Machines can be temperamental things, particularly when the environment isn’t to their liking.
We often assume summer would be when machines would suffer the most, however, this isn’t necessarily true. When machine builders design machines, they concentrate in heat dissipation and cooling systems to prevent over-heating of components, but rarely is any consideration taken to put in place systems to minimize issues in colder climates.
To be fair, there isn’t a huge amount you can do, except keep the workshop warm, but this can be costly.
The one thing you can do to help reduce issues though, is this.
Switch on one hour before running
I know this isn’t always possible, but it may just reduce problems you could really do without. Power up the machine, leave on for 10 to 20 minutes before releasing emergency stop circuits. This will begin to increase the temperature of components in electrical systems and burn off any moisture. Then release emergency stop and run a gentle test program for 30–40 minutes.
This should gently ease the machine up to a nice temperature to begin working.
Or you could……
I know some customers which just don’t turn their machines off at all in the colder months. They leave the machine running a gentle test program, just slowly moving axes backwards and forwards with a slow spindle rotation.
This ultimately will prevent the machine from dropping to undesirable temperatures.
