Hi, Converting an OX CNC 1500x1500 to a plasma cutter. Installed floating Z, inductive endstops and a Proma THC SD controller. Now ordered the Blackbox controller to take control of the beast. Anyone else running the Blackbox controller with plasma, and care to share there toughts and expiriences? Erik
No it cannot. Google for "grbl plasma" to read up about it GRBL does not support up/down commands from a THC. Option a) dont use THC, use a Floating / Drag head setup with BlackBox Option b) you really want THC then a low cost controller like Blackbox or any other Grbl board will not suit you. Want to go professional, you'll have to spend on professional / or diy with LinuxCNC
For Opton B, use the Proma THC-SD. It works with the balckbox, because it takes control over the Z motor. Use the floating head for the Z zero, and then the Proma SD takes over the rest.
How would that work considering to wire the HTC-SD it needs to between the CNC board and the motor driver and the Blackbox has onboard motor drivers?
i'm using a relay that switches between the blackbox driver and a seperate driver. The moment the relay switches on the plasma torch, it switches to a second motor driver for the Z-Axis. Since the torch fires, and waits 1.5 seconds before moving, this is not a problem
i know, but from that moment blackbox does not control the Z axis, the Proma Thc-sd with its own driver does.
Fair enough, but then what are you switching? I was thinking you run step/dir/enable out to the relay, and step/dir/enable from your standalone THC, then switch which goes to the Z-driver (assuming external used for both) Are you switching enabled motor wires then? (That would be heavy on the drivers on blackbox, like unplugging a motor, back-emf dumping back to the driver)
Right now I have an ST-V3 Board connected to four DQ542MA Step Drivers and two 36v power supplies. Can I connect the Blackbox to the DQ542MA drivers and bypass the onboard drivers?
No, like i've been saying for a while, its not really what Blackbox is for man Just get an Uno and some DQ542MAs if you want to do advanced stuff like this. BlackBox is meant for those 99% of our users who just want to plug in a controller to a standard machine and go. Easy, simple, to the point
Hi - I followed this thread, and I am hoping for some insight. I have a custom 1 meter square XYZ build with openbuilds heavy duty Nema 23's,and the black box. I was able to get it working great with the endurance 10W laser as a laser engraver using lightburn. I made it using a modular quick-change tool system I found on Thingiverse and printed up. laser mount: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3530513 quick change mount system: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3369444 I found a design for the S-45 torch my Lotos Plasma came with, mashed it up in sketchup, and it printed great. Now I need to connect my plasma cutter to the GRBL Black Box. I understand the GRBL Black Box will not deal with a THC. Can anyone give me guidance on which pins to use on the CNC port of the plasma cutter? Wondering if anyone else has done this yet, and would be willing to share some insight. Plasma is LOTOS Supreme Cut 60D (manual here: https://www.uwelding.com/content/manual/SupremeCUT60DManual.pdf pinout on page 27 My question is this: what pins can I use to control this plasma cutter (just on/off, on-off and power setting?, anything else?) and what changes would I make in the settings for the black box tool?
From the description, that should be pins 1+2 connected as before here https://docs.openbuilds.com/blackbox/#334-plasma.html to the Relay connector on the BlackBox Make sure to set the Relay jumper to m3/m5 mode: https://docs.openbuilds.com/blackbox/#214-relay.html M3S1000 to turn plasma on, M5 to turn it off
From the description, that should be pins 1+2 connected as before here OpenBuilds BlackBox 4X Documentation to the Relay connector on the BlackBox Make sure to set the Relay jumper to m3/m5 mode: OpenBuilds BlackBox 4X Documentation M3S1000 to turn plasma on, M5 to turn it off
