SUPER Fast Arduino Servo! ClearPath! WW120

ClearPath Servos are AMAZING! Using them with an Arduino UNO to get over 1,100 IPM rapids on a linear stage!

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[krisc]

I was so amazed that the servo motor can do that accurate movement. I thought it was a stepper. It should have a very fine rotary encoder that records rotational angle of servo. Very interesting video.

[machine]

I bought 3 of these along with the cables.  These are awesome motors.  The tuning was super easy and my little cnc table is singing.  No stepper noise as is so common.  All I hear is the 2.2kw spindle running.  Machine is virtually silent.  I built the machine to machine coins specifically and I couldn't be happier with the Clearpath motors.  In a word, awesome!  Thinking I'd like to retrofit some on to my Tormach!

[adisharr]

Hey John, hard stops are one of the best ways to home and the method is commonly used by just about every motor manufacturer. Generally it works either by sensing an increased current draw over a threshold or position error threshold (actual vs commanded position). The downfalls are windup inaccuracy in your coupling and end stops on your slide. As things age, your position will drift. Also, it will home against ANY hard stop including something in the way and give you a false position. You probably wouldn't run into that issue though.

Either way, I think this solution is much better than a plain stepper :)

[sparksflyingpyro]

I recently had a 4x8 cnc router built and had the company upgrade me to servos over stepper motors, Super excited, machines coming today!!!

[galencallahan]

I just got 3 of these for my bridgeport retrofit. I have seen some amazing things done with them. Largest downside is they don't have many options for higher torque. At the torque I needed, I will only get about 80IPM rapids. They are better for plasma/ routers / lighter weight DIY type machines. Still can't beat them for the money, and amazing performance.

[MrJsmall]

The servo motor is moving to the limit as a hard stop most likely, so when the torque monitoring detects a substantial raise in torque it know to stop, it's like a block skip mode in probing. Once the increased load is detected the servo motor goes to a pulse marker (0 or 180) and then you probably can define an encoder position to go to a commanded home position. This works as long as your "limit" (hard stop) is somewhat repeatable. On higher end system you can give it a window relative to the home position so you know if there is a chip, or something obstructing the hard stop. Also your math on the speed could have been much simplified by converting your 10 pitch to inch and then multiplying that by the RPM of the motor. .3937X3500=1377.95 ipm. Good video!

[onemanriflemaker]

I'm just in the process of dumping my home built router mill. Clear paths are the motors of choice.
I'm going for broke with the addition of a custom motion controller too!

[trentw]

So excited about this. Been looking at these for a while for my next cnc machine, but didn't really know how to integrate them. Thanks.

[partisanguerrilla]

John, you beat me to getting into the ClearPath! Would be interesting the accuracy results with more mass on the table, but it
should be great. Servo is closed loop, it goes where it is supposed to go without skipping steps (stepper). You also get the controller built-in, not like you have to buy a complete assortment of controllers for each stepper. ClearPath has some awesome video demos of passing linear stage movement going right through a rotating disk that has notches in it with a crazy tight fit to pass through, going forward and reverse directions at fast speeds on the linear stage. Incredible possibilities!

[HughesEarthworks]

I can't wait to see the DIY plasma.  I'll be making one right along with you.

[ghostcoast]

Quickly becoming one of my favorite youtube channels

[legionk]

very cool, I use to work in robotics (semiconductor) and we had homing sequences and home offset. Takes me back. :)

[thomaswayne]

A couple of notes - you can configure the percentage of total available torque used during the hard-stop homing sequence, We typically run them around 5% torque for homing, and use VERY hard stops (steel) to prevent any elasticity variable with rubber stop, such as temperature. Homing at only 5% torque protects every part of the machine against potential. jarring.

Also, there are two distinct families of Clearpath motors - the MV series and the SD series. The MV motors are used for a variety of SIMPLE applications that would typically utilize a PLC to control and drive a SINGLE conventional stepper/servo motor. The advantage with the Clearpath MV is that you program it once using a USB cable and a laptop, after which it will reliably repeat that program forever, being triggered by simple analog switch inputs. So no dedicated computer/controller required. Changing the program does require using a laptop and USB, but in most cases you'll simply want to "set it and forget it".

The SD series is primarily meant to replace stepper motors, and they provide greater accuracy, speed, and torque along with ZERO chance of dropped steps. They basically turn a stepper system into a servo system VERY economically. Caveat: the feedback loop is self-contained within the motor itself (built in tach & encoder), so there is no feedback loop out to your computer screen or DRO. However, in practice the low-end "DRO" feature of Mach3/4 (for example) is perfectly adequate due to the motors faithful reliability in executing the commanded moves.

I have built and/or rebuilt many, many small shop machines, and since adopting Clearpath SD motors a few years ago I will NEVER use another stepper motor for any application I care about. They're just that good.

[Max_Marz]

Whaaaat, I cant imagine I introduced you to these things but I did leave you a comment about them a couple weeks ago, I'd love to see them retrofitted into your little Tormach slant bed, it would become a completely different machine.

[TomZelickman]

I was toying around with the idea of swapping the motors on the slant bed to a beefy version of these to get rapids up... Glad to see you are having some fun though! I've been so bogged down with "paying" jobs that I haven't had a chance to play much lately. Maybe it's time to take your advice and take a darned break!

Best wishes, sir.
TZ

[DStrayCat]

Absolutely AWESOME!!! A long, long time ago, I recommended Servos. That's the exact ones, I had in mind ;-) Great job :-)

[kocnn]

Very Cool! Financially out of reach for me though so I'm sticking to steppers for now because I have them and my machine is not even built yet.

[kurtfeigel]

awesome. We have these on our MK7 reloading automation system. They are very good. Very precise.

[mowbetter]

I purchased three of the nema 34 versions 1392 oz/in to convert my old j2 bridgeport over to cnc. There is a really nice controller to run these with called Masso by Hind Technology. Tons of IO points and it runs its own software and is capable of running 5 axis. Might want to check it out. I will post some video of the mill when I get the motor mounts finished up.

[turbotona]

These are awesome!! Could I use something like this to convert my lathe to CNC ? Or my Bridgeport ?