Moving a Thermwood 3 axis CNC

[Gavin Armstrong]

I am going to be moving a Thermwood C53 Router in the next week or so, I was wondering if there is a correct procedure to follow when moving one of these machine? It will be travelling about 300 miles

Cheers
Gav

[Gerry A Brown]

Hi Gavin,

I would get a hold of the router manual from Thermwood. We have a CS45 & the operators manual has very specific instructions on moving it. The controller sits on the table and bolts down for transport. We had a nightmare in that when we bought the machine the person who was said to be experienced in moving this type of equipment decided it was best to disconnect the controller & ship it separate! When the machine arrives it is a good idea to check & make sure the video cards etc are still well seated in the mother board. I also did a drive image of the hard drive out of the machine before starting it up so I would have a copy of the drive as it arrived.

Good luck,

Gerry

[Gavin Armstrong]

Thanks Gerry some good tips there, I went to view and pay for the machine a few days ago and with some luck it should be getting shipped next week. I sat looking at the hard drive thinking to myself I should prob remove that before shipping but for some reason I didn't and I am now regretting taking the time to take it out. The machine will travel roughly 400 motorway miles plus maybe 20 rougher smaller road miles. Should I instruct somebody to remove the hard drive or should it be ok for the journey? I wouldn't know where to start if the hard drive failed.

[Gerry A Brown]

Hi Gavin,

It "might" make it ok. It would be wise to remove it but you need someone who knows computers to do it. When hard drives are shipped they are packed in foam to prevent shocks. I suggest you get a copy of Acronis drive image software & get an image of the drive as soon as you get it. The best way to run Acronis is from a boot cd or dvd that way you don't need to install anything on the controller. The software is quite easy to use & there is a lot of tutorials on the web.

Good luck with the new machine,

Gerry

[Daniel Odom]

We had ours moved w/ hard drive in machine, no problems resulted.

[Gavin Armstrong]

My machine arrived today mostly unscathed. There was one piece of damage to one of the twin siemens motors that moves the gantry, the forklift during loading has snapped both the encoder and tach wires clean off plus some chucks have been taken out of the main motor power wires that will need repaired. What is the best way to repair the wires, is it as simple as soldering back together and protecting with heat shrink, or will I need to replace the wires because the shielding was been comprimised?

Cheers

Gav