Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Re: emc help2

Greg wrote:

>Hello,
>I am curious as well,Emc being open source but yet for years being
>stuck with a few rather expensive boards.
>
>I am still not sold on the pc closing the servo loop.
>Bridgeport used the same system with the ez-trak and dx32 controls
>with rather high failure rates for a dos control.Hmm i wonder why
>bridgeport usa is bankrupt.
>
>

Bridgeport's engineers have NEVER understood thermal management.
This is not "rocket science" with 4 K cryogenics cracking electron-beam
welded supermetals. It is just warm semiconductors on heat sinks, and
fans or convection. It takes serious effort to predict how hot things will
get in advance, that's what prototypes are for. Bridgeport's design
strategy must have been that if it survives a one month normal test,
then it is ready to ship. No worst-case tests, high ambient temp tests,
accelerated life tests or any of that.

But, from the very first CNC control (BOSS 3 was the first one they sold,
so I guess BOSS 1 and 2 didn't last that first month) to the Ez-Trak, the
thermal management is pretty awful. Everything runs hot as H**L in
cramped cabinets, and the parts cook.

This has absolutely NOTHING to do with whether the servo loop is closed
by the PC! How can burning up the video monitors have anything to do
with the servo scheme?

>Having used a lot of different hardware,Having some new drivers would
>break thing open a bit.
>How about plug and play profibus modules.
>Let me know what you think.
>
>

If you choose to write the drivers for us, then it will be supported!
Go ahead, design a board, buy the parts, get somebody to solder them in,
test it, market it, write the software (which is given away as free on the
BDI CDroms) and then come back and show us how you can do it cheaper!
Everybody says "Oh, they must be making a MINT on that product, look,
it is just a couple of chips on a PC board!" But, when you price all
this stuff
out, you find that everything adds a cost, and electronic components, these
days, are NOT cheap! The FPGA on my Universal Stepper Controller
costs $30 each! The cheapest connectors I could find cost $22 for
the whole board (there are 6 of them). In small quantity the boards cost
over $30 each. It all adds up, and then there's labor to assemble and
test them.

Jon