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SmoothStepper USB / SmoothStepper and PLC with Modbus
« on: November 18, 2011, 12:25:12 AM »
Hy, brand new on this forum.
So... let’s go into it.
I have a milling 3 axes with gecko drive, spindle with servo, and automatic tool change. All do by myself. The motor control is made by Mach3 and all the rest is made by a Fatek PLC. I feel it's more reliable and safe to dedicate a PLC to control limits and estop because it's closer to the energy that way.
The spindle has 1 HP at 10000 RPM and all axes are mounted on 0 backlash ball screw and linear bearing. That makes the machine pretty fast.
I use tis milling on the past 2 year, toke me 3 year to build it.
A couple of day ago, I run my biggest and complicated G-code on that mill. An 3D mold for plastic part. The finishing run toke 25000 line of G-Code. After the machining end up, I realise that there is some missing step. I look upon this forum and conclude that the tension on my PP wasn’t high enough. Then I decide to use SmoothStepper drive to overpass this problem. In fact, if I still miss some step, I can simply put some encoder on the step motor. Till yet, everything look fine.
After installing the SS driver and updating Mach3 to the lasts version, thing became worst. All my input from Modbus stop working. I try to reinstall and reconfigure all the communication on the Mach3 seting but never work.
When I open Mach3, SS throw me a error screen who tell me that Limits and estop are on another port than the SS port. All my input are set to the port 0 (Modbus port) when I open the debugger screen of Mach3, I see the led blinking as it normally do when I push my estop button on limits. So the config is good but something in the SS driver cut the communication or I don’t know what.
If I restart Mach3 on PP without SS, all input work well. Is there something I can do to fix this?
Really sorry for my poor English, I try to do my best
So... let’s go into it.
I have a milling 3 axes with gecko drive, spindle with servo, and automatic tool change. All do by myself. The motor control is made by Mach3 and all the rest is made by a Fatek PLC. I feel it's more reliable and safe to dedicate a PLC to control limits and estop because it's closer to the energy that way.
The spindle has 1 HP at 10000 RPM and all axes are mounted on 0 backlash ball screw and linear bearing. That makes the machine pretty fast.
I use tis milling on the past 2 year, toke me 3 year to build it.
A couple of day ago, I run my biggest and complicated G-code on that mill. An 3D mold for plastic part. The finishing run toke 25000 line of G-Code. After the machining end up, I realise that there is some missing step. I look upon this forum and conclude that the tension on my PP wasn’t high enough. Then I decide to use SmoothStepper drive to overpass this problem. In fact, if I still miss some step, I can simply put some encoder on the step motor. Till yet, everything look fine.
After installing the SS driver and updating Mach3 to the lasts version, thing became worst. All my input from Modbus stop working. I try to reinstall and reconfigure all the communication on the Mach3 seting but never work.
When I open Mach3, SS throw me a error screen who tell me that Limits and estop are on another port than the SS port. All my input are set to the port 0 (Modbus port) when I open the debugger screen of Mach3, I see the led blinking as it normally do when I push my estop button on limits. So the config is good but something in the SS driver cut the communication or I don’t know what.
If I restart Mach3 on PP without SS, all input work well. Is there something I can do to fix this?
Really sorry for my poor English, I try to do my best