and Y are 2.5" diameter Japan
Servos. The big 4" diameter motor on the z-axis moves the head up and down
with no problem.

Rapid traverses: I have not been able to go beyond 50 ipm. I think that
is due to the non-precision ballscrews with double ballnuts spread over 2"
apart on them. I have also read here that EMC has problems with screwed up
pulses above a certain frequency- but I can't confirm this. Anyway, I do
small parts that don't require large feedrates in the space of a 6" vise.
I will probably work things out over time too. There are a lot of things
that I can tweak later, but this month I have had to put out a lot of work
with it already. Make money now- tweak later. I am just getting
comfortable with this machine.

So far, I am pleased with the servo lite package and the RF-45 mill. I
think that you will like your machine too.

Dan



At 03:26 AM 1/17/2000 , you wrote:

>From: PTENGIN@...
>
>In a message dated 01/16/2000 7:50:43 AM Hawaiian Standard Time,
>dfalck@... writes:
>
><< I know that this is hell on the spindle bearings of this machine, but at
> this point, I don't even care. I have other machines to do actual milling
> and this machine is just an engraver now. >>
>
>
>Dan,
> I'm going to start work on my RF-45 in about a month. I was gonna ask how
>yours came out. You are not refering to it in the above paragraph huh? Do

let

>us know how Dan Mauch's / Bill Wainright's Servo lite worked out and what
>kind of positioning accuracy and repeatability you get. I remember you
>mentioned it moves pretty fast, 100 inches plus. How's the iron turning

out?

>What if anything would you do different.
>TIA
>Peter
>THRD, Inc.
>Honolulu
>
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