LinuxCNC still used

[proebler]

@vtpup

I have been casting and machining since 2002. I am completely self taught, and have built most of my tooling from scratch. I built my own lathe (a Gingery) that year from my own patterns and castings:
About ten years ago I built a second lathe to my own design, also casting almost all of the parts myself. These are photos from construction - I actually don't have a photo of the full lathe, finished. Mainly because the shop I work in is so small that I can't get back far enough to fit it all in a photo!

AMAZING !!

@Wiz57

..well, when I "retired" from pharmacy, I went to work in a local machine shop

DITTO !!

[vtpup]

Just a follow up on the final configuration of the Thinkpad T43 for CNC.

LinuxCNC is successfully installed in a blank partition on the t43's original hard drive via dd, and a change to menu.lst.

I found that straight filecopying of the linuxCNC partition did not work, because of the complex permissions structure of the underlying Ubuntu OS. dd-ing the partition retained the permission complexities. The latency problem was also solved by activating an included kernel module, as mentioned in the first post in this thread.

It sure would be great to have a Puppy-LinuxCNC of that same rtai kernel version to simplify and reduce the size of the OS, but things just work now and even though this is an old version of LinuxCNC, it is plenty powerful for most conceivable purposes and machines. There are many existing cnc machines that still interface through a parallel port, and most any desktop computer can add an inexpensive card for a port, assuming it doesn't already have one. My need for a laptop was a special case.

The T43 drive also retains its XP first partition which has other foam cutting CNC design programs I use with a hot wire cutter.

So, finally I have a working recovery from the loss of two 25 year old computers that were used until now to do CNC work. They also ran many versions of Puppy Linux until the end. RIP TP600e!

[vtpup]

Connecting rod for a model hot air engine with pressed in 3 mm ball bearing, cut from aluminum today via linuxCNC on the old T43 thinkpad.

ConrodandBearing.JPG (72.96 KiB) Viewed 209 times

[Wiz57]

Good job! Aluminum...used to cut a lot of that! 3/4 inch diameter, 12 foot rods, making the body part for firing mechanism of oilfield penetration guns!
I've got a few here at the house, along with some other parts I made, on the old B&S machines and the Citizens/Tsugami...maybe I should see if I can take a pic or 2!

[vtpup]

Cool!

[williwaw]

hope you can post a video when you get in spinning!
it looks like a rewarding project.

dd-ing the partition retained the permission complexities

if I understand correctly, you managed to dd the partition on to an existing disk without disturbing the windows install?
can you share the command?

[vtpup]

@williwaw I've got a long thread going now on that engine on www.madmodder.net, if you're interested, but not a video yet.

re. moving that partition with LinuxCNC/Ubuntu to the drive with WinXP and some Puppy partitions, I actually did it the easy way (for me) instead of the old console way (which I have in the past), and that is by using Puppy's own Pudd program, found in the Menu under Utilities.

It's easy, you just need a destination partition larger than the partition you want to transfer to it. Just follow the program prompts -- for me less of a chance to screw up dd, which can be unforgiving.

You should do that from a pfix=ram version of the puppy you are using to do the transfer, even if the partitions in question aren't mounted. Pudd will also enlarge the new partition if what you are transferring is smaller than the destination -- if you elect to enlarge it. You don't have to.

(I often get to pfix-ram by the trick of interrupting grub during a boot to puppy and editing a cheatcode line (temporarily) by hitting e for edit, than adding pfix=ram, then enter to get out of edit mode, then b to boot.)

[rockedge]

@vtpup

I took a look at the forum you posted! Wow that is an interesting place......I really found myself browsing the forum and found it very interesting and fun to explore the projects.

I am impressed to say the least.

[williwaw]

@williwaw I've got a long thread going now on that engine on www.madmodder.net, if you're interested, but not a video yet.

Nice you were able to get No. 83 back after so long. The pics with the blurry con rod in the project logs section illustrate the motion better than a vid. Excellent photography as usual.

will take a second look at pudd.

[vtpup]

Thanks Rockedge, Williwaw, it's been a really fun forum for years. Sadly of late, fewer people participating, and many valuable old threads missing photos after the Photobucket debacle. I'm trying to re-energize it by posting more. Hope we get some new members!