The Home Machinist!

Cutting the power to the VFD by using the foot brake is not advised, generates high voltage to the VFD potentially damaging the IGBT's. That isn’t how it works. The microswitch on the foot brake is wired to an X bus input and it’s configured with the proper parameter. That parameter tells the VFD t...

All VFD makers need a lesson from Automation Direct on how easy a VFD can and should be to set up. Maybe I just got lucky with that as my first VFD purchase. Lots of people recommended TECO but glad I went with AD. At this point I've figured out how to operate the VFD through the spindle control ro...

Just gotta be careful with deceleration. If you set it too high, can overload and pop breakers Assume your lathe has other type of braking system available. My old clunkers do not, and the 3 phase trick of popping in reverse to brake can be problematic with a vfd. Trying to use the deceleration cur...

No sooner than I posted this I went to the shop and tried one more set of parameters and it worked. I set F01.11 to 90.00 and F01.12 to 30.00 and it finally turned loose of the 50Hz maximum speed. I would still like to figure out how to set the default at 60Hz instead of 50Hx, though. The lathe is a...

Looking for someone that has set up an ENC VFD from Shenzhen Encom Electric Technologies. It's a little different from other VFDs that I have either configured myself or seen videos/read manuals. I've set up an Automation Direct and had no difficulty making it work exactly as I wanted. I set minimum...

You might look for free machining brass.

That's my plan for the VFD, Bill. Table power feed is very optional for most of my work. Spindle, not so much. I held off on getting both VFDs at the same time in case the first one was inadequate. I may never push a mill to its horsepower limit but wanted to be confident that the spindle motor had ...

The power enclosure is switched with a 30A 3 pole Leviton switch and an enclosure designed expressly for that switch. It sends 240V into the main enclosure which is branched off to supply 120V to a 2 gang 4 outlet box on the lower right where the black/white/green wires exit. That switched power is ...

It's been a while since my last post. The machine is being used as needed although it still needs a lot of work. I haven't hooked up a VFD to the table motor yet. The Battleship Texas project has become almost a full time job as a volunteer. I need to re-plumb the one shot lube lines, clean up the p...

FWIW the YG-1 end mills from Korea have been good for me so far. Amazon carries them. Someone ordered some Drill America dies for me to use and they’re underwhelming.

I walked away from the mill. Even though the price was very low it was becoming more of a project than I expected. I had given the seller some money and he agreed to me taking the vise and he kept the money I had already given him. It was about what used Yuasa 6” vises are selling for on Marketplace...

I only have a set of R8 collets by 1/16" increments, a single 3/8" Weldon holder and an inexpensive set of 1.25" to 2" indexable end mills. I'll probably cough up the bucks for a regrind after getting aggravated enough with the BS9 taper.