Messages

1

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 02, 2008, 02:32:48 PM »

Thanks for the heads up Hood and thanks to everyone who helped me sort this out!

2

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 02, 2008, 02:10:17 PM »

Look like I have a 3.3 volt motherboard.  I guess I need a break out board that will accept the 3.3 volts and output the 5 volts that the Gecko's need.  Does anyone have any suggestions?

3

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 02, 2008, 08:18:56 AM »

what do I do if the output from the PP is less than 5v?

4

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 01, 2008, 04:19:56 PM »

Hmmm... I wonder how I can check the parrallel port for this.

5

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 01, 2008, 03:53:41 PM »

Rich, the low actives are selected.
Woolex, it is being driven by the parallel port as was the the old prodrive setup. Since it ran before I don't that this is the issue.

Thanks for your help.

6

General Mach Discussion / Motor Lock Up with New G201's

« on: November 01, 2008, 01:47:43 PM »

I am having trouble running my CNC router.  I recently replaced the existing Prodrive 2000 motor drivers with new G201's. I understood that they are pretty much interchangeable save the disable feature on the G201 pin 7 needing a ground.  The connections were simple since the G201 and Prodrives use the same terminal connectors all I had to do is pull off the connector and install it on the new drive (no wiring issues).  The prodrives use the same current set resistor values as the G201 and the power supply output reads 48 volts as expected.  Both drives are 10 microstep stepper drives so I think that the Mach 2 settings for the motor tuning should be the same.
However, now when I try to JOG, I see movement in the DRO but the motors do not move.  When the motor drives are off the motors can be turned by hand but when I turn the system on they are locked up tight so my guess is that the drives are working.  I think that my Mach 2 setup is good since it used to work with the Prodrives but now the motors just lock up.

Any idea on how to get this working?

Thanks,
Steve

7

General Mach Discussion / Re: MOTOR LOCK-UP ON RAPID MOVEMENT

« on: May 03, 2006, 10:22:36 AM »

There are quite a few more settings available in Mach3 that are not the same in Mach2.  I was hoping to be able to decipher them as I go through it by reviewing the manual. I guess the changes are not major but I always try to understand what I am doing before I implement a change.  I am currently having trouble getting Mach 3 to talk to the controller.  I should be able to sort it out but I have been so busy lately that I have not been able to take the time to go through the process of checkin all my settings.  I will get just need to spend some more time on it.

My CNC router is running well with the 25000 Hz and 5uS settings.  My rapid movements are now set at 35 IPM.  I face milled, roughed out, and finished four large 3D Milled molds at cutting speeds of 20 IPM and did not have any stalls.  The finishing cycles took between 9 to 14 hours a piece so I know it is wooking better since it did not stall once.

I will let you know the results of the sherline settings as soon as I get Mach 3 up and running.  Has Art though of just putting out a quick start guide for Mach 3 that could explain some of the differences with Mach 2?

8

General Mach Discussion / Re: MOTOR LOCK-UP ON RAPID MOVEMENT

« on: April 28, 2006, 11:33:31 PM »

Brian,

I ran the machine all day without a hitch.  I started setting up mach 3 as you suggested but had to stop to run a couple jobs.  Is there a new users manual or update for Mach 3?  There are some differences with Mach 2 and I am not sure what they mean or what I should select.

Thanks,
Steve

9

General Mach Discussion / Re: MOTOR LOCK-UP ON RAPID MOVEMENT

« on: April 28, 2006, 07:19:17 AM »

PROTOBYTE PRODRIVE 2000's

10

General Mach Discussion / Re: MOTOR LOCK-UP ON RAPID MOVEMENT

« on: April 27, 2006, 09:57:49 PM »

Hi Brian / Wayne,

I spent most of the afternoon running tests on my router.  I changed the minimum step width to 5uS and reduced the kernal speed to 25000 Hz and reduced the aceeleration to 1.1 U/S^2.  I repeated the bench tests starting at max velocity and kept slowing it down until the motor sounded smooth.  I came to the conclusion that a velocity setting of 0.6 in/sec felt right.  The motors run fairly well (sputtering occaisionally) at speeds up to 0.75 in/sec but on long runs with all the motors running at 50in/sec they almost always stall after about 5 to 10 seconds.  I also noted that my problem of sputtering starts to show up at all speeds above 0.6 in/sec.

The 0.6 in/sec setting is a little better than what I had with my original settings. So I hooked up the motors to the router and ran them through a series of long run cycles both individually and simultaneously.  The good news is that with this setup I did not experience a stall. To see if I could improve the speed on the machine, I tried increasing the velocity. Again at anything over 0.6 in/sec the motors start to sputter and stall at 50 in/sec just like on the bench tests.

My feeling is that the issue will likely repeat itself because I really did not notice a change.  Although after about 1 hour of cycls with the 0.6 in/sec settings I realize that my original problem of stalling once or twice on a long cycle (4 to 9 hours) may still occur.

I think that my drives are either bad or not capable of driving these motors properly.  I know that they should be able to cope with mid band resonance stabilize the motor but from what am seeing it sure looks like it is not doing ti very well.

Any ideas?

Steve