Messages

1

General Mach Discussion / Re: Why does my z lift incrimently more after every cut.

« on: January 29, 2013, 11:14:27 AM »

I once had this issue.  For me, turns out the motor coupling was loose by a loose shaft screw.

2

Third party software and hardware support forums. / CNC3040 root cause of Z axis abnormality.

« on: December 02, 2012, 02:21:12 PM »

I write root cause because more than one existed yet solving them made no permanent correction.

My Z axis from time to time would not raise, hence, scratched surfaces and broken end mills followed by vulgar words would come to pass.  First cause was faulty wiring.  I replace the shipped cable with opens in the wire with my own.  Worked for a while.  Second cause was the screws becoming loose for the motor shaft coupler.  Tighten it down and the CNC3040 Z axis worked again for a while.  All the prior bagging of the axis from the first cause eventually loosed/stripped the screws.

Finally, the darn machine Z just went kaput, no power at all.  Cracked the controller case open and seen the YOOCNC board for Z axis did not power its LEDs.  Removed card and look at each component.  Voila!!  The LM317 regulator surface mount package, now get this, not a cold solder joint, there was NO SOLDER AT ALL for one of the legs.  I nearly flipped.  So much rework time and router bits biting the dust just because lack of solder.

The thing ran for a year before I found this out.  Added the solder and now works flawlessly in the realm of CNC3040.  Operational for 1 year by means of close proximity of one piece of metal to another  

Is there a specific place on the forum to add to CNC3040 trouble shooting?

3

General Mach Discussion / Re: Parallel Card

« on: November 06, 2011, 01:12:38 PM »

I/o Range BF00-BF07
I/o Range BE00-BE07

I noticed the commonality between the various PCMCIA to Parallel cards it that the first number of the top line in the I/O range is the port to enter into Mach3.
Here is what I had to do to get smooth operation:
* XP sp2 HP Pavillion 1.7 ghz dual core laptop.
* 3040 typical ebay brand CNC router / engraver.
* Card is ebay cheap brand "Best Connectivity" purple label.
* Mach3 Port & Pins  > Kernel speed = 100khz.
* Mach3 General Config > Input signal debounce set to 1 or more.

Before my motion was very loud, slow, and jittery.  Every once in a few boots the motion would be good.  None of the motor tuning settings helped.  Disabling all non essential services did not helped.  Change powercfg settings did not help.  After 2 days of fiddling around I pushed the kernel speed to 100khz.  CNC moved smooth 50% of the time.  Then I adjusted input signal debounce.  Worked perfect after that.