Machsupport Forum
Third party software and hardware support forums. => SmoothStepper USB => Topic started by: MechanoMan on August 17, 2014, 06:06:06 PM
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Have an Ethernet SmoothStepper Rev 1 on latest version of Mach3 with latest plugin, hooked up to a G540 driving a large CNC router with NEMA23 motors. The E-Stop switch is routed into a G540 input.
If the E-Stop is hit, the ESS is stuck in "Stopped". In fact exiting Mach3 won't clear it either, the power has to be cycled on the controller before reloading Mach3.
Some of the time- too often- when I tried starting Mach3, the ESS is of course Stopped at the start, but cannot be cleared except by exiting Mach3, cycling power, and trying again. I don't have any idea what error condition it's responding to. Yes it's supposed to start in the Stopped state, but clicking the flashing "Reset" inside Mach3 won't clear it.
Weirdly if I stall the motors by hitting a mechanical stop, Mach3 does end up in a Reset "emergency". At first this seemed like a great feature, but I'm confused, because there IS no such feature. The G540 does not have any stall-detection mechanism! The power supply is a 48v 10.5A, stalling an axis shouldn't draw enough extra power to put that supply into current limit, I would think. Actually if the ESS lost power due to the supply dropping out, I'd expect Mach3 to say "the ESS has not responded/timed out" that you get if you turn off the control box while Mach3 is running. I could chalk that up to "some power or EMI thing" but I'm curious, and it MIGHT be related to why the ESS keeps getting stuck in Reset.
What can I do to make this start and operate reliably?
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You have to set Mach 3 so that the Charge pump remains on in EStop. I'm confused though when you say 'The EStop is routed to an input on the G540'. The G540 has an 'Enable/EStop' input. If your using a separate input then you might confusing things.
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The EStop goes to that input on the G540. One of the parallel port wires relays that status back to the ESS and to Mach3.
Charge pump? Will look and see!
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You have to set Mach 3 so that the Charge pump remains on in EStop. I'm confused though when you say 'The EStop is routed to an input on the G540'. The G540 has an 'Enable/EStop' input. If your using a separate input then you might confusing things.
Checked... NOPE. The "Charge Pump On during EStop" box was already checked.
Yeah I'm just getting the msg scroller saying "Emergency Stop Press Reset"... but clicking on the flashing Reset doesn't have any effect. Remains flashing.
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If you turn off the chargepump switch on the G540 does it start working?
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If you turn off the chargepump switch on the G540 does it start working?
G540 Rev1. No charge pump switch exists to turn off.
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The switch is there, you have to pop case apart to reach it :(
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The switch is there, you have to pop case apart to reach it :(
OK, found switch, turned it off. Yes, now I can recover from E-stop.
... what's this mean? Should I just leave this switch off? Isn't it a safety feature?
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that would seem to indicate that there might be a problem with the Chargepump signal getting from the ESS to the G540 or a problem with the Chargepump circuit on the G540. If you have a scope you can monitor the signal at the DB25 to see if it is getting to the G540. If the chargepump signal is getting there and is the correct frequency (in that range) then the G540 has an issue.
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But if the G540 couldn't see the CP signal, it would never work at all, right? This seems to be a problem where the system gets locked in E-stop. I was kinda picturing it as the Fault off the G540 is preventing the ESS from issuing the Charge Pump signal, so the G540 will be stuck in Fault. Except the "Charge Pump On during EStop" box is checked, but the ESS might not actually be doing it.
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The G540 can't prevent the ESS from generating the charge pump signal. Mach has to tell the ESS to generate the signal though. There is a slim chance your Mach3 profile is corrupt and doing goofy things like maybe telling the ESS to generate the charge pump signal at the wrong frequency. Your ribbon cable could have a very poor connection on that particular signal (unlikely) or it could be the G540 is just not working correctly. Unless you can test for the proper signal being delivered to the G540 you don't know where the fault lies. You could try creating a new Mach 3 profile from scratch I have seen that fix some really odd behavior before.