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Adding a 5th axis to an old Fadal mill?

To any Fadal experts here I have a question. I have a Fadal 15XT with the 4th axis. I would like to add a 5th. Mainly for indexing. So I would put another rotary table on the existing 4th axis, at 90 degrees to the 4th axis, for some jobs that require it. I have one job now that I bolt an index head to the 4th axis and I need to index the head

90 degrees in the middle of the job to finish the part. I have another mill with a Centroid control on it that I added a 4th axis to. I would like to use this 4th axis on the Fadal too. But the Fadal uses resolvers instead of encoders. Does anybody here know if I can replace the encoder on my home made 4th axis with a resolver, tune the servo amp, configure the Fadal for 5 axes, and go to town? Eric
Reply to
etpm
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The Fadal DC systems also need a tachometer to provide analog velocity feedback and so it's best to start with a motor that already has a "pancake type" tach in place and that also has room to mount a "size11" resolver inside the end bell...

Also, make sure you have an inhibit setup on the rt table that the second table is mounted on, so as to make it difficult or impossible to damage your cables etc--this can be done on several ways depending.

As a point of refrence, the axis motors on that machine are ~ 12 amps, but for a small rotary table you can probably get away with motor/ amp combination at least 1/2 that size, probably even smaller, depending on worm ratio and final faceplate diameter.

Reply to
PrecisionmachinisT

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