This Technometal Glass machine is located in a busy factory in South East Asia. After the original CNC controller refused to work anymore, the owner contracted MDSmotion to build a replacement control system for it. The result is software that can read INTERMAC’s ‘.cni’ format, making it compatible with INTERMAC’s ‘Genius’ range of Automatic Glass Cutting lines.
Retrofit Details:
- Machine Configuration:
- Servo X, Y, C (Updated to Panasonic Minas A5 from ABB/OSAI OSS200)
- Pneumatically controlled Z Axis (Up/Down Only)
- 8 x Digital Outputs required
- 8 x Digital Inputs required
- 1 x +/- 10V 16 bit DAC Channel required for table tilting
- Key Control Equipment supplied by MDSmotion:
- 1 x MDSmotion-PCI Rev-B PCI Controller (now obsolete)
- 1 x Auto Glass Cutter Software
- Control Methodology:
- X, Y, C Axis Drives running in Velocity Mode and commanded by +/- 10V analog signal from MDSmotion-PCI. Position feedback via Quadrature Incremental Encoder.
- Z Axis controlled by Digital Output connected to Pneumatic DCV.
- Table Tilt Hydraulic Valves controlled with +/- 10v analog signal as a velocity command. Table position feedback provided by limit switches connected to digital inputs.
- X and Y axes home to limit switches. C axis homes to a dedicated home switch as no limit switches are used since it is a rotary axis.
- Digital Outputs from the MDSmotion-PCI (NPN) motion controller interface directly to existing 24 VDC relays in the machine to control various machine operations.
- Isolated inputs from the MDSmotion-PCI (bi-directional opto-coupler) motion controller are used to interface with sensors and mechanical switches on the machine.
The Technometal Auto Glass Cutting table in this case study is capable of cutting glass to size, including curved shapes. Input file format to the software is in ‘.cni’ format, which is the same format as INTERMAC’s ‘Genius’ range of Auto Glass Cutting Tables. Since this retrofit was completed in 2012, a now obsolete motion controller was used. However, since all of MDSmotion’s Motion Controllers use the same API, the software can run on MDSmotion’s current controllers, for example the G2-M104.
