Easy to build CNC Mill Stepper Motor and Driver circuits

Step 2 Circuit Cloning

If you have a time machine you can go to the future and ask yourself to make the circuit board with the finished machine and then bring it back and finish building the machine. After a couple of tries I got the board to come out pretty good. The machine routes what are called isolation paths which means it seperates the copper that is associated with a conductive path from all the other copper around it. This leaves some areas of the board that are not associated with a path still covered with copper. You could leave this extra copper on there but when your soldering it is easy to get solder bridges across the isolation paths and short circuit something. So I take the soldering iron and touch it on the excess copper and peal it up off the board. It makes the board more like what you would get if you chemical etched it or bought it from a board house(see below).

Any way look over the schematic and place the parts accordingly. I added a few capacitors along the power lines just for general principals. There were so few traces on the top side of the board I didn't bother milling it. I just used jumper wires. See the pictures below of the populated board. All the little FETs ligned up like marching soldiers.

Comments

[medalhead]

HELP PLEASE!!

Hy i used some motors on my board wich are not strong enough, these motors shoud be driven at 12 V. now i bought some new motors with more power.

for my old motors i did not use the light bulbs ore resistors instead, cause i did not need them....
but the new motors should be driven at 4V and 1A.

im from germany an cant find any bulbs with sockets that would match and do not have any 8R power resistor.
so is it possible to use a speaker with 8R??

[mahmoud asem]

please guys what are the values of c3-c6 i just need that to finish :)

[woodspinner]

.1uf

[mahmoud asem]

and how about c6 is it imortant ?

[mahmoud asem]

thank you buddy i will finish it and post some pics :)

[adam.part]

hi there, a very good design, wang to make one, cann't get the 4516, what should I do?

thanks

adam

[stewie0056]

i have used a 74191 instead of the 4516 and it works perfectly. just look at the two datasheets and find where the pins need to go. i ordered mine from www.allelectronics.com
if you need any help message me

[adam.part]

thanks, i got 4516 and made a single axis circuit, but do not know how to start, i connect 25 pin on and set pin2 as step and goes to pin15 of 4516, pin3 as dir and goes to pin10 of 4516, pin4 as enable goes to pin12 of 4028, i am using mach3, what can i do now ?

[stewie0056]

right now i have a single axis too because i am waiting for better stepper motors to arrive.

you are correct on where the direction, step, and enable need to be.
to do a quick test unplug from computer. make your enable wire HIGH. make your direction wire HIGH or LOW. take a wire from your clock and move it from GROUND to VDD to GROUND......
everytime you touch VDD your stepper should move one step. change the direction wire and try it again. then ground your enable wire. if it stops power to the motor. if all that works everything is working onthe circuit side of the cnc driver.

i have not used mach3 yet but when i do ill let you know if anything needs changed. as far a kcam it works perfectly. just set up the port and the table settings and its works good. i cant seem to get it to run off of g code. only .gc files will work for some reason.

good luck

[adam.part]

HI, stewie0056
Tried steps above and unfortunately, motor no move, must be something wrong, I just don't where?

[stewie0056]

What I did was start and test each component individually. The for example make sure your decade counter works buy putting leds on the outputs and have every thing else hooked up like the schematic except the parallel port wires. Then move your clock wire to high then low then high then low and so on. I every time it should count in binary from 0-15 if not then there's your problem. I if it does now move on to your decoder . Give it a known input by outing the input wires on your + 5 power and ground rails. The now check that the decoder is working properly and giving you the correct values. If so move on to the fets. I had bad luck with mine and I'm actually using a uln2003a instead of fets. Other changes I have made are I don't have a zener diode but I have a 7805 voltage regulator and I have added a 4700uf capacitor because my motors draw more current then my power supply can provide.

[emihackr97]

Hi, Can I use a USB to PARALLEL (CENTRONICS) converter??

What are the light bulbd for??? can't i just remove them??

thanks 4 answering.

[zulfiqaradil]

hello , friends the z - axis motor is not working whats the problem man plz helpo me

[woodspinner]

the bulbs limit the power going to the motors, if you use a big power supply and no bulbs you will fry the motors and possibly the board.

John

[pfred2]

I bet. If you want to get unstuck send me a message maybe I will be able to help. This is one of my motor drivers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgbeyNNBZ68

So I'm pretty good when it comes to these stepper motors.

[old baldy]

Emihackr97,
printer.

I am currently using win 7 ult. My system does not have a parallel port.
Bought USB to Parallel cable. I lied to windows, and installed a new
printer. I then changed the port in Properties, from LPT1 to USB2.

This configuration runs HP laserjet 5 and Cal Comp plotter.
Windows thinks plotter is HP 430.

Have not tried Mach 3 yet, but autocad, and solidworks , print just fine.

Setup on Cal Comp 3025 is set for HP-GL 2. Kind of universal data stream.

Hope this helps.

[chony420]

Here is mine, i have some problem yet, but working on it, it work just to one side, the direction pin aperantly not working, in kcam, and with the paralell port tester. I think the problem is the stepper motor, becouse i take it from an old printer, i will buy a new one on monday to test. Here is my circuit board.

[Serek_1]

I think the board is made wrong...
Its made as a mirror.
I've made today the same, I've noted it after drilling the holes.

[chony420]

In the top black image of the tutorial appears the componenets and how they goes. In that image you have all the information to make the circuit board.

[chony420]

Video Comming soon!!!!! It woks, it give the pulse to the pin and the stepper motor make 1 step every pulse, but cant change direction yet. When i fix that i will upload video.

[kosme]

I am having problems with this. X axis works fine, Y axis only works in one direction, Z axis doesn't work at all. Anyone with similar problems??

[kosme]

partially fixed the problem. You have to set to true the inversion of pin 14 in the port settings. Step and direction pins in Y axis have cross talk, that is causing that it only turns in one direction. Same with Z axis. Still have to figure out cause

[Mauricio_muga]

Hi, do you have a circuit for bipolar motors?

[howim]

i think this controller can work with both types of motors..

[kooshall]

HI can we use March3 with the board?

[gelicker]

 Could you list the components this circuit?  

[nitro3551]

Hi
What program did you use to create the pcb and convert it to code.
This is an awsome project, Great work.

[sydios]

Hi,

is the Pix where we can se the pbc mirror inverted ?
Becouse i mirror inverted the plan so the little "1" is readable on the 
board. What is right to do ?

thanks .,..

[bobsmith760]

 Yes, you do need to invert it.

[dragonart777]

i am a bs2 programer  so i have over 60  servo's around  im wondering
if servo's can be used for this  for a small project i like to try
servo's run by pulse  same as the axe motor  so i would thank
if so please send me a yes or no in my index 

[the gamer 579]

what programe did you use to make the .gbr files .drl files and .gc files

[bobica257]

Probobly Corel.

Can you tell me can I use 3 LEDiodes with resitors on  place 3 light bulbs?

Sorry about my English.

[calphool]

No, LEDs would not work very well.  He's using the bulbs as RESISTORS.  LEDs are diodes, and are not linear devices like resistors.

Read:

http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/4943/Resistance-of-LED-s

[DrKhaos]

Wouldn't bobica257's use of resistors in series with the LED's give you the same effect?

[calphool]

If he uses both resistors and LEDs he may be able to get "close" the same behavior as a lightbulb, but LEDs are diodes after all, and have a breakdown voltage that they must reach before they pass anything (they're non-linear -- unlike an incandescent bulb or just a resistor), so that might have some unwanted side effects in a circuit that's driving a precision motor winding.  I'm about half way done building one of these right now, so maybe I'll give it a try and let everyone know what happens.

[CMNDR]

 Good Project. Though this is the first post in a while for this project, I was wondering if for all three circuits I use the same pins on the cable connector?
Thanks

[gettingitfirst]

Yeah, Where's the parts list?

[Carsen55]

The parts list is on the intro page when you scroll it down you,ll find a Words document, open it.

[bobica257]

And  is that 3 Light bulb are motor indicator?

Sorry about my English.

[isidoro.maich]

No, the light bulbs are used as high power resistor (limiting current), this is because is more cheap than power resistors. Read the text, is well explainded.