O was poking around with the meter on my new 5.1 which hasn’t had a bit in it yet checking on the grounding to see where things may need improvement.
The only oddity I saw was between the machine (pretty much anywhere including the ground block) and the motor shaft poking out the back of Y Left. That read 7+ and from the machine to the ball screw or on that side it was 16+. No idea of that indicates something loose. It was 0 between the grounding block and the screws on that motor.
Everywhere else was 0-2 and mostly zero.
Some random video on YouTube I watched last night said < 5 for telecom and sensitive equipment was best.
All of the power cords to the wall were unplugged so this was just points on the machine to itself.
I assume he’s measuring ohms considering the comment on telecom/sensitive equipment.
Certainly seems strange to see one shaft across the machine at 16 with everything else at near 0. I’d make sure everything is nice and clean but with it being a new machine, it’s probably pristine.
Maybe a film of oil is raising the resistance measurement
Yeah sorry. I was measuring ohms across various points of the frame and spindle. I will do some more looking at that motor to see if there is anything obvious. And yes, it’s pretty clean, no cuts made yet. I’ll have the dust collection set up this weekend and should be ready to roll.
The brilliance of AI suggested that I run a ground wire on the inside of the PVC pipe and loop it around a screw head every couple of feet. It didn’t explain how I was supposed to put this screws on the inside of the pipe though. I can’t have anything protruding on the outside of the pipe anyway because I plan to nest the main pipe inside a larger so that it can pivot. I will just make sure the wire is tight enough to not flop around.
I have only had disconnects a couple of times in 3+ years and I do a lot of PVC but I figured I would try to do what I can to avoid issues before getting started.
Yeah I noticed that with the spindle. The shaft on the opposite motor read 0 or close to it as did the ball screw so it just seemed odd about this one.
It’s most likely the bearings in the motor. If I measure from the motor shaft to the grounding block it’s 11Ω on both sides, a motor mounting screw to the grounding block is .2Ω. This sat undisturbed for 4 days, I moved it about 4" and the resistance jumped to 78Ω. An hour later both motors are about 58Ω, you’re probably measuring resistance from a clingy oil or light grease.
Sounds good. Thanks. I will write off the anomaly.
When the vac and controller and spindle are on different circuits do you ground everything together at the machine or ground the vac and tubing separately?
And is the ground plug on the outlet sufficient? I know there has been a lot of discussion about that.
Sure, or not. Its all magic anyway, so won’t hurt to try! The main thing with “grounding” things like your vacuum hose is to just “ground” the one end away from the vacuum opening at your router. That process has some basis in electronic theory. My vacuum hose has a metal wire “spring” to hold it open, so I “ground” that wire at the one end. That’s like the 4th shield in a coaxial cable. (You generally have to pay extra for that kind of construction, but it works in extreme circumstances.)
Again, all of this is some kind of magic witchcraft that won’t change anything, but makes you feel better.
If it will help you sleep better I have not had one disconnect with my S5Pro 4x4 ER-11 spindle since purchase in 10/2024. I have only factory wiring to the ground block as in the manual.
To discharge a static electricity, that resistance is no problem at all. There’s very little current involved, so you’re not going to see any real voltage differential.
As far as wrapping wire around a PVC pipe, years ago I would have told you that it won’t do much compared to a pipe or hose that’s made to be slightly conductive. But we have pretty good anecdotal evidence that wrapping bare ground wire around a hose works well in many cases.
To get something inside the pipe, maybe some of the aluminum tape used for sealing ducts would work, if you can get it in there without creating a ball of tape stuck in the middle.
Good idea on the tape. The low profile Oneida separator came with some then tape I have wrapped around the lid. I have a long roll of the 3” wide stuff that is metal. I could cut that and leave the backing on then peel the backing off while using a long dowel to press the tape down.
I am using a 3” pipe to provide a “stand” for the 2” pipe to rotate inside so there is no real room between them. Hopefully I will know tomorrow whether that plan works.
How about disassembling a cheap tape measure? The blade is by definition flexible, and it could have holes punched through it at will for sheet-metal screws.
I previously used a standard, high quality dust collection hose with my Dewalt vacuum for over a year. I had it wrapped on the outside with copper wire and had it grounded to a well researched “star point” grounding system (along with an extensive list of other after market grounding upgrades). I was still getting some disconnects so I switched to a Flex-tube antistatic dust collection hose. This was clearly an improvement to my system. It made at least a 50-75 % improvement in my disconnect problems. I have no idea about the science of this anti-static hose since it does not use metal wires but it definitely works better than my prior copper wrapped hose. I would suggest not messing around with wrapping a standard hose and just spend a modest amount more on a good anti-static hose like this.
Its all magic anyway, so won’t hurt to try! The main thing with “grounding” things like your vacuum hose is to just “ground” the one end away from the vacuum opening at your router. That process has some basis in electronic theory. My vacuum hose has a metal wire “spring” to hold it open, so I “ground” that wire at the one end. That’s like the 4th shield in a coaxial cable. (You generally have to pay extra for that kind of construction, but it works in extreme circumstances.)
