Boxford VMC190 - PS8 Steam

I've constructed a small serial adapter to allow me to capture both serial streams - one from the PC to the Mill and one the other way around.

I have two USB to serial adaptors in a seperate laptop to allow me to capture both streams.  I am using putty as the simple terminal and that will allow me to capture the data to a file, I have instances running, matching the streams isn't possible.  The plan is to write some code to monitor both ports and produce a single log file.

The PC sends out at 9600 baud, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit, no parity

The mill sends out 9600 baud, 7 data bits, 2 stop bits, no parity

This is typical output from the PC:

G67I000000J000000K000000!d-c-+c+d+

G67I000000J000000K000000!d-c-+c+d+

G67I000000J000000K000000!d-c-+c+d+

G67  I000000  J000000  K000000  ! d- c- + c+ d+

This is the serial out from the mill after power-up - the sequence seems to be an indicator character followed by six hex digits - perhaps three 16 bit values?

!1 00  (c)1998 Rod Hine MT190HI,v015,H,07-10-1998 09:22:31

(c)1996 Rod Hine auto4t 1/3/96

ms190.asm    ml190ph.asm    

0!s 00001000000

A000000

Q0000B4

p060000

Q000137

p060000

Q0001BA

and on....

Moved the PC into the workshop and connected it to the mill.   Now when I select manual control on the Boxford software it's displaying the current X, Y and Z positions.  When I move the table using the front panel controls, the display in the software is updating!  So, at least there is communication from the Mill to the software.

Boxford have kindly provided a copy of their original software to drive the mill.  However, getting it to work on modern hardware is tricky!  We ended up running their software under Windows 98SE, under VMWare Workstation on a machine running Ubuntu!   And it works!  At this stage I am just capturing the serial output from the software.  An image is alongside.

General clean up and lots of photographs.  It's cleaned really well, and you tell it's hardly been used.

For the record:  VMC190

Model/Type: TCL 160  Serial No: 198 6590

Smaller PCB: Serial No 1196009

EPROM U3 (27128) Version: ZT190H Ver 014

Larger PCB (underneath stepper drivers): Serial No 0996001

EPROM U1 (27128) Version: MT190H Ver 015

EPROM U17 (27128) Version: ST190H Ver 004

EPROM U22 (27128) Version: XT190H Ver 011

EPROM U24 (27128) Version: YT190H Ver 011

Collected the VMC190 from near Exeter and now have it home - albeit in the back of the car.  It's very heavy and not altogether sure where it's going to go yet.