Thats a strange one, why not just go back to unbuffered and use the ratio in Pulley setup?

Hood

This is what I have been doing - either under pulley setup or in the ESS config. Problem is that I found that I couldn't re-ran the same thread. It doesn't always pick up the index in the same position of the chuck. Thought if it would be done in the drive it might be different.

Dan

May be worth resetting to factory defaults to see if the drive works. Also might be worth checking the line driver, maybe a solder short on it.
Hood

OK. Didn't think about resetting to factory defaults. May be worth a try indeed. No line driver - using a scope right on the drive's connector.

Dan

I was meaning the line driver on the logic board.
Hood

Ah... it does look like a hardware issue. Not sure if I would be willing to take it apart though. Haven't yet tried resetting factory defaults. Will try that first. Mean time it's divided in the ESS config as it used to be.

Ran a a couple of short programs a few tens of times each. Had the ESS running out of data once at 4Mhz controller frequency. Reduced it to 2Khz and so far it looks good. Using the current plugin (ESS_v10h2d1a) and Mach version .062. It's hard to tell though if the problem has gone. Only time will tell. Haven't tried your plugin since I want to know what exactly solves this. If I see the problem again I will try your plugin.

Mach3 .062 has a strange issue however. If I feedhold and then start again it would make unpredictable moves at rapid feed for a few seconds (just skipping all over the place with the toolpath showing exactly what it does) and then follow remaining toolpath correctly.

Dan

If your eyes are good and soldering skills reasonable its fairly easy to replace the receivers or drivers, I had to do it on one drive that I made a balls of soldering a cable up
Hood

Thanks for the encouragement, Hood. Still more like a shot in the dark, but I will give it a go when time permits and if factory defaults fails.

Dan

Was still experiencing those annoying runs out of data (controller now at 500Hz). So tried the plugin you posted. This introduced a new problem: every time I used a run from here - as soon as the OK on the prep move window hit - a SmoothStepper Watch Dog window popped up! It suggests increasing the trigger time, but that is already set to the highest 3.1 sec. Wasted a few hours and haven't made a single part yet! Can't get from start to end without a ESS error!

And an update about threading: ran several tens of thread cut tests today with the index being halved in the Smooth Stepper config and good news is that as long as I don't disable the spindle servo and rotate the chuck manually, it seems to pick up correctly each time, running same thread over and over again.

Anyhow it's sad as the lathe is useless since can't make a part without getting an error from the ESS.

Dan

Not so good about the time out issues, I have only suffered from that once and it was when I tried a newer plugin, possibly the one you passed on. Regarding the trigger time, not sure what mine is set at but will go and look, I have cetainly never changed it so should be whatever default is.
Hood