Storebro260 Lahte with Sinumerik 6T / FANUC 6T Controller
By Roger Holmquist Mars 29, 2012 

Summary
A Storebro 260 lathe situated at SMP Inc i Valdemarsvik is under cosideration to be refurbished with a LinuxCNC system.
After 20 hours exploring the system it is now running with some efforts!
Previous points in an effort to gain system control are commented below:

Details
// 1) Not running in automated mode.
	
	Solved! 
The reason the machine wasn't running was simply because of an unshut door...
Part of what fooled me was that the indicator for "system ready state" didn't light up as expected, might be caused by a broken bulb and the fact that the machine did it's G-code-interpreting in single step mode.

// 2) Trouble with the tool change system sometimes affecting the part reference point 
	
	Partly solved but not yet fully understood.
The revolver moves at T-command if tooloffset parameters are read-in.
That means you can't change tools at machine reference point who is a very natural and expected point of tool change.
The offsets introduced causes the revolver to move off-limits and an error is generated.
I solve this by first moving revolver to mirrored tool offsets where the tool change is commanded.
The reason for this is because of the second problem: The part reference point is moved exactly at tool offset.
This means you are back at machine reference point when the Tnn<offset> command is executed and then you can set your PartRef-point.
When subsequent tool changes occurs the revolver moves according to the difference between last and current tool-offsets.
This time no change on Part RefPoint seem to be introduced.
So the problem seem to be at initialization time.

// 3) Limited and not well written manuals in Swedish, might be caused by insufficient translation.
 No real manual still not available…

// 4) A system based on bubble memory tecnology, probably around 8 kbyte in an unknown state regarding reliability.
 Yes, bubble memory card visible when opening the Control system door, din't check out the size...

// 5) A control system without functioning shiftbutton.
Well, going remote will work around that problem, next bunch of tasks include RS232.

// 6) Uncertain positioning of workpiece/part zero reference point
Yes, this has still to be monitored carefully.

// 7) No authorised code examples
Trial and error is what's going on…

// 8) Some switches and indicators not interacting with the diagnosis parameters, may of course be caused by broken wires/ oxidized connectors.
It may of course also be caused by design, even if it's unlikely...

// 9) One servo making noise in it's static position, might be caused by faulty/deviated loop parameters?
Haven't checked up that much, both motors are in fact active, my "problem axis" was X but the Z servo is also humming but less noisy in static mode. No apparent overheating is anyway observed. 

I have looked thru the drawings and circuit diagrams in the system manual and the machine looks fairly well documented at first sight.

Finally, a test run with some G-code turning a metal rod was successful as a first use of the hydraulic "Thing" (forgot my English sorry!) who pushes the rod at the chuck under rotation!
It works well even if the pressure gauge is malfunctioning.

/ Roger