SMART CNC PLOTTER

Abstract

The main idea behind this project is to designand implement a cheap, smaller size, easilyoperable, easy interface and flexible 3-axisComputer Numerical Control (CNC) plottermachine. The lower cost is achieved by using 2CD drives from old PC’s with their steppermotors as the main structure for the hardware. The two stepper motors already found in the CDdrives used to control the pen movements onto Xand Y axis and one servo motor on the Z axis. AnArduino Uno microcontroller is used to controlsthe proper synchronization of these three motorsduring printing/drawing process. The ArduinoUno is programmed with G-Code parser from PCthat is connected to the Arduino via a USB cableto control the motors movement andsynchronization. The plotter machine isimplemented and tested by printed differentimages and texts on papers (40mm × 40mm) using apen, the small size of the papers because of thesmall plotter size. The motors winding voltageswere displayed on the oscilloscope during theprinting process to investigate the synchronizationbetween the three motors. The design of thecircuit is simple, inexpensive and can beaccomplished using commercially available componentsthe project is very useful for printing and sketching.