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help with sorting cnc dahlagren machine
Hi All,
I have a small desktop cnc machine which I bought a few years back but did nothing to it. I have now decided to get it up and running. I dont know nothing about cnc machine’s and would like help with sorting it out. I have been told the controller is old and wont run on mach 3. is there anyone out there who would be able to help me sort it?? or is there a way to run new drivers or re program it??
thank you
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11 Replies
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Hi,
My first port of call would be to give Vectric a call they have designed some very user friendly CNC software that works a treat and can handle most machines no matter what there age or software…..
My second port would be to located a member on the forums called Dave Rowlands….this guys is a CNC guru and he really knows his stuff, his helped us on a number of occasion his very knowledgable and knows what his talking about.
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eek
my advice is to dive into http://www.cnczone.com forum, learn as much and post questions about it there. That CNC doesn’t sound like a known brand name and you may find all you need on a CNC forum.
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I assume he meant to say Dahlgren, not Dahlagren Dave.
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Yep – Dahlgren. Probably market leaders in CNC engraving systems a good few years back, bought by Suregrave I think, who are now Trotec. Possible could be a DOS based controller depending on age – maybe not though. As Dave says, cnczone.com would be a good place to visit. They may even have a dedicated forum for Dahlgren there. Place is full of very helpful guys.
What model is it?
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ah i dont know anything much about engravers
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just wanna say thanx for all your replies. Yes i think its a dos based cnc. Harpreet if vectric has to work on this I would be amazed. Would be a dream come true will definately give them a call. after months of looking I finally came across a dhalgren service guy who can upgrade the machines. very keen as i was, I asked for a quote to find 10 x more then what I anticipated. £4500 plus vat!!! Im now thinking worst case scenario, can i convert my illustrator designs in to dxf then run in to dos somehow? or better is there anyone i can take my machines to who can either service, or repair or upgrade them who wont rip my arms and legs off??
Or would it be better to get rid of them altogether??
I currently have an engraver, a cnc and 2 control boxes all by dahlgren and yes i think they did have something to do with suregrave but when i called they were playing dumb for some reason. as a newbie to cncs and having these machines I’m stuck as to what to do with them. -
Maybe grab an old box and stick DOS on it (?) just to see if you can get it working. I certainly wouldn’t be spending very much cash on it as there are lots of used machines out there all ready to go.
You could try contacting Rona Machines http://www.ronamachines.co.uk/ who refurbish/service a wide range of machines including Dahlgren.
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Does your engraver have an external serial controler?
Some Dahlgrens do. If yours does, you could be in luck as it may take plain HPGL and probably accepts depth commands.Or you may have one of the older machines and you will need to send HPGL or DXF files to a DOS based program called CasDirect that actually sends it to the machine. Might mean you need XP or Win 98
Is it a Dahgler EZ, SEZ, SE, does it have a serial controler?
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Neil, Graham at Rona was very helpful. He really put me in the picture. I’m preety glad I spoke to him when i did as a i dumped the old pcs which came with the machine only to find out from graham that I would need the card in the pc whcih would cost £200.00 if i didnt have it! good job they were left just out side. one more week and they would have gone! Frank, I think its an es as it has some sort of funky es logo on it. The contoller has a grey ribbon which connects to a pc. My plan from what graham said is to get an old pc with win 98, stick the card in there with a motherboard with the right port and see how goes? would i need a special software driver for the pc? or is this something generic??
my plan is to use a modern pc, create a dxf file via illustrator and put the dxf file on to the older pc with the cnc to route, hopefully with a mach 3 software or something.
thanx again.
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Seems you cant post addresses.
I googled "using the dahlgren engraver"
2nd one down is a very informative dahlgren help file.
Explains just about everything you would want to know about any dahlgren machine.
Looks like you need cas direct or possibly super pro
The 300 Se is a 2d only machine -
thanx frank i’ll give it a shot, im hoping to get a old computer with xp, put the pci/asi card dahlgren in there and try a demo of vectric to see if that works.
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