Shopbot driver card

[Mr. John (Unregistered Guest)]

Has anyone else had to replace a driver card for their Shopbot controller? The two main boards are from a company called Blue Earth and can be purchased and modified rather inexpensively, but the driver cards (looks like a custom job made for Shopbot) cost in the neighborhood of $235 bucks each from the Shopbot sales office!! The electronics are fairly simple and the components can be purchased online for pennies. Can Shopbot justify why these simple cards are so expensive? If I needed to replace all 3 axis driver boards, the cost would be rediculous.

[richards]

Mr. John,

I can't speak for Shopbot, but I have designed "many" process control computer driver boards over the years. The largest production run that I ever had was in the low 100's, consequently, the cost of each card had to include part of the cost of research and development, design, programming, prototyping, sales, warranty, and repair. Getting a driver card for $235 seems like a steal. Some of the companies that I've had to buy from in the past (including Kodak, Lucht, Bremson, etc. - who were all leaders in their field) had very simple boards that cost several times $235.

Right now, the minimum cost for having a prototype (bare board - 5 day service, 2 sides, w/silk screen and solder mask) is $750. Before I get to that stage, I have to design the board (schematic capture, parts layout). After receiving the prototype cards, I have to stuff the card (finding parts from various suppliers, checking part specs against requirements, solder, clean, and test). Finally, I have to program the card (assuming that it has a microcontroller on board or PAL, GAL, FLASH or other programmable parts). That entire process can easily take the better part of a month. Someone has to cover those costs. AND, even though I work carefully and cautiously, it is not unknown to have to cycle through that process several times before the board is ready for the marketplace.

You always have the option of designing your own cards and then marketing them to other users. However, unless you have had a lot of experience, I doubt that you could build a card that would sell for less - if you were counting on covering your costs, time, and effort.

Mike

[ron brown]

Gee Mike,

I had some cards assembled from a purchased PC board and bought the chips. If I remember correctly, it cost me about $500 an axis. It cured me from even building kits.

There are less costly options than the ShopBot controller. With this forum, I think ShopBot might be the least expensive way to get into the CNC business.

Ron

[Mr. John (Unregistered Guest)]

Hi Michael and Ron,

Sorry to burst your bubble but I was able to reverse engineer the board and re-create it using an etching kit from Radio Shack.

The board works great and it only cost me about $40.

Of course a degree obtained in Printed Circuit Board Design and Manufacturing years ago helped me quite a bit.

I still maintain that the high driver board cost is a total rip-off for the tiny amount of electronics on the individual driver boards. The more complicated (with the microcontroller) Blue Earth controller board and serial interface can be purchased directly from Blue Earth for an approximate cost of $150.

[kivimagi]

Mr. John.. How about leaving your info around so we can contact you if we want to buy one of your circuit boards.

Regards,

[richards]

Mr. John,

Congratulations. $40 for a board, even if you don't count the time it took to design it, lay it out, process it through the chemicals and test it, isn't bad. There have been times when I've done the same - and enjoyed the process. At the present, however, I usually don't take the time to do a one-off if I can buy the part for a reasonable price. Depending on the type of work that I'm running, recapturing $250 might take two hours; therefore, if it takes longer than two hours to reverse engineer, design, layout, process and test a board, I would be money ahead in buying one from the supplier.

Please don't take this wrong. I'm not saying that every decision should be based on cost or cost effectiveness. But, I have had to ask myself, many times over the years, what business I was really in. There was a time that I designed a lot of boards - so I wore the hat of an electrical engineer. There was another time that I wrote a lot of code - so I wore the hat of a programmer. Now I've choosen to wear the hat of a cnc router operator.

Wheneven I catch myself thinking that I could design something a little better or a little less expensively, I ask myself whether I'm a cnc router operator or a cnc router manufacturer.

[elcruisr]

I have to agree with Michael. Unless you are just playing with this as a hobby then every minute of time you put into it is lost revenue. In business, time is money. Also we need to remember that Shopbot has to make a profit or there is going to be no Shopbot. I doubt that you are covering the overhead of a large commercial building, employees, employee expenses, utilities, etc. Not to mention supporting a R&D program. I don't have time to play games with making parts, I have to stay in production so I'm profitable!

Eric

[gerald_d]

"I was able to reverse engineer the board" is another way of saying "I stole the design". That is always the easiest way to bring down the price of something.

And then to come into SB's Forum and complain about their prices, is like a guy walking into your lounge and telling you that you paid too much for your TV, as he puts it under his arm to steal it......

[Mr. John (Unregistered Guest)]

Oh Gerald, you are so melodramatic. If I advertise and sell cards then you may cry and complain about my 'stealing the design'.
If you calculate the number of SB sold and the number of axis cards in each machine, either SB got ripped off from their manufacturer or they are raping us poor SB'ers when their design fails.
Now you want to crucify me for being intelligent enough not to fold and shell out $235 bucks per card? I think not. For the rest of you, I encourage you to build your own cards if you need them, because it isn't rocket science, no matter what Michael says.
And to Eric, how much time do you lose when you wait for a part to be sold and shipped? I too like to stay in production and to have my hand-made cards ready to go at little or no cost to me.
Now, I have been an SB'er since 1998 and rarely come to this forum due to the tendancy of it's users/members to be very closed minded. I see not much has changed.

[shopbotjohn@yahoo.com]

My address if anyone wants to contact me:
shopbotjohn@yahoo.com (mailto:shopbotjohn@yahoo.com)

[Ted Hall]

Just a little clarification. Yes, we do try to maintain an inventory of critical parts for all ShopBots including drivers for products that have been out of production for over 5 years such as the tool in question here.

PR drivers are $225 (these are all tested and warranted for 1 year). PR tools have been out of production for over 5 years. Very few of these drivers fail, even at this age, but we do have them available for overnight shipment if they are needed. Because of the number of upgrades from PR to PRT, we also have used PR drivers available at $75 (these have all been tested and we will warrant them for 90 days). [The price for a new driver is the same we have charged for the last 5 years.]

Early PRT Drivers (IMS replaceable chips) are available at $125.

Later PRT Drivers are all built into the board. Depending on the situation, we can replace a board with a re-manufactured board or repair the board on a 1-day turn. Either type of repair is warranted for 1 year. Note that PRT boards ship with 5 drivers, this means that for standard tools there is an additional 'spare' driver available on-board.

Our new PRTalpha tools come with an AlphaStep Motor/Driver combination for every channel. These remarkably fast and smooth motors offer advanced, closed-loop technology that will never lose position or steps (more advanced than servos). The drivers have an impressive reliability record in installations around the world, and along with the rest of the PRTalpha tool, are warranted for 2 years. If a replacement is ever needed, we will replace the motor, driver, and cable.

Ted Hall, ShopBot

[beacon14]

Now, now boys and girls, settle down. Just as in the current thread about holding down nested sheets, each operator will have their preferred method,and that will be the best method for them, but if they see a better way hopefully they will recognize it as such and improve their operation; at the same time each of us must realize our limitations (be they mechanical, intelligence, software, electrical power, availability of funds, etc.) and be smart enough to know when another method is good for someone else but not for them.
Personally, it would take me far too long to research and re-create the driver board for it to be cost-effective. If I was in production and couldn't afford lost time to a blown driver board, I would buy and keep a couple of spares on hand. For my ocassional use, I can find other things to do while I wait for a board to come in, and it's not expected to happen very often, so I'll buy one if I need one. One of the original themes of the ShopBot was that it is made from easily replaced and modified parts, so you can maintain and/or improve your machine based on your own abilities. Some of us have abilities in areas others only dream about (I do a lot of dreaming, myself). I won't pay ShopBot $75 for a z-zero plate when I can make one for $1 in just a few minutes, and I won't call them to come and re-square my z-axis every 6 months, but if something in the control box blows smoke, I don't need to reinvent the wheel when they can test and fix it while I build cabinets so I can pay the bills (including theirs).
And yes, ShopBot does have the right, indeed the mandate, to turn a profit so they can continue to service and improve their product while providing their owners and employees with a livelyhood. Remember, they don't charge for tech support, which I have to figure costs them a pretty penny as the number of machines out there escalates. Would you feel better if the board were $100 but you had to pay $2.95/minute for them to help you figure out what's wrong? If you extrapolate your logic, the parts for a ShopBot can't cost more than $5000 (?? I have no earthly idea, actually), so why do they sell it for $10,000? Because that's the business they are in. If you can buy the parts and build one yourself, more power to you, and I don't think they will mind at all, but if you value your time like I do, I think I am far better off buying the finished product.
John, you are right in that you are not stealing the design unless you try to sell it for a profit. Part of what you bought when you bought the machine was the design, and I think part of the ShopBot spirit (mentioned above) is that if you can fix it yourself, great. But clearly, that's not for everyone. I do have to disagree when you call the members of this forum closed-minded. Most of the regular posters are generous and helpful almost to a fault.
Sorry for the rant - the above is just my opinion.
David B.

[shopbotjohn@yahoo.com]

Wow! I had an email address and didn't even know it! So, if you guys are fooled into mailing the bogus shopbotjohn@yahoo.com (mailto:shopbotjohn@yahoo.com), then who knows what type of coward you are talking to, it most certainly isn't me.

Good information to know Ted; I guess whoever I talked to on the phone was confused regarding the pricing structure; they were aware that I had an older PR machine and still wanted me to pay the $225 per card. If your sales had the correct information, I would have purchased additional used cards at $75 bucks a pop. Since the sales person wasn't informed, the resulting bad service made me turn elsewhere. I don't mean to sound like I am out to slam you, but you should know where there was a failure in your company.

Hopefully with this additional information from Ted, the rest of you who are in my shoes can benifit from the information.

And to the individual who was cowardly enough to imitate me and set up a Yahoo account....you have no business owning or participating in a Shopbot venture and should be taken out back and flogged to within an inch of your life.

[gerald_d]

"Mr. John", when you chose to hide behind an unregistered name, you leave yourself open to all sorts of mischief on a bulletin board.

[Mr. John (Unregistered Guest)]

My bad, I thought I was dealing with an 'honest' group.


In the past 6 years of working with the 'bot, I have enjoyed my privacy and do not choose to reveal my information on a public, non-password protected forum written in Perl.

Hiding to you it may be, but to me it is a wise decision.

Thanks for all of your input, I consider the matter closed.

[john_amonson]

When my son and I become the third owner of a PRT, Shopbot treated us just like we had just purchased it from them. The control box worked fine during the seller demo, but failed on the way home. Yes, it was packed very carefully in foam! It was tired, and packed full of fine dust. Anyway, Shopbot rebuilt the control box for FREE!!! I have never delt with a better company, ever!

[Mr. John (Unregistered Guest)]

I too have had good service from Shopbot; I'm not sure why the sales individual had the wrong information pertaining to the older PR systems.

Shopbot has replaced rails, wheels, and even given upgraded stepper motors at no cost, so you can understand my confusion when my 6 year old machine would have cost an arm & a leg for driver cards.
But, now I know, and if my hand made cards ever fail, I'll probably be the first one on the phone to get the used ones for $70.

Thanks for pointing out the good...sometimes it is overlooked when the bad dominates.