Solved CNC card reading question

[Merv]

I am beginning my journey into the world of CNC. So far I have a Ender 3D printer and a cheap CNC mill from China, both of them work fine. With my Ender, I can insert a SD card & it will read it. With my mill, I need to have my computer feed the instructions.

Is it possible and/or practical to add the card reading ability to my mill? If so, how? Is there a prebuild add on that will accomplish the task? Or is it necessary to build it from parts.

 

[Flitedesign 3d]

I am beginning my journey into the world of CNC. So far I have a Ender 3D printer and a cheap CNC mill from China, both of them work fine. With my Ender, I can insert a SD card & it will read it. With my mill, I need to have my computer feed the instructions.

Is it possible and/or practical to add the card reading ability to my mill? If so, how? Is there a prebuild add on that will accomplish the task? Or is it necessary to build it from parts.

Its possible for sure the question is how much time and effort one is willing to give, probably most common way is to use mega2560+ramps board with the marlin firmware. Here is a good tutorial:

Might be easier ways out there that I dont know about, also depends on what you have. Personally I prefer to mill through usb

 

[TEAJR66]

https://shop.v1engineering.com/collections/parts/products/full-graphic-smart-controller-big

Here is a card reader and a quick explanation of how to add it to a machin

 

[Notnewton]

I'd check the MPCNC forum on the V1engineering web site. This is how they run the MPCNC & Low rider CNC's.

 

[Dudley1001]

Just be aware to get the sdcard working, you will be running marlin rather than grbl. Not saying that that is a problem, just letting you know. I have a mpcnc and a erc timsav needle cutter. The mpcnc is on marlin, the timsav is grbl. As far as I know, the grbl will not support sd card natively. There may be a way to do it with the MKS DLC grbl controller when combines with the MKS tft24 screen but I am not sure of that. Grbl was written for the arduino uno so not enough memory for code to do the sd card. Newer 32 bit boards are now supported but I don't think they even support it yet.

 

[Merv]

Any thoughts if this will work to read G code files without a PC.
I'm thinking about giving it a try.

Upgraded 3 axis grbl usb driver offline controller control module lcd screen sd card for cnc 1610 2418 3018 wood router laser engraving machine Sale - Banggood.com


@FlyingWithRyan

 

[Merv]

Thanks to this post from @jamin12369, I got the offline controller mentioned above to work.

I can now print planes with my needle cutter without a PC attached.