Messages

2221

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: ESS settings vs control configuration settings?

« on: July 29, 2019, 08:34:49 PM »

Hi,

I guess it pulls them in from the ESS plugin.....lots to learn...

Yes that is correct. If you make a setting in the ESS plugin it will often update Machs Control plugin as well. Thus it is not
necessary to make the setting in both plugins. There are settings however that can ONLY be made in the Mach Control
plugin, motor tuning for example.

The pinout is set in the ESS/Ports and Pins tab ane THEN they are connected to the Mach inputs and outputs in the ESS/Input Signals
and ESS/Output Signals tabs. They are automatically carried through to the Inputs and Outputs tabs of Mach Control.

Craig

2222

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Hobby install failed

« on: July 29, 2019, 06:23:22 PM »

Hi,
latch onto the nearest Win7,8,10 PC or laptop you can, download Mach4 just in demo and see if it runs,
i suspect it will whjich rather points to XP being too old.

Craig

2223

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Hobby install failed

« on: July 29, 2019, 05:04:13 PM »

Hi,
I'm not sure, but I think that is is a library which is missing from your XP installation.

I think smurph, Daz or Chaoticone  may be able to confirm that.

Mach4 requires  a reasonably late model version of Microsoft Studio and I suspect that your existing XP
installation cannot support it.

Craig

2224

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: I want to move 1 inch but move 5 total beginner

« on: July 29, 2019, 04:50:40 PM »

Hi,
use MDI to move an axis one inch and then measure (accurately as possible) how far it actually moved.

Then change the <counts per unit> to:

<counts per unit> =1000 / distance moved

Once the change is made it may well pay to restart Mach to ensure that the change is flushed to the .ini file and that
your controller firmware is updated as you restart.

Craig

2225

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Servos Motors/Drives & ESS Smoothstepper/Mach4 communication (Encoder Feedback)

« on: July 29, 2019, 04:46:02 PM »

Hi,

If people are not really using pokeys for their physical switch panels anymore with Mach4, then what are they using?

As I stated earlier that users DO use PoKeys boards for control panels, so it is very possible. Indeed PoKeys have their
origin in data  input boards and are good at it.

The problem you face is trying to reverse engineer the control panel and make logical connections to Mach4. You may
well require some Lua coding which as a Mach4 beginner is going to be tough.

Will the Mach4 demo let me work these bugs out before I buy it, or am I gonna have to restart the program every 6 minutes during my configuration? That could be quite frustrating.

Yes Mach4 demo will work but until its licenced it will require restarting every six minutes.

Craig

2226

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Servos Motors/Drives & ESS Smoothstepper/Mach4 communication (Encoder Feedback)

« on: July 29, 2019, 02:47:18 PM »

Hi,

I thought the servo drives themselves took care of closing the loop and all that? There was talk of me possibly needing a whole new motor/drive, control etc system....but I don't see why any of that would be necessary?

That is correct. If you had them running with Mach3, an open loop step/direction controller, then they will work with Mach4
which is also an open loop step/direction controller.

Your existing breakout board will still work if you plug in two (of three) ports of an ESS.

As I replied in your other thread I think getting your pendant to work may be possible but I suspect would be difficult
to do so. Even if you updated the board to a 57 or a 57CNC for which there is a Mach4 plugin you still have the problem of
Mach4 decoding the control panel switches.

Note also that Mach4 can have but one active motion controller. Thus if you have an ESS to drive your breakout board
then any PoKeys board MUST be a secondary data input board. PoKeys devices are good at that. A number of users have
used an ESS as the motion control board and then used a secondary PoKeys board to construct their own control panel.

If you were prepared to reverse engineer the existing pendant you could do the same thing. Are you up for the challenge?
Or just buy a Mach4 ready pendant, the one I use costs $160.

Craig

2227

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 work with Pokeys 55 or 56 ?

« on: July 29, 2019, 02:30:55 PM »

Hi,
the manual shows that two plugins are required to run with Mach3, one to allow the PoKeys board to talk to Mach3 and the
second to allow the control functions to be interpreted by Mach3.

Even if you can get from PoKeys a Mach4 plugin to suit the board installed you still have the problem that you have no plugin
to decode the control panel functions to Mach4.

I think in order to get it to work would require you write a plugin to adapt the control panel functions to Mach4. That would
be quite an undertaking.

Craig

2228

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: TOOL changer problems after update

« on: July 29, 2019, 04:08:49 AM »

Hi,
yes I use the wx.wxMessageBox for that purpose too.

Just be warned......DO NOT USE IN IN A PLC SCRIPT!!. I know eventually you will....I fell into that trap not once but twice!

Craig

2229

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Motor position alarm

« on: July 29, 2019, 04:05:26 AM »

Hi,
this is also from the manual:

The servo drives internal position error decides the status of the On Position signal and the Lost Phase
servo drive alarm.
The On Position signal is triggered (LOW) when the servo position error is within the OnPosRange set in
the DMMDRV program. The Lost Phase alarm is triggered when the servo motor is physically 90° or more
out of position for ~2 seconds.
The servo position error is cleared when the drive is disabled using the ENA input and does not accumulate
when the drive is disabled

If you really cock-up and have the servo 90⁰ out of position for more than two seconds then yes you will have to
power cycle to extract yourself.

Note the last line though.....sounds like you can clear a simple and modest following error by taking ENA low.

Craig

2230

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Motor position alarm

« on: July 29, 2019, 03:56:28 AM »

Hi,
this is from the DMM manual:

Once servo drive triggers an alarm, the user should use the DMMDRV program to read out the alarm
condition then inspect the machine, load or operation for cause to the alarm. The problem should be fixed
before re-setting the servo drive and running again. The servo drive main power should be cycled to fully
re-set and clear the servo alarm status.
! WARNING

This however is a separate issue to 'following error'.

The motor alarms referred to are:

Over Voltage
Over Temperature
Lost Phase
Over Power
Over Current

For any one of these conditions you will have to power cycle to reset. You should indentify the fault and correct it before resetting.

A following error is not a safety critical fault, you wish the machine to stop so you can asses the cause of the following error
but it should not require a power cycle to reset.

Craig.