Hi All,
I have an issue with a probefile and needs to get some 'tools' to solve it.

I use a software utility to probe a PCB blank on a set of mesh points, the board I'm working on at the moment has 210 probe
mesh points which are recorded in a file. The G-code probe job runs fine, the file is created and the data triplets recorded.
The problem it that the file contains more data triplets than probe cycles, sometimes as many as 220 after only 210 probe cycles.

Thought in first instance that I had a noisy probe circuit. I've used this setup with M3/PP for sometime without this behaviour.
Tried increasing debounce settings on ESS probe pin, no change. Fitted capacitor to the BOB pin with a time constant of 1ms, no change.
Have probed the output of the BOB with my scope and have yet to find any switch bounce. I can't categorically state that its not a hardware
issue but increasingly forced to believe the hardware is good..ergo the ESS/M4 combination is randomly recording two events instead of one.
When an extra unintended data triplet is recorded its a duplicate of the preceeding entry.

I have watched the ESS plugin diagnostics page like a hawk when a probe job is running but have yet to see a fault. There doesn't appear to
be any facility to log the diagnostic so I can only watch it in realtime, hardly conducive to finding a fault if there is one. Does anyone know if the
diagnostic can be logged either by a built in facility or maybe some code that would have to crafted to do so?.

Have had a look at the M4 log but have only a few guesses at what all the entries mean. Is there any documentation official or otherwise that might
allow me to make more sense of what I'm seeing?

What I'm hoping is that I can record a probe job run log and then either manually count the events in the log or 'strip' the logfile of irrelevant entries
to focus on the probe event/issue of data triplet record to the outgoing file stream.

Craig

Im having either dejavous or i have gone back in time, but thought you had solved this??

DazTheGas

Hi DTG,
as you know I've written a couple of macros, or should I say modified macros that came with M4 as examples, that open
and close the probefile. Additionally the close macro can detect and delete duplicate entries and 'massage' the raw data
into the form that the utility can use. Might add too, the exercise in LUA coding has left me VERY impressed with its flexibility
and power.

I have not been able to solve the issue with multiple records though. What I do have is a working fix for the data.

I would still like to find a reason for the multiple records, everything else in M4 has worked perfectly, once I at least understood
how.

'Looking under the hood' is a time honoured tradition for me to really understand something.

Craig

Try posting an example of what your running and the result, then include an example of what you should have. Its very difficult to imagine what someone requires. (well it is for me)

DazTheGas

Hi DTG,
roger that. Last day of work tomorrow and the a few weeks rolling/grovelling/excessing in the hobby/obsession!

Need to get to the machine to get the live data. When I run the sim of course the probefile is perfect.

Best wishes of the season and may Santa bring you a set of 'you beaut' servos and drives...

Craig

Hi All,
have a bit of an update.

Have tried over several days to run a gcode probe job while simultaneously recording M4s log. Damn me if I can't
get it to fault. Before Christmas the same probe job would on nearly every occasion it ran record an extra 5-10
extra data triplets than probe events.

Andy at Warp9 believes the latest build of the ESS plugin will solve the issue, while earlier builds work fine for most for
some it would behave weirdly.

I am impressed with the logging facility of Mach4. Decoding the wealth of info in it is not straight forward. Is there any
documentation/discussion about what all the entries mean?

Craig