New cable guide

[richards]

When the factory cable guide broke, I called Rube Goldberg for some design help. He stopped by and this is what resulted:


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The disign is loosely based on Paco's design, using 0.98 High Density Polyethylene. The 8-inch width was choosen to help eliminate electrical noise from the spindle. So far, it works great. The alpha hasn't stuttered once from electrical interference since I made the change.

The aluminum is the 1010 size from 80/20. A similar guide runs along the x-axis, but it is constructed from 3/4-inch black pipe.

[paco]

Hey Mike!

Look good!

Where is your dust collector hose?

So far, is the fixed wires (look like they are "ty-wraped") bending when it's unfolding?

I'll post some of the mods I made recently later today...

[richards]

Hi Paco,

I'm working on a new dust collector assembly where the hose will hang directly from the ceiling.

You're right about the nylon ties holding the cables to the plastic. What you can't see is a 1-1/2-inch x 6-inch chrome tube at the top of assembly that acts as a bearing. The cable ties hold the plastic to the tube and the tube is free to rotate around the arm. It's very crude, but it keeps the cables from flexing.

[paco]

On my setup, power cord and air line to motors and sensitive signal wires are about 4" apart. I soon notice that they we're bending when the guide was rolling... so I free 'em (from mid to on end only).


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Wires here and there at the Z we're becoming annoying to avoid, so I added another wire guide there too!


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As for the dust collector hose, I've combined both benefit of this wire guide setup and the hanging hose from the ceiling...


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I'm still at the prototype stage (I like to improve things over time...) but someday I may have a good looking installation as yours! 8-)

**Louis, notice something on this late pix?!**

[gerald_d]

Mike, FYI, on my "Mechmate" with PMDX/Gecko/Mach control, and 5HP spindle with DeltaVFD, I bundled all the cables (all screened) tight together and put the VFD 4 inches from the PMDX card. No interference, touch wood. I would get rid of the susceptible control board before trying to get 8" of separation.

[paco]

Mike,

not that I've note anything special from your pix above but look closely along the length of your setup to see if you aren't getting the wires and cable closer than you think on some places...

I added this...


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...when I realized afterwards that they we're "too close" together here... I'm looking for some more improvement regarding this (from tool to control box).

My point is that it's easy to overlook something like this and render the whole concept "useless".

Still, I like your setup; you got room for loads of cable there.

[richards]

Gerald,
I'm still playing with my Gecko/Mach3/MachIV stuff. At some point I'll probably actually use it. But, as you've noticed, it doesn't have the same noise problem that I've fought with the Alpha.

Paco,
You're right about the cables being closer than 8-inches at some points. Except for the top of the bracket, where the cables are about 3-inches apart for two inches (where the black bundle is connected to the plastic), the other points are at 45-90 degrees. Most of my problems seem to be related to induced noise when the cables are parallel to each other for significant distances.

I've hung the dust collector duct from the ceiling and connected it using the standard Alpha shroud. It works better than expected (especially when considering the age of my old Jet dust collector).