Can you guys educate me? I'm an old disk drive guy so I know a little about servos. But a design from scratch is very difficult. Velocity curves, speed torque curves mass and all that "stuff". What's the magic that makes this easy? Software?

 

I guess I got spoiled with using Servo's off the bat and their basically flat torque curve when I got involved in motion control.
I have never really developed an affinity to steppers, in spite of trying them on occasion.

Typical servo torque curve.
Max.

I'm not trying to cut steel or anything. Since this is my first project of this nature, I'm more concerned with my ability to control the motors and less with torque right now.
Max, you brought up the Mach3 earlier, and it seems like you have experience with this stuff. I like what I've seen from ClearPath. They tell me I don't need a driver, only a controller. Mach3 claims to turn your computer into a controller. So it seems I can control the ClearPath servos using Mach3--no controllers or drivers need?

 

Can you guys educate me? I'm an old disk drive guy so I know a little about servos. But a design from scratch is very difficult. Velocity curves, speed torque curves mass and all that "stuff". What's the magic that makes this easy? Software?

A basic CNC controller has a front end HMI (Human Machine Interface) and a trajectory planner that is required to control the servo positioning with interpolated motion of 2 or more axis.
Other features are multi axis electronic gearing and electronic cam.

I'm not trying to cut steel or anything. Since this is my first project of this nature, I'm more concerned with my ability to control the motors and less with torque right now.
Max, you brought up the Mach3 earlier, and it seems like you have experience with this stuff. I like what I've seen from ClearPath. They tell me I don't need a driver, only a controller. Mach3 claims to turn your computer into a controller. So it seems I can control the ClearPath servos using Mach3--no controllers or drivers need?

I have no knowledge of ClearPath, but apart from the CNC software you need a drive amplifier of some kind to control the motors from the commands issued by the front end software.
My experience has been with industrial CNC retro-fits, Fanuc, Mitsubishi etc, but my favorite for home built is the Galil Motion cards that fit in a PC slot. But pricey $$$.
Max.

 

@tlewick1 I think I may have been wrong on requiring a drive for the stepper-like Teknic motor, it appears to have the drive internal?
Max.

 

@tlewick1 I think I may have been wrong on requiring a drive for the stepper-like Teknic motor, it appears to have the drive internal?
Max.

The drive for the motor is internal (controller is external), but the 75V power supply is external.