the application used to control this dongle is a hack of the EMC/LinuxCNC project written in nice, portable Python. The software is where this really shines. It’s fast - at least as fast as the parallel port in the ancient laptops we have sitting around and plugs right into the CNC controller box for the Sherline. With a bare minimum of parts, this chip converts USB into a parallel port for real-time control.
The core of this build is the rt-stepper dongle based around the PIC18F2455 microcontroller. Instead, he built a USB dongle and wrote the software to turn this mini CNC into something usable with a modern computer.įirst up, the hardware. While some of us still have a Windows 98 battlestation sitting around, doesn’t. There’s a problem with it, though: normally, the Sherline CNC controller runs off the parallel port.
If you’re looking for a small, benchtop CNC machine for PCBs and light milling the ubiquitous Sherline CNC machine is a good choice.
