Working on a new winder. . .

[kayakerca]

So, a dozen or so winds into this new CNC winder and how is it working you ask?

FANTASTIC! ! !

[Lyrebird Steve]

FIRST WIND IS DONE! ! !

Jim,

that's AWESOME !

Steve, are you at the point where you can run your new code on your Haydon dual motion motor yet?

Right at the moment I'm getting my garage/workshop re-roofed - so I've had to move everything into storage

Expect to be back at it at Easter.

Also, I'm working at completing my Cub Scout Leader training, so I've had to hit pause on the Open Source winder program ... expect this for a May release.

[kayakerca]

Knowing what I know today about my CNC Winder build, I think I could have gotten away quite nicely with one of these bipolar Haydon linear actuators off ebay. With a 1" stroke and .0003125" per step resolution, this would have worked very nicely for any pickup I could ever see myself building. And @ $50 with only 40 hours of run time on them, they are a pretty good deal relative to over $200 for a new one. Would have put me in at cleanly under $300 for my CNC winder.
Ah, if only they had been on ebay when I was buying mine. . .

Haydon Linear Actuator Stepper Size 23 | eBay

[Lyrebird Steve]

Haydon Linear Actuator Stepper Size 23 | eBay

That's perfect for the CNC winder app.

I'll be posting the Open Source code for the winder very soon.

[Jim72]

Jim, Great job on your winder! Do you think this other actuator that you linked to will work with the controller and power supply you used? I am thinking of putting this together using the linear actuator you linked to.

Thanks,

Jim

Knowing what I know today about my CNC Winder build, I think I could have gotten away quite nicely with one of these bipolar Haydon linear actuators off ebay. With a 1" stroke and .0003125" per step resolution, this would have worked very nicely for any pickup I could ever see myself building. And @ $50 with only 40 hours of run time on them, they are a pretty good deal relative to over $200 for a new one. Would have put me in at cleanly under $300 for my CNC winder.
Ah, if only they had been on ebay when I was buying mine. . .

Haydon Linear Actuator Stepper Size 23 | eBay

[kayakerca]

Jim, Great job on your winder! Do you think this other actuator that you linked to will work with the controller and power supply you used? I am thinking of putting this together using the linear actuator you linked to.

Thanks,

Jim

Hi Jim:

Actually I think it would work better than the one I used.

Haydon Linear Actuator Stepper Size 23 | eBay

I errored on the side of being able to traverse slower (greater tpl). The stepper in the link is about 1/3 the resolution of the one I used which means it will more easily handle fewer tpl winds (e.g. it will traverse about 3 times as fast as mine). The one in the link has a 1" stroke, which should handle any pickup you throw at it, but you'll always want to double check that your traverse starts moving in the right direction or you'll get that horrible gear/spline grinding that happens if you let the unit get to the absolute end of the stroke. Not a pleasant experience as it is REAL hard on the stepper, not to mention the wire mess.

I would also use a beefier stepper for the winder such as this:

Phidgets Inc. - 3303_0 - 42BYGHW811 NEMA-17 Bipolar 48mm Stepper

I started with a lighter one and you could stop it with less force that takes to break a strand of 42 AWG. I have had no issues with the higher torque motor stopping to this point.

It will definitely work with the Phidgets bipolar controllers I used and with the app. I think steppers are great for this type of application, but they can be funky. One caveat though, my opinion isn't worth much on the technical side as I spent my working career as a C.A. (CPA if you are from the U.S. of A.), not an engineer.

Hope that helps.

Enjoy the winder build. I found it a ton of fun!

[Lyrebird Steve]

but you'll always want to double check that your traverse starts moving in the right direction or you'll get that horrible gear/spline grinding that happens if you let the unit get to the absolute end of the stroke. Not a pleasant experience as it is REAL hard on the stepper, not to mention the wire mess.

What is needed to prevent this is a pair of traverse limit detectors.

You would need something like these
https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9322
https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9299

These will plug (almost) directly into your Phidgets 1063 stepper controller. Note that the hi-speed replacement (1067) doesn't have the digital inputs, and this would require the purchase of a more costly I/O board.

So grab one of these boards for the traverse
Phidgets Inc. - 1063_1 - PhidgetStepper Bipolar 1-Motor

and one of these for Rotational
Phidgets Inc. - 1067_0 - PhidgetStepper Bipolar HC

[Jim72]

Hi Jim,

I ordered the linear actuator, so I am committed. I am sure I will have questions. I looked for your reference to cncdudez info on their winder, but see that the old site doesn't mention anything about it. The new site is to sell a built unit so I don't see plans or drawings for parts. The guide needle you are using looks interesting, did you make it or buy it? I wonder if a mig tip may work for that? Or a pastic or delrin rod with a small hole to try and minimize damage to the wire? Is your needle working well or do you think you will change? Or perhaps an IV needle sheath, semi flexible, smooth, available in different gauge and length.

I plan on the NEMA 17 motor as well. I would like to take you up on your offer of your programming efforts, and would be very grateful as I know nothing about programming and very little about cnc. I am OK at woodworking, metal machining, and am learning more about electronics (just finished my first amp build, a 5F1, and am getting ready to start a 5E3 build next). I am self taught on all of my hobbies which helps with having the confidence to take on new stuff, if it looks interesting and useful I'll probably give it a shot.

Thank you for your generosity with sharing your skills and knowledge. Hopefully I will be able to contribute as well.

Jim

[Jim72]

Hi Steve,

Thank you for your advise. I saw the other (newer) board and wondered if it could work with the project. I am sure once I get started I will have questions for both you and Jim. I will begin gathering parts.

Jim

[kayakerca]

Hi Jim,

I ordered the linear actuator, so I am committed. I am sure I will have questions. I looked for your reference to cncdudez info on their winder, but see that the old site doesn't mention anything about it. The new site is to sell a built unit so I don't see plans or drawings for parts. The guide needle you are using looks interesting, did you make it or buy it? I wonder if a mig tip may work for that? Or a pastic or delrin rod with a small hole to try and minimize damage to the wire? Is your needle working well or do you think you will change? Or perhaps an IV needle sheath, semi flexible, smooth, available in different gauge and length.

I plan on the NEMA 17 motor as well. I would like to take you up on your offer of your programming efforts, and would be very grateful as I know nothing about programming and very little about cnc. I am OK at woodworking, metal machining, and am learning more about electronics (just finished my first amp build, a 5F1, and am getting ready to start a 5E3 build next). I am self taught on all of my hobbies which helps with having the confidence to take on new stuff, if it looks interesting and useful I'll probably give it a shot.

Thank you for your generosity with sharing your skills and knowledge. Hopefully I will be able to contribute as well.

Jim

Hi Jim:

I am using a "commercial grade" wire guide with a ruby tip that I bought from a company called Cosmos (very expensive). I believe CNCDudez make GREAT winders from what I see on their website. Very gifted development skills in my opinion. I asked Sean at CNCDudez (who seems like a really good guy) about the wire guide on the pickup coil winder and he said they use both tips like mine and more cost effective alternatives, depending on the user and their wishes. The stainless/ruby tips are expensive unless you are venturous enough to buy from something like aliexpress.com. I think the soft wire guides, because of their whippyish composition, allow the wire to "follow" more than be "guided" by the traverser motor if that makes sense. While I haven't used one, I could see how it might promote wire build up at the traverse direction change. Could be wrong. Who knows. . . But, I can say that I get absolutely zero wire build up at the edges of the bobbin with the rigid style guide. The ID of the guide is only 4X the diameter of the wire, so there is virtually no opportunity for backlash type wire build up from the wire guide. There may be lots of less expensive alternatives as you are thinking, but you will only know how successful they are by trying them. I think I see benefits of a wire guide that is rigid, has a small ID, is smooth so it won't scratch off the wire's insulation and is durable. Again, it is whatever works for you at a cost effective price is all that matters.

My code isn't very sophisticated, but you are welcome to it. It will only work with the Phidgets bipolar controllers, so if you go that route send me the serial number of the boards and I will put them in the source and send you a compiled version of the app. You will need to be running Windows with .NET (recent version) to have it work. I am NOT a coder and it shows in the simplicity of what I did. I just bought a Visual Basic into book and went for it and with a bit of guidance from Steve came up with what you see. Steve's code promises to be much, much more powerful and versatile (if he puts in guide alignment functionality ;-).

I look forward to seeing your progress, with pictures!

BTW, looks like you bought 2 of those linear actuators.

[peskywinnets]

I built my own simple CNC winder & utilize the 'feed the wire onto the bobbin over a threaded screw' (helix) method ...for my needs it works fine (& doesn't scratch the enamel off the wire)

Another alternative to throw into the mix is a free program called GCoil, which is what I use ('gcoil' is part of a suite of free programs all lobbed together into a rar file called gsuite...simply dig gcoil out of this suite of programs- http://pilotpage.monosock.org/filead...suite_v1.4.rar



it converts your bobbin dimension & wire size data into g-code which can then be loaded into any CNC application (Mach3 etc).

this makes a for a very cheap & simple way of winding coils.

[the great waldo]

Hi Peskywinnets

Have you a working link for the Gcoil software? the link you posted does'nt seem to work.

Cheers

Andrew

I built my own simple CNC winder & utilize the 'feed the wire onto the bobbin over a threaded screw' (helix) method ...for my needs it works fine (& doesn't scratch the enamel off the wire)

Another alternative to throw into the mix is a free program called GCoil, which is what I use ('gcoil' is part of a suite of free programs all lobbed together into a rar file called gsuite...simply dig gcoil out of this suite of programs- http://pilotpage.monosock.org/filead...suite_v1.4.rar...



it converts your bobbin dimension & wire size data into g-code which can then be loaded into any CNC application (Mach3 etc).

this makes a for a very cheap & simple way of winding coils.

[peskywinnets]

Ok, I've edited the original bad link in that last post of mine, but here it is again..... http://pilotpage.monosock.org/filead...suite_v1.4.rar

[the great waldo]

Hi Pesky

Thanks very much.

Cheers

Andrew

Ok, I've edited the original bad link in that last post of mine, but here it is again..... http://pilotpage.monosock.org/filead...suite_v1.4.rar

[Eastbville]

Kayakerca, Your development/component looks to be an improvement over the cam. The cam works fine, but is just a pain to fashion from scratch and is time-consuming to position so that it doesn't chatter at the rod's tip. I have my shop's new winder 98% complete thanks to a good friend being a machinist and having time to help me out. I'll post a picture after assembling it in the next week or so. I'm encouraged by all these new components making our winding job, possibly, easier.