CNC Pendant from Homann Designs to control my G0704 Milling Machine. I narrowed my choices down to the Vista CNC P4-SE and the Homann MP-03, in the end I went with the MP-03 because I thought it would make an interesting project to complete.
Box with all the parts arrived within a few days from Australia to the US.
http://youtu.be/JAB76ndN75U
The kit went together more easily than I expected. I used solid core 22awg wire for the runs between components so I could bend them into the shape I wanted and stranded for the data and other wires that would need to bend when the two sides were assembled.
I used different color wire to help differentiate and troubleshoot later if necessary
- Red: + DC
- Green: Ground
- White: LED Data
- Yellow: Switch Data
http://youtu.be/LL7y8VFgxTE
The Serial cable terminates in a Male DB9 and goes to a dual DB9 plate on my CNC Controller. There the E-Stop and Power Cables are attached inside the controller and the Serial TX/RX and ground are passed through via a DB9 Female to the PC.
How the DB9 on the end of the MP-03 is wired –
Which goes to the back of my CNC Controller
Where it’s separated into Power, E-Stop and the Serial TX/RX & ground go back out via another DB9 to the PC running Mach3.
My Serial is COM8 and the 6 is set by the MODIO. Once I had that set and went through the process outlined in the Plugin’s help file I just had to set the values for the Left and Right 12 position switches who are shown in the MP-03 screen. I just went roughly 20 either side of the value when entering them into the plugin config.
Video showing the Software setup and a demo of the basic functions.
http://youtu.be/zryGXszhjXs
Nicely put together and written up.
Cheers,
Peter