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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Upgrading from relays to PicoMite
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| PhenixRising Guru  Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
Hydraulics, not a problem. When there is a delay, it's usually because of the fact that star/delta is involved. I invented the 100% electric CNC tube forming machine (US Patent:5862697) But ironically, I was the only one who was disappointed and the reason was because no matter what I tried ballscrews or rollerscrews, nothing has the resilience of a hydraulic cylinder. The solution was to use a servo motor to drive a gear pump to push a cylinder. Wonderful. The hydraulic fluid became a liquid transmission. Hydraulic oil is slightly compressible which wasn't a problem but I wanted to switch to water to be absolutely rigid. Yeah not that easy.  |
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Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7997 |
I know. You just wanted to play with a *proper* water pistol! :) Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
Hydroforming is a proper water pistol. Car chassis are preformed on my machines and then transferred to huge hydraulic presses that are fitted with "jelly moulds" All they do is contain the material and then both ends are plugged and the tube is pressurised to 60,000PSI of water. Product emerges, zero errors. Takes some balls to be around 60,000PSI |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7997 |
I've watched titanium sheet being cut by water jet (aircraft components). Very interesting! The business end was safely on the inside of a safety enclosure with inspection windows. I've also seen the bleed valve come out of the top of a forklift lift ram. That was a lovely shower of hydraulic oil until the carriage reached the bottom! Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
I was doing the startup of a new machine and because the servo valves were sensitive to contamination, I had a flushing block that bypassed the valve to filter the crap out of the system. All of sudden our Armani suited sales director appears with prospective clients and he wanted me to at least demonstrate some movement. I'd just removed the flushing block but hadn't fitted the servo valve. I hit Pump-Start and he was stood right in front of the manifold, blasting 2,000 PSI. Blew him across the floor and destroyed the suit..oops 🤣😂 |
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phil99 Guru Joined: 11/02/2018 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2668 |
No airflow sensing on the burner air supply is baffling, it is a requirement here. Have worked on boilers (when relay logic was the only kind) from domestic to 4.5MW Maxitherm and all except the very smallest domestic unit had either a wind-vane or pressure sensor to shut of the fuel/gas in the event of a fan fail. Before startup and at shutdown there is no other way to be certain a proper purge has been done. At the last place I worked the main chillers were all DOL. The largest ran at 140A @ 3.3kV (800kVA), with the ammeter slamming into the 1000A end-stop and staying there till the turbine passed 7000 RPM at every start. |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7997 |
Chillers are a sod for that! Big motors starting against a heavy load, but at least they shouldn't be more than one or, at most, two starts per day. That's how they get away with DOL. The electricity authorities normally won't allow frequent starting of big DOLs as it puts their network under stress. The 3.3KV motors are across two phases (there is no neutral at that voltage) and will be spread across different pairs if there is more than one. ------------------------------- There used to be a PLC emulator for the Pico. The firmware was Beremiz4Pico, but I can't find it anywhere now. It may have been dropped. :( There seems to be a PicoPLC here though, but I'm not sure how you get the system to work. . Edited 2025-08-08 16:57 by Mixtel90 Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
PicoPLC: pyRTOS caught my attention. RTOS in the context of MCUs seems a bit pretentious to me. Appears to be nothing other than timer interrupts(?) MMBasic has SETTICK and for higher priority, MATH.PID supports eight ISRs that don't necessarily need to use the PID. For me, an RTOS is an OS that allows existing apps to run but with some protected, deterministic background process having top priority(?) |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
Just bumped into the guy who keeps these ovens running, throughout the UK. I asked him if there was a market for replacement controls. To quote: "I wouldn't bother, I can get the ones with a touchscreen now and they're only £22K" |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7997 |
LOL!!!! So did you tell him that £10K is the going rate now? ;) Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1437 |
In fact , I actually said "what if you can get one for half the price?"He got a bit nervous, thinking maybe he has a new competitor |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7997 |
Hehe... Well, he might well have... :) Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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