Touchscreen for Clough42 Electronic Leadscrew ELS

[@kentvandervelden]

The interface has been updated. See the latest here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pni0qH-ZfNqql9k After making these changes I found another ELS with a beautiful interface. A few have been sold on eBay, but I found no information about them. Please comment if you know more. kzbin.info/www/bejne/b5PblYKApdJ6nrM kzbin.info/www/bejne/hmOyh4usmJ2epNk

[@gangleweed]

Hi..........DEC 2021......I've just ordered the kit for this ELS called the EZnc-2...... waiting for it to arrive.....it's a 2 axis control for the leadscrew and the crosslide.

[@kentvandervelden]

@@gangleweed Thank you for mentioning the eznc. I'd seen a video of it on KZbin when it was being prototyped. Very fine looking interface. Glad to see it's becoming available for purchase.

[@gangleweed]

@@kentvandervelden I'm hoping it will fill a need I have for a threading function on a micro lathe I built way back in 1964.....at the same time it looks like it could do CNC work too.......still to be tried. My intention is to fit it to the compound slide and lock the crosslide as this way it won't affect the normal working of the lathe in manual mode.

[@chilebike6556]

Oh my, Code Composer is just awful. Slow as a dead dog, and hey! lets just make a copy of the project to backup our current work and switch projects to that! How? How on earth do you close one and start another? God's teeth. Try Kiel. Oh, this is Eclipse. Some munchkin thought not intuitive and terribly hard was clever. ELS is working great with a differential driver to the display, but CCS is just a wooden leg.

[@kentvandervelden]

Thanks, I'll try Kiel. Each tool has comes with its own advantages and irritations, so is trying a new tool always wash? I'm no longer working on this ELS.

[@gorak9000]

I have a product I need help with - a time machine. Not to travel back and forth in time, but to create more of it, so I have more time to work on my other hobby projects! If that's not do-able, a cloning machine, so I could make more of me? One for each project, and one for coding for work, which is way less interesting. Looking forward to our collaboration :-P

[@kentvandervelden]

I like how you think and these ideas how been the basis of many sci-fi tales gone awry. How well would you get along with your clones? I can't imagine being able to stand myself :) Perhaps in the same line, a product to share experience with our selves in parallel universes, so we can learn the alternative outcomes of important choices. Peace

[@HardwareTX]

Nice upgrade ! Purpose of electronic lead screw is to avoid changing gears, very simple use (not worth it to me). Now having a unit that has an electronic start point and an electronic stop point now we have something. Why use a mechanical switch when you have a encoder to track servo position. Cutting a thread, you would set a start location and then electronically advance to the end point and store the end point location. Now the electronic lead screw will advance between the to points at a rate that you select. All you need to do now is just set the depth of cut then press start. When the lead screw reaches the stop point you back off the depth of cut and press return. Lead screw would return to start point and now you set depth of cut and press start. Just repeat till you reach the proper depth of cut. Now that would be very very useful for threads or even just turning parts. No additional hardware needed just tickling the key board ;)

[@kentvandervelden]

Your idea is a very good one. Physical limit switches were stuck in the my mind having only the experience of feeding up to a traditional physical carriage stop. What you are suggesting make a lot of sense. One could set limits by moving up to the limit and pressing a left- or right-button or typing in a distance. My changes where on top of existing code and the implementation would diverge it more. Check out Jesse Schoch videos on an ELS that he's making. He's implementing virtual end stops. kzbin.info/www/bejne/e3aYenyrl9N4jtU

[@HardwareTX]

@@kentvandervelden I recently added magnetic 3d printed scales and touch DRO. In touch DRO you can add workspace data points or profiles so cutting a part over and over is easy peasy. Having an electronic lead screw to do the cranking with the preset limits would finish the project off. Thanks for sharing !

[@kentvandervelden]

That is a fantastic idea! Touch DRO looks fantastic, especially the tool library. Looks like he has a quadrature convertor addon and four axes of inputs. Maybe the hardware part is easy? I'll send him an email to to see if there's any interest in supporting such a project. If not, andTouch DRO is closed source, maybe there's another option? Thank you

[@lesthompson5907]

were di we find the code to weight pitch to an Arduino ? as i cant get the board you spiking of. les England

[@joecnc3341]

Thank You for the video and the great work - and sharing!

[@kentvandervelden]

Thank you for the support, and Happy New Year! :)

[@jamesweber8212]

Amazing work by a very talented man, Thank you Kent for everything you have taught me and inspired me to accomplish.

[@kentvandervelden]

Thank you James, that's very kind :)

[@rbyt2010]

Nice post; great work - Thanks Kent! Would definitely be interested in seeing new Launchpad projects. James made a great case for it, but there doesn't seem to be much current YT content

[@kentvandervelden]

Hi Ron. Have you checked out the TI BoosterPack Checker? There are some interesting add-on boards. Do the content for the launchPad boards is similar in quantity as Atmel boards programmed with Atmel Studio? There all pretty powerful, but require a solid investment of time to get started. Excluding making the video, I worked on this probably 35 hours. Starting again, probably need 1/3 of that, maybe. dev.ti.com/bpchecker/

[@rbyt2010]

Kent VanderVelden Thanks Kent. I haven’t done much hacking in recent years, but have been considering a few small projects. Would be nice to invest the startup time in something that’s mainstream. I know they’re TI, but it seems there are so many arduino/atmel/ videos out there. I don’t really care about saving $5 (or $50 for that matter) considering the time investment coming up to speed with new tools. Just trying to avoid starting over in a year because the platform is not popular. The RT capabilities and debugging tools of the TI platform certainly make it look appealing

[@kentvandervelden]

Can't go wrong with either name, TI or Atmel, huge companies wanting consistent development environments across their products. You might take a look at this discussion too. I like the concept of the Zynq boards, but I am partial to FPGA. Could mix high level programming, even Linux, with custom hardware. I was considering making an ELS-like demo with an FPGA, as an introduction to FPGAs by comparing CPU and FPGA implementations. Does that sound interesting? www.researchgate.net/post/Which_is_your_best_microcontroller_dev_board_for_real-time_data_acquisition_and_or_control

[@rbyt2010]

@@kentvandervelden Sorry I dropped the thread - I'm easily distracted :) Having been party to more FPGA projects than I can count, yes that sounds interesting. I am curious about the current state of tools and development boards; I've been away from it for a couple years. Practically, I'm not sure I have much direct need. Most projects I would consider are well within the performance range of a small DSP. (or maybe I'm wrong? :)

[@giusepperisini5620]

Ciao, sarebbe possibile integrare il sistema con motori stepper ad anello chiuso?

[@Elektronaut]

Great work! Nice to see Clough42's project growing!

[@kentvandervelden]

Thank you, it' was a nice project. Once can only asymptotically approach done. I would like to have redone the step generator to use an acceleration profile and move it to the co-processor. And, I would like to have added input fro arbitrary feeds. Unfortunately, I kept hitting memory limits already. I think we'll see other TI boards again :)

[@mrechbreger]

why would you use optocouplers before interfacing the stepper driver - if the stepper driver itself already uses optocouplers?

[@kentvandervelden]

The optos on the stepper driver protect the driver. The optos on the ELS protect the ELS. Doubling up may not be necessary and each adds a small delay (~20 nanoseconds). If making a product to sell, I would increase robustness to avoid support calls. Have a great weekend!

[@watahyahknow]

have been looking a while now for using this product for a cilinder honing machine kzbin.info/www/bejne/oKTLk2R7osaXrNU based of a drillpress basicly putting the encoder sitting on the drive spindel of a stationairy drillpress and the servo motor operating the up and down motion of the same drillpress would it be verry hard to change the software so distance traveled per rev read in mm and the distance per rev go up and down without steps (so 1 2 3 4 5 6 etc) ? that would allready help me get the right crosshatch pattern , there is some calculation involved with getting the crosshatch to match the bore of the cilinder (bigger the bore the shallower the crosshatch if everything else stays the same ) if i give you the calculating formulla for the crosshatch angle could you make the software so i can fill in the crosshatch angle , bore size and stroke length and have the machine set itself based off that data?

[@kentvandervelden]

Very interesting idea! If I understand what you're describing correctly, yes, that could be pretty straightforward and quick to change. Send me an email with the details.

[@rbyt2010]

Non-seq - Re: new video ideas. I built a LCNC/Teknic CNC router a few years ago which has worked great for me. I’ve recently learned about their new “Clearcore” platform. Looks like it could be an interesting topic for a video or two.

[@kentvandervelden]

Hi Ron, that's a good idea. I only looked at the ClearCore briefly, it appears to be a motion controller. I have a little experience with Parker motion controllers. In the case of Parker, they would work well for "repeat this pre-programmed pattern conditional on inputs" but not as a g-code driven CNC controller, at least not a CNC controller with the sophistication of LinuxCNC. I could be wrong and am willing to investigate. I've talked with Teknic before and they were uninterested in sending loaner hardware and suggested instead a purchase followed by a return. If I could get loaner hardware for a few weeks, I would investigate the potential for the software side, though can't imagine making a full CNC router. Maybe it's something that could be incorporated into your router?

[@rbyt2010]

@@kentvandervelden Completely agree. Certainly not enough horsepower for my CNC machine, and I'm happy with LCNC (or at least I was until I saw that Datron machine :) I'm guessing ClearCore has lots of application in automation retrofits on larger systems, but its overkill for my small projects and underpowered for larger ones like CNC and 3D printers. Still, would be interesting to see what someone else might make of it. I'm big fans of the Teknic guys, though I agree they don't seem very big on marketing outreach.

[@Dancer148]

Nice work, Is it possible to switch the SCI-A and SCI-B ports so that the Nextion display will work on SCI-A ?

[@kentvandervelden]

That should be doable. SCIA is positioned under the ELS board but is not in use by the ELS. I only used SCIB because of convenience. When I made the video, I was thinking about how the ELS board could be improved, so I'm pretty sure switching to SCIA would work. I made a follow up to this video that improves the UI but uses the same ELS board. If you make a new board, check if there is anything else in the my notes (link in the video description) useful to you. All the code changes are on GitHub.

[@kentvandervelden]

@@Dancer148 You could alter the end stop or debug pins or disable either. Unless you will monitor function invocation with an oscilloscope, the debug related code could be dropped.

[@Dancer148]

@@kentvandervelden Kent, is it possible to send you the code to upload it as a pins-swapping variant?

[@kentvandervelden]

@@Dancer148 The easiest way to get to your work out there is to make the changes a GitHub pull request. Your change would be visible to anyone viewing the repository and be part of its history.

[@Dancer148]

@@kentvandervelden I have to get the code working first. Not familiar though with GitHub pull requests that also changes from kentavv to clough42 .

[@pravado81]

What is connected to the touch screen with a ribbon cable just below the limit switch?

[@kentvandervelden]

It's a GPIO breakout from the Nextion and is unused. Before I started, I was not sure how I was going to do the work and it was comforting to have the Nextion GPIO to fallback on if needed. Thanks for asking.

[@CanadianPenguin_]

touch screen and dirty/ oily shop fingers don't sound like a good mix to me

[@manimib2429]

Hello! Could you tell me what the markings are on the U4 chip?

[@kentvandervelden]

I still have the hardware, but I'm not sure what chip you are asking about. Let me know, and I'll get the information for you if I can.

[@manimib2429]

@@kentvandervelden On display, chip U4

[@kentvandervelden]

@@manimib2429 It's pretty hard to read, but IL6HD seems to make sense.

[@manimib2429]

@@kentvandervelden Thanks! You helped me a lot.

[@kentvandervelden]

@@manimib2429 Glad to have helped :) Have a wonderful weekend!

[@gvinrad]

Hi Kent, I've built & installed the Clough42 leadscrew on my 1950 Myford Ml7. Having watched your video I would like to add a carriage stop switch I presume that's what you refer to as a limit switch ? How exactly did you couple it up ? I seem to have an unused terminal on my stepper controller labelled as BRK, is that a stop function ?

[@kentvandervelden]

Right, a carriage or limit stop. For demonstration, I wired a limit switch to the TI Launchpad board and added some code. I don't know what BRK is, but if the motors are disengaged outside of the Clough42 code, all may not work correctly once reengaged. My demo was also not ideal for installation. For instance, proximity sensors should be used instead of the mechanical limit switches, and probably additional thought would need to go into stop/start logic. Thank you

[@davidwillmore]

Hey, I recognize those 7-segment boards. ;)

[@kentvandervelden]

Are they common enough to be called ubiquitous? :)

[@davidwillmore]

@@kentvandervelden lots of people make them and I have ordered them several times. They are also easy to find. Guess that's close enough.

[@kentvandervelden]

I'm looking forward to the project where you recognize the linear CCD :)

[@davidwillmore]

@@kentvandervelden you found a use for them? That's wonderful.

[@kentvandervelden]

Spectrometer, of course :)

[@paulprobusjr.7597]

Very nice work. Have you pursued this any further? By looking at your lathe encoder install video, it appears you have moved on to LinuxCNC? Did you give up on Clough42's ELS because it did not have full CNC capabilities or are you still looking at it? I'd be interested in seeing what you did to CNC your lathe. I don't have interest in fully CNC'ing my old Craftsman lathe, but I would like to add features beyond easier threading and feed rate changes, like a powered crosslide, etc. I.e. partially CNC'ing to give my lathe the options my grandfather could not afford when he bought the lathe back in the day, but still keep it a manual lathe like James Clough's goal was for his lathe (although he stopped too soon 😄).

[@kentvandervelden]

This work was done for a machinist friend who had a reason (which I've forgotten) for not complicating his lathe. Most of the use of my CNC lathe is manual work anyway, making the CNC a fancy DRO. In the past I've made two ELS, one from Arduino and another from FPGA. If you have motors on two axes, you're really close to full CNC. Start with the ACME screws and constrain movements so backlash does not matter. Here was the first lathe "CNC" I made. Can be pretty simple. kzbin.info/www/bejne/iajZm3qJpLRjb68

[@paulprobusjr.7597]

@@kentvandervelden I know it's a slippery slope, but yes, my plan would not be to fully CNC it, but make it more of a "manual" CNC where after each pass, I have to reset the cut (which is what I would have to do if it came with a QCGB for threading, or mechanically powered crosslide or using a physical taper attachment). Like I said, this lathe was passed down from my grandfather to my father now to me. I like the idea of being able to use the same lathe they both used and making improvements as they each did as they owned it. Making it full "CNC" would take away that same feeling, I think, but adding on an electronic QCGB and powered crosslide would be in keeping, at least to me, in spirit of making improvements that they would have done if this technology was available to them. Besides, if I were to make a full CNC lathe, I'd base it on something that was more rigid.

[@Dancer148]

Hi Kent, in your video "build the nextion clough42 ELS code" at 6:10min you mentioned that the els-f280049c.out file can be used to share binary without CCS. When loading this file in Uniflash it gives an error "Cannot read property 'DS' of undefined". It wants the Texas Instruments XDS110 USB Debug Probe to flash. How can I just program with Uniflash and a simple USBcable without CCS?

[@kentvandervelden]

Yes, this can work. I don't remember the state of the .out file on GitHub, so you may still need to build a new .out, and if you do be sure to build it using the flash memory layout. I don't have the hardware any longer so I may not be of much help. The specific error message I never saw, but I find some hits on TI's forums, where they say restarting, reinstalling, etc. fixes the problem. That's great if this solution works but offers no ideal of the underlying problem if the solution does not help. Wish I could be of more help :(

[@Dancer148]

@@kentvandervelden Thanks Kent, your confirmation that it can work made me investigate further and in my case wouldn't work whatever I did on my Windows7. Switched to another pc with Windows10 and worked flawless. Could be also because on Windows7 I had your CCS10 installed and nothing on Windows10 where I saw that it installed something extra. Thanks for the help Kent.

[@kentvandervelden]

Glad it worked for you! Thank you for letting me know.