Axis Only Moves In One Direction

[AdamF]

Hi all,

I set up my Mach3 software today and hooked it up to the Mini Mill 3-Pro. I started jogging the tool around to get a feel for the different feedrates and noticed a couple things:
- The tool would only move positively along the X and Y axis in real time, despite the DRO in Mach3 indicating that the tool was moving in both the negative and positive directions
- The tool would move in the Y direction when I would try jogging using the Z direction buttons in Mach 3, but when clicking the Y direction buttons I get no response in any direction on the tool
- This would occur whether I used the arrow keys on the keyboard or the hard keys for +Y, -Y, etc. in Mach 3
- Z axis would not move on the milling machine despite the DRO in Mach3 indicating that it was moving

Any suggestions on how to go about fixing these issues? I'm very new to the Mach3 software, so any support here is much appreciated.

Thanks!
- Adam

[Hood]

Sounds like you have the pins assigned wrongly for your axis, you need to work out which motors are which and enter these numbers in the respective boxes in Ports and Pins Motor Setup page.
Hood

[AdamF]

Is there any particular way I should go about finding which motors should go to which pin/port?

[Hood]

Did you build the machine? If yes then you should really know which pins you connected to. If you bought it ready hooked up then there may be documentation or even a xml file with the setup.
Hood

[AdamF]

Bought it ready to be hooked up. I think I figured one thing out, as now the tool moves in every direction, but they are backwards. I.e. jogging in the positive Y direction will result in the tool moving in the negative Y direction etc. I'm a student doing research for a professor, so I'll ask him if he has any documentation that might help fix this issue.

[Hood]

Reversing is done from Config menu then Homing and limits.  It may also be the Dir pin active state as changing that will also reverse an axis, however your drives will likely need either active High or Low and you should find out which and set it up correctly in Ports and Pin Motor Setup. Once thats correct if the axis is still going the wrong direction then the reversing from Homing and Limits is where to do it.
Hood

[pgh3]

I am posting for the first time here, so please bear with me. I have been searching this and other forums for this particular problem, and rather than start a new post on the same topic, I thought it is more appropriate to add it in here.
My only worry is that no-one will see it.
Anyway, I've just finished setting up a 3040 Router (the Chinese version) with Mach3 and although at the start, things didn't look too good, but I'm now at the stage where the X and Y motors are running sweetly; except for the Z axis.

It will only run in one direction regardless of which key is pressed.

I have swapped the pin allocation from either X or Y to Z and the same effect happens, only a different key does the move: this suggests that the signals from the PC are not getting through.
I've looked at the Config pages dozens of times, but nothing is leaping out that is obviously wrong. I've allocated different keys to the Z axis, with the same single direction.
Has anyone had the same problem with this?

[AdamF]

Update:

So it would appear that I have all the input ports and pins set up correctly as now each axis will move in both directions. However, the issue I'm running into now is that the scale of movement on the different axes is different. For example, the DRO will say that the Z axis is traveling significantly faster than it really is (z axis motion in reality is barely perceptible), and the X and Y axes seem to be operating at different feed rates as well. Suggestions?

Thanks!
- Adam

[Hood]

Likely you need to set the correct steps per unit for your axis.
Hood

[AdamF]

Wouldn't that also mean that the steps per unit for each axis would be different as well? If so, when I go into the Motor Tuning and Setup, the step per unit for each axis is the same, but I still run into this issue.