Brandon,
How do those Big foot Drivers you have on your site compare with the on-board drivers they have on the TinyG? Do you know?
Also, do you use an oscilloscope to troubleshoot your machines? I actually purchased a small kit one that I assembled off the Internet, but my soldering and the directions that came with the kit are not “A” grade. If I can get the little scope to work, I think it will be well-worth the $ for it. They’re about $25-$30 on the Internet.
Hey George, the Bigfoot’s are good. I am currently moving away from onboard sticks and heading towards individual drivers. Your rig is pretty big, what size motors do you have?
@Brandon_Satterfield I don’t think they will work for that machine, but I plan to do some “renovations” on my old Ox, as well as possibly some smaller machines that they would work well on. I like those, especially for the cost. How hard is it to keep them cool? For my large machine, I have a DM542T driver for one of the axes, 2 TB6600s for another axis and a gecko 201 for my Z axis. I’m still trying to get the axes tuned though. I haven’t found the kind of groups yet that use both Mach 3 and the ESS. As soon as I can get the motors tuned, I’ll be able to see what my machine can do. It’s been quite an adventure putting it together. I had to have the Makerspace wire me a 220v outlet for my spindle & VFD. I had to learn the difference between a 3-wire 220v Outlet and a 4-wire outlet as well as the difference between single phase and three phase. Finally, it seems, I have my VFD wired and ready to go, but I’ve got to get my motors correctly tuned.
@George_Allen it’s been amazing to watch your adventure, you’ve done a great job!
The Bigfoot’s are a perfect fit for the OX and R7, they do require crazy cooling as the thermal protection is set very low. As long as you can get a 60mm or bigger fan blasting down them they will provide infinite life and quality production.
The Bigfoot drivers are way beyond the ones on the TinyG. My opinion has always been that the tinyG is way underpowered for any CNC application, the 4988 drivers are only suited to drive NEMA17 motors.
The Bigfoot drivers are miles beyond the 4988’s, but as Brandon said, you do have to fan cool them. I use TB6560 drivers, they have the settings for hold torque, decay mode, and switches for current limit so you don’t have to mess with pots, etc. Big heatsink eliminates the need for fan cooling. Optoisolated inputs keep isolation between your computer and the motor power supply. They are about $12 US from SainSmart, same price as the Bigfoot drivers.
I’ve found that most of the TB6600 drivers from China are poorly designed, and have poor performance.
MG
@Brandon_Satterfield Thanks for the encouragement! I tell ppl until I get it working it’s just expensive modern art.
@Brandon_Satterfield I think those big foot drivers may work well on one of my 3D printers. I’ve seen some people buying those triaminic drivers with the tall white heat sink on them, but they are expensive and I don’t know that I trust them. I had some DRV8825 (I think was the #) and they worked better than the 4988 but they got like white hot. It was pretty obvious that wouldn’t last on the board. I kept adjusting the current to no avail.
@George_Allen I played with the trinamics extensively, probably more than I should have. It was a while back, I found one mode that almost provided enough amperage but was in the danger area. I’ll give them one thing they were quiet.
Modern art, I love it!
Bigfoot on a printer with the standard 1.68A/phase motor they should be a great match. Better than a knock off 8825 at 12VDC.
I like everything at the highest possible voltage. Have ordered PSUs at my stepper sticks highest possible voltage before just to get smooth perfect motion. Some boards will regulate, but there’s ways around that.