Spindle Warmup that can be interrupted

Onefinity Spindle Kit by Redline CNC
1

This may help you overcome a frustration I have had.

I have installed the warmup program right out of the Redline manual to a macro. Once you start the program it cannot be stopped until the end of the G4 P600 line (for the BB controller) - in other words I had to wait 10 minutes.
I press stop - and it will stop - after 10 minutes.

Twice now I have accidentally started the macro when I shouldn’t have. Once the VFD was not turned on. Once when I intended to run the macro beside it.
So I changed the program so the longest I would have to wait is 1 minute:

M3; spindle rotate CW   
; 10 minutes @ 6000
S6000 G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
; 7 minutes @ 12000
S12000 G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60  
; 3 minutes @ 18000
S18000 G4 P60
G4 P60
G4 P60  
M5; spindle stop
1 Like
2

Can I make a suggestion about warming up the spindle without panicking over, or even using gcode?

You can park the spindle out of the way (pretty much anywhere), and use the spindle controller in “manual” mode to ramp up the speed of the spindle. Let it run for a few minutes at each different speed (for example… 1,000… 10,000… and maybe 20,000). There really is no hard rule to any of this, it’s more about care and longevity of the part. Just like your car/truck, the concept is more about taking some time warming up the fluids and the engine before slamming it into gear and hitting the road.

By design, “routers” use brushes that make hard contact and grind down over time, so cold starts are part of the game. When brushes wear out, replace them and keep going. Spindles rely on bearings and fluids. Warm fluids have less resistance, and less resistance makes bearings happier, and happier bearing last longer… pretty much.

1 Like
3

I submitted a bug report to Masso regarding spindle warmup.

The recommended warm up cycle for my spindle is like 10 min on 10 min off. Do that 3 times increasing the RPM.

Since Masso does not have a GCode editor that moves with execution, I assumed the program was finished… it was not.

I moved the spindle to touch off and WHIR … the spindle fired up. I sure hope this issue was fixed in the latest upgrade… I have not upgraded yet. But I am extra carful.

And yes, my warmup code has pop up buttons, but like most nagging messages you lose track of where you were.

1 Like