Mesa VS Pico?

jmelson wrote:

cncnoob1979 wrote: I did not order Pico because I was confused about the options and what was required to order for my particular setup. I found the Mesa information and to be sufficient and explained what I needed to order for my purposes.

Would that have changed with more information available for Pico systems directly related to my system? Perhaps. With reading about limited availability of Mesa hardware, I was strongly considering Pico. In the end, I did not feel as comfortable with the options. Either due to information overload or my limited understanding of the options, both perhaps contributed.

Well, you could have called or sent me an email. I would have been happy to help you figure out what our products could do for your specific project.

I can say personally the support from Jon at Pico is AWESOME. As I am in WAY over my head on my first retrofit every dumb little question has been answered and with short response times. My first retro is a VMC with a TON of peripherals, but ill be tuning servos Sunday!

For example - If I wanted to purchase a Pico system to handle exactly what I need for this system, a Bridgeport Interact, what would I need to purchase? I still unsure, I stopped researching the system and decided Mesa.

So, this has SEM motors on it? Do you have the servo drives? What shape are they in, and what brand?
I've sold the gear to a few people who have retrofitted these, but I think they replaced the servo amps with newer units from eBay.

For use with existing velocity servo amps or newer ones from AMC or Copley, you can use our PPMC board set, which is $780 for the basic set. Or, you can use our PWM system, but our servo amps are limited to 20 A peak. That may be enough for the Bridgeport with SEM motors, however. A 3-axis system would be $625 in that case.

Jon

I will agree with Jake. The personal support you get from Jon at Pico is second to none. Before I began my retrofit Jon suggested that we test my servo motors with his drives. I took one of my servo motors to Jon (I live about 1.5 hours away from Jon) and we tested it to make sure the two were compatible. They were so that sold me on the Pico system as a whole.

I place my order for a UPC, 3 PWM servo amps, Heat Sink for the amps, Spindle DAC, and SSRs for my retrofit and I had them within a week.

As with any project I have had some issues with getting my machine retrofitted. Jon has always had quick responses via email or phone. (Note that he is not available by phone in the afternoon or evening). I have also had some hardware failures (Due to my stupid mistakes) and Jon has had me replacement parts within a week each time.

The Pico system is not as easy to configure as Mesa as there is no setup tool like PNCCONF for the Pico products.

All of this said I will for sure recommend Pico Systems.

Jim

PCW any news when i can order 2-3 pcs of 7i77?

we will have them sometime next week (Eurosurplus should have some sooner)

EuSurplus

I Agree with You brother, I order my Mesa hardware as soon as inventory was available and I receive my 5I25-7I77 kit in the next 3 days. I don't know about the past but my present experience is that the guys in Mesa are taking care of business. I also ask support and received answers right away. therefore in my present experience I am a satisfied customer. I found mesa hardware as a Plug and play solution. I am not going to take away credit from Pico systems due to the support for redcap Fanuc servos, my next project is to retrofit a Fanuc IKEGAI AX25N so I am considering Pico Systems for that.