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Open CNC software adds choices

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James R. Fall has over 20 years of operations management and marketing experience in manufacturing and high technology companies. He has continued to offer MDSI's innovative software motion technology and OpenCNC software CNC to manufacturing companies worldwide. Fall engineered MDSI's move to globalization with the company's acquisition by Tecumseh Products Company in April, 2002.

Manufacturing Engineering: What is open CNC software?

Fall: It's an unbundled software computer numerical control (CNC) that is independent of any hardware and includes all of the following in software as an integral part of the control: HMI, interpolation, servo algorithms, RS-274D parser, PID and PID tuning tools, soft PLC, a defined and well-structured API, and a data server that can push data across a network. It runs on standard office-grade or industrial PCs.

ME: Why should a company use open CNC software?

Fall: The great advantage of an unbundled all-software CNC is that it gets you on a different technology curve, a software technology curve. What this means is that you can continuously improve the productivity of your machines by installing new versions of the software-a matter of simply loading a new CD-without being forced to do complete and expensive control retrofits and hardware-- swapping that is the hallmark of traditional proprietary CNCs. Another reason for moving to an unbundled software CNC is to reduce the life-cycle costs of machine tools. With a renewable software control, users avoid the steep increases in costs that occur in traditional hardware systems when hardware becomes obsolete, or when improvements can only be made by throwing out the old and starting over. An unbundled software CNC can change and grow along with your manufacturing assets and processes. Also, the performance of off-theshelf PCs continues to improve while the price drops, and unbundled software CNCs allow you to take advantage of this-once again, without incurring significant hardware costs. Finally, an unbundled software CNC benefits the user because it provides realtime data that manufacturers can use to continuously monitor and improve their processes.

ME: Can one program fit every type of machine tool?

Fall: The dream of every manufacturer is to have a common control across a broad range of machine tools. An unbundled all-software CNC can provide this capability. We designed reconfigurability into the OpenCNC product from the beginning. This capacity to reconfigure the existing control across a broad range of machine tools, axes, and job streams was recognized by the US Patent Office awarding MDSI a patent. When one program can fit every type of machine tool, manufacturers can move operators freely from one machine to another and training costs are decreased.

ME: Does it completely eliminate the control software that came with the machine tool's controller?

Fall: Yes it does. The machine tool becomes a device on a network, just like a printer is now in your office network. Device drivers pertinent to each machine tool come with the software, not with the hardware on the machine.

ME: What kind of computer equipment is needed?

Fall: Unbundled software CNCs run on standard PCs and use standard communications cards to talk to the servos and I/O.

ME: How difficult is it to run these types of programs?

Fall: With the advent of graphical user interfaces, unbundled software CNCs are more intuitive and easier to learn than traditional hardware-based CNCs and user interfaces. Furthermore, upgrades to the unbundled software CNC don't require retraining in the dramatic way control retrofits of hardware controls do. Historically, with proprietary hardware CNCs, multiple generations of different kinds of hardware controls across multiple kinds of machine tools have maximized costs, isolated each element, and hamstrung an enterprise's ability to change and adapt to new technology. Unbundled software CNCs that include HMI, interpolation, servo algorithms, RS-274D parser, PID and PID tuning tools, soft PLC, a defined and wellstructured API, and a data server that can push data across a network offer the first true way out of the Balkanization of the traditional factory.

Copyright Society of Manufacturing Engineers Jul 2002
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