Motorise z axis mini mill

[David George 1Participant @davidgeorge1]

Hi looking for a bit of help. I am modifying my Chester Champion 16 mill as the Z axis hand wheel is at the back of the column and only 5 feet tall I struggle to reach it. I have bought a ball screw and a pair of bevel gears to move the handwheel to the right hand side at 90 degrees in a new housing so as I have the room I would like to fit a DC motor to traverse with a variable speed controle. But the motor I would need can traverse at slow speed and have a maximum speed of only 200 rpm and 80 mm x 80mm square would fit the top plate but that could be changed. Where can I get a motor and controler from and has anyone done a similar mod.

David

[David George 1Participant @davidgeorge1]

[EmgeeParticipant @emgee]

David

Have you considered a Stepper motor controlled by an Arduino ?

Size will be determined by the power required to raise the head and you may need to use a gear/belt arrangement to provide desired feeds/speeds.
Control would be similar to the rotary table described on this forum a few months ago, adapted to suit your application, or if you search the net/youtube there are numerous articles showing how to achieve your goal.

Emgee

[I.M. OUTAHEREParticipant @i-m-outahere]

My mill is basically the same as a chester lux with the crank handle on the side of the column , i origianally used an 18 volt drill but ended up just buying a dirt cheap mains power drill with the built in speed control and using it to raise ./ lower the head. I can buy the proper motor / gearbox unit for this but the price was unbelievable !

It depends on how much torque you need to turn the handle ,if it is easily turned then a big stepper motoer will do it If you want finer control . The other issue i found using DC motors is they can draw a lot of current and getting a power supply that can handle 40 or 50 amps + wasn't easy or cheap !

[Frances IoMParticipant @francesiom58905]

Computer server power supplies generally provide 450-600W at 12.2V and are relatively cheap – 40 of the 450W variety made by HP turned up at an auction house here in SE England – I bought one lot of 10 for ?60 (inc buyers premium etc) – could have had 40 but didn’t think I’d use that number. If you do buy off the net (generally around 15 dollars or so make sure you are given the pin out needed to turn them on, as all different. For slightly lower say 15amp at 12V the standard PC power supply, often given away when PC fails, is suitable tho physically larger.

[Nick HulmeParticipant @nickhulme30114]

A simple solution for driving a stepper with Enable/Disable, Forward/Reverse and 3 speed ranges is an MKS OSC V1.0 board, stepper driver, PSU and stepper motor.

[Pat BraveryParticipant @patbravery]

Hi Dave, I have done that mod on my Champion 16, if you look on the Chester forum you will see how I did it, it is much easier to raise and lower the head now. I also motorised the table wit a windscreen wiper motor which suits my needs but a stepper would probably be better. Keep us posted, regards Pat

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