Um, no I didnt try that. In fact I forgot that was even there. I must have seen that there many times but it just didn't register...kind of a "cant see the forest for the trees scenario". Thank you
Overloaded for the heads up on that!
Results: When I pressed the Ref B button the motor moved a small increment and stopped like it had homed. I jogged the axis different directions and tried re-homing it, but with the same behavior of moving a small increment and then stopping as if it was homed. There was no indication of the home switch LED lighting up so I figured it had to be something else. When I jog the axis I noticed the LED would light up as it passed the switch but it would flicker sporadically on occasion as well. I had used an RJ45 breakout board (
http://www.cnc4pc.com/Store/osc/product_info.php?products_id=213) at both ends of a single CAT6e (fully shielded) cable to carry the step, direction and 5V signals for the stepper drive as well as one wire from the switch from the rotary axis to the Smooth Stepper board. I figured this would allow me to easily setup and remove this B axis from the table. At the RJ45 breakout board on the rotary axis end I had tied the 5V logic supply for the drive to the other side of the switch so I wouldn't have to run two 5V lines through the CAT6e cable. While a CAT6e cable is fully shielded, I don't think the individual pairs inside the cable are shielded from each other and I was getting the step signal interfering with my switch signal. So I ran a separate 2-wire cable from the switch directly to the smooth stepper breakout board. one wire for 5V and the other for the NO switch side.
It works! Now both the "Ref B" button on the Diagnostics page and the "home all" button on the Program Run page work. I will use two more RJ45 breakout boards and run a dedicated Cat6e cable for the home switch so I can have the ease of use while keeping the two cables and their signals RF interference isolated from each other.
Thanks
cncalex for the button mod directions, it did work after all!