Anybody any experience/opinions of Compucut? Looking at the x1 project since I have one of those.
- posted
17 years ago
Anybody any experience/opinions of Compucut? Looking at the x1 project since I have one of those.
From what I recall of the Compucut hardware, it is basically a crude half-stepping drive system. For a similar price you could buy three of the 3A/phase microstepping stepper drives from Arc Eurotrade
I would not consider the Compucut software to be a serious option. At the moment I am operating my X3 and Taig mills using DeskCNC
Mach3 is also worth serious consideration
Regards, Tony
If it of interest have a look at my experience in converting an X1 from Arc Euro Trade.
Having used it now for some months I am extremely pleased with the results.
Alan
Due to advances in stepper drives, motors and generally the whole CNC scene things have moved on from the older 1/2 step low power drives and the limitations they produced.
Off the shelf affordable drives from the like of Arc Euro and plenty of people doing their thing like Alan above has opened up far better ways of converting machines. Note in Alan's case his adoption of using the whole of the Z axis from travel whereas the Compucut relies on driving quill thru it's original rack and pinion system which was never renown for accuracy. Compucut also ignore this extended travel saying "The location of the vertical leadscrew BEHIND the column where it will always tend to jam the dovetail when moved" when in fact they offer nothing to support this.
You have to read up, study what others have done and make a choice from that but nothing stays still in this game for long.
.-- Regards,
John Stevenson Nottingham, England.
Visit the new Model Engineering adverts page at:-
Thanks guys, I had read both excellent write ups, trouble is the last electronics I did was a ZX80 kit and that didn't work till the radio ham over the road found all the dry joints, this exercise has just demonstrated to me what I don't know! I wondered about that Compucut assertion regards the X1 column feed, doubt my chances of lucking on cheap ballscrews though - nice one Alan. How good can backlash compensation in software get? I can get my x/y down to a couple of thou but it's getting harder to turn by then, serious steppers needed!
More reading required when all I really want to do is make swarf!
Andy -
Software backlash comp is if limited use on a mill - it can help in some circumstances but not all (tracing circular paths is generally the pathological case). Having said that, you can do quite a lot with a machine that has (only) a couple of thou backlash.
Regards, Tony
It's also fairly easy with some ingenuity to minimise it without adding too much friction.
Make an additional nut from Delrin or similar and Belleville washers or other strong springs to preload it against the original nut.
Wayne...
I CNC'd my X1 with a motor mount kit form CNCfusion (exchange rates help a lot at the moment) and a controller box from
There is a Yahoo group dedicated to CNC conversion of the X1 mill, (also known in the US as the HF47158),
Stu G
PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.