CNC Update

The EMCO F1 CNC machine that I received for some time ago has not yet been put to good use. I have moved lately, and thus I needed a place for this 200kg beast to stay. It has been stored in the garage of my good friend.

We have been busy remodelling his house and haven’t had the time to look at the CNC machine before now. I must say that this machine is really retro. It looks like it came right out of TRON. Even the key is a rather spectacularly designe specimen. Everything has the "robot from the future in the eyes of 1984" feel to it. All the while being a very high quality product made in Austria.

But the best part by far is the sound when you switch it on. It spends several seconds winding up the computer fan, and you feel like an astronaut from some sci-fi movie every time.

Status on the machine is that the software, computer and control panel works great. So does two of the axes, which will jog manually. The Z axis and the spindle motor are however not responding. We are troubleshooting this, but given the limited space and time (it has to fit in both our busy schedules) progress is slow.

The way ahead on this is most likely replacing the 1984 beast-computer that weighs in on around 120kg with a linux based control computer and some matching stepper/spindle motor controller boards. But we will try our best to diagnose it first and see if we can get it working using the existing hardware. For that job, this site has been an absolute god-send resource. It has all manuals, programming guides and specifications for the machine.

I might get some pictures or videos of our effort in here.