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What's new

Scissio.com selling complete module (black) boxes now

John S01

Aluminum
Joined
Mar 5, 2017
Location
Sunnyvale CA
I have made a few posts about Tim Jones products for the 10ee and I think I will post one more at the risk of being called an investor in his business (as a customer, I suppose I am).

Tim appears to have stopped selling his kits and is now selling complete module boxes, or black boxes or whatever you want to call them.

Spindle Module Replacement

For that price, I think we modular owners are very lucky to have him as a valuable resource. His thyratron replacements are just as good, and I am sure he is hard at work in his laboratory developing a version that has a flashing purple glow to satisfy the oldest of old timers.
 
I have made a few posts about Tim Jones products for the 10ee and I think I will post one more at the risk of being called an investor in his business (as a customer, I suppose I am).

Tim appears to have stopped selling his kits and is now selling complete module boxes, or black boxes or whatever you want to call them.

Spindle Module Replacement

For that price, I think we modular owners are very lucky to have him as a valuable resource. His thyratron replacements are just as good, and I am sure he is hard at work in his laboratory developing a version that has a flashing purple glow to satisfy the oldest of old timers.

Holding out for the purple glow.

You have these installed? And no issues? My drive is in perfect condition. But a peace of mind in having replacements on standby isn’t a bad idea.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
Holding out for the purple glow.

You have these installed? And no issues? My drive is in perfect condition. But a peace of mind in having replacements on standby isn’t a bad idea.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

I have had his thyratron replacements (2) and black box running in my 1961 10ee for at least 6 months. I thought the thyratrons worked better, but I think one of my tubes was wearing out. I had observed that I get much finer rpm control in the low range. The black box just works, I can't say I've notice a difference, but I have a tin ear for these things.
 
But I am also old enough to remember a time when Allied Radio's "dream book" dead-tree catalog still listed Argon glow lamps for.... "whatever the Hell it was" that Argon glow lamps were meant to be utilized for!

Pretty sure they were used as a UV source. I recall one that was used in a laundry dryer my folks had in the 60's, I presume that the intent was to sterilize the wash or something.
 
I simply do not believe that those tube replacement actually replaces tubes, maybe they will turn the spindle and one can pretend to have the problem solved, but, I bet they wont hold up to the capability of the machine.....like high speed threading using the ELSR.
The spindle on a Southbend will certainly turn and cut metal, but with a Monarch ee there is a lot more to it then just that. You can take command of most any situation,
 
Some of you raise valid points. The truth is, I have not done much research into the edge behaviour of the thyratron replacements beyond the initial waveform measurements that I made several years ago when I was doing the designs.

Thermite, on the point of possible motor damage, I don't have a definitive answer and think it would be useful to do some further testing as you suggest. I suspect that while the SCRs certainly do switch quite a bit faster than the C16J tubes, this is probably irrelevant as far as the motor is concerned which, as a DC commutator design, is subject to and must withstand quite a bit of transient abuse that probably far exceeds anything the SCRs are doing. Again, this is just my speculation and I have no evidence at the moment to support it one way or the other. I will try to do some testing that might shed some light on the issue and report back when I have something.

Donie, you have raised the question of whether a solid state replacement can really do the job under conditions that may put the lathe under the serious industrial strength stress that it was designed for. It is true that vacuum tubes in general are seriously robust where solid state devices are not. I remember in college watching my professor take a blow torch to a functioning vacuum tube and melt it in front of our eyes to demonstrate that exact point. It was a very impressive demonstration. The tube kept functioning until it was little more than a pile of melted glass. Solid state devices just can't do that.

That all said, and in no way diminishing my sincere respect for vacuum tubes, I am confident of the replacements' ability to perform. I and others have attempted to exercize them at the limits of the machine. At this point there are also many sets out in the field some of which are being used in industrial situations with no failures that I am aware of.


Finally, addressing the issue of "GLOW". I love the glow of the original tubes. It also provides a useful visual indicator of function which I miss on the replacements. I actually did a few designs that incorporated a lighted feature but abandoned the idea because of the excessive complication that I felt it introduced. The vacuum tubes glow brighter when there is more current. An obvious approach in the solid state design is to turn on a light during the time that the device is in conduction. With this approach, the "on" time is proportional to the current so the light would mimick the function of the varying glow in the original tube. Unfortunately, when the SCR is "On" or triggered, the voltage accross it is brought to zero. This implies that to have a light on during the time that the SCR is on (and the voltage accross it is zero) you need some method of storing energy up during the SCR "off" period. It is certainly possible to do this, but it just adds complication and cost for not much improvement in function. If any brilliant person out there has a (simple) idea on this, Ii would love to hear it.
 
I don't see how anyone could possibly argue that solid state spindle motor control is inferior to tube tech.

I'd speculate that 99.999% of all round parts made since the late 60's have been made without tube tech.

CNC's have beautiful finishes, perfect control and WAY more power than old manual stuff ever dreamed of having. My big lathe is fed with 2/0 copper wire. That's 80 Horseponies and all that juice goes through a spindle drive that's smaller than my old Stereo receiver.
 
...

This one is "universal", all motors or drives 10EE used up to 20 FLA and a bit, conservatively rated:

Hammond Reactor
195M20
20 mH @ 20 A DC

Good for use with all of the 10EE motors, 3 HP (one of mine) or 5 HP (everettengrs' 5 HP GE Kinematic, see thread). Smooths 'em out, tames the spikes.

...
Thanks Bill.

The Hammond 195M20 is pretty pricey, $329 from Newark: https://www.newark.com/hammond/195m20/dc-reactor-choke-20mh-20a-15/dp/52F9510

The 10mH version, 195J20, is $169 but Newark doesn't stock them: https://www.newark.com/hammond/195j20/dc-reactor-choke-10mh-20a-15/dp/52F9525

It looks like 20A DC reactors go for about $80 on eBay. There are 2.5 and 5.0 mH Hammond 195s there now.

Cal
 








 
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