fredhh47
Aluminum
- Joined
- Nov 11, 2009
- Location
- Upstate New York
I have a Bridgeport BOSS 6 Series II CNC that has been working (mostly) faithfully since I bought it used in the 80's. It was made about 1982. I love this machine, not just for the 15" x 30" work envelope, but also for its' overall reliability. That is with the exception of blowing transistors on the SMD boards and a few other glitches that I can usually handle by myself. This problem has me stuck with a dead machine and nobody who knows how to fix it. I need a replacement power supply for the 5/12 circuitry**. For anyone with a BOSS machine, you know that is the metal box to the right of the card cabinet in the control enclosure on the side of the machine. Ithas the vertical strip of test points to check the 5 and 12 volt output. For some reason, the 5-volt REGULATED side of mine no longer puts out anything at all. The 12 volt side (Regulated and Un-Regulated) and the Un-regulated 5-volt circuits seem to be working.The Reguated 5 volts comes from theFPS board that plugs into the front of that unit. Unregulated 5 volts comes pretty much straight off a transformer, thru a couple diodes that probably work like a bridge rectifier to produce the 5-v DC, which can run as high as 15 volts. DOES ANYONE HAVE one of these units, possibly pulled out of machine that was retrofitted into the 21st century? If so, was it working when taken out? If it was a working unit, I would like to buy it. I only have 3 CNC machines, one of which is already in the middle of an update-retrofit. The other one was retrofitted with a Centroid control back in the 2000's. I am having to turn away work because I could do, but cannot do in the required time frame.
**You may ask why don't I just put in a couple off-the-shelf power supplies? I wish it were that easy. Bridgeport built solid machines, but I think the electronic controls were designed by a cadre of monkeys. In fairness, in 1980 solid state was limited to IC's and discrete components, and power was handled by big, heavy transformers. In this machine, Circuits overlap and some components seem to multi-task. The wiring is especially complex as a result. There just is (almost) no way to simply pull out the box and stuff in a couple switching power supplies instead. I can't afford the time and expense of totally gutting the control system and retrofitting it. I already have one machine in process and it's been almost 2 years so far (I'm working by myself). So, in plain English, HELP!
Fred Howe
**You may ask why don't I just put in a couple off-the-shelf power supplies? I wish it were that easy. Bridgeport built solid machines, but I think the electronic controls were designed by a cadre of monkeys. In fairness, in 1980 solid state was limited to IC's and discrete components, and power was handled by big, heavy transformers. In this machine, Circuits overlap and some components seem to multi-task. The wiring is especially complex as a result. There just is (almost) no way to simply pull out the box and stuff in a couple switching power supplies instead. I can't afford the time and expense of totally gutting the control system and retrofitting it. I already have one machine in process and it's been almost 2 years so far (I'm working by myself). So, in plain English, HELP!
Fred Howe