Messages

1

General Mach Discussion / Re: stepper motor direction/s

« on: April 24, 2014, 10:16:51 AM »

yes, it was a dodgy connection. Thanks Stirling. I was just going to change out the Y driver board with the spare. I didn't know it until the other day but the wire connectors are actually un-pluggable. I un-plugged the 3 sets. Got the power connector plugged into the spare board. Plugged in the motor wiring plug and was about to plug in the step and direction plug and noticed a loose wire. It was the ground wire for the direction  I fixed that, put the old driver board back in and all is fine.

2

General Mach Discussion / stepper motor direction/s

« on: April 23, 2014, 09:37:20 AM »

i got my "buildyourownCNCrouter" back up and running. After finding the bad solder connections and re soldered them the 3 stepper motors run. BUT, I was experiencing when I set my speeds for each axis it worked great. When i pressed Return all home, I would have to play with each axis and finally get them to go to the home position. Once I did that and then try to jog, one or 2 of the axis would go in the oppisite direction. Now I have done something wrong (as usual) When I jog the Y axis to the Green Positive directiion it goes in that direction, when I jog the Red Negative direction it jogs in the Green positive direction. I can reverse 2 motor leads and all that does is make the Green go in a negative direction and the Red go in a negative direction. Why is this happening?? The brain for Mach 3 is out of wack, so is mine!!

3

General Mach Discussion / Re: optical interupter switchs

« on: April 21, 2014, 01:52:20 AM »

I finally went with the micor swtichs. I was having a problem with my system. I was going to change over to Linux EMC2 CNC program and it was on another computer. I hooked it up and guess I should have waited (to learn something about the Linux program first). Well when I switched back the comptures my Z axis would not work. I thought OH OH, I did something wong. I ended up ordereing another driver board from my supplier and installed it and nothing? I called my supplier and he suggested several things to try, nothing worked. I switched the stepper motor to another driver board and it worked OK. Hooked up the Y motor to the Z board and nothing. I thought heck, what am I going to do. So I started looking close at the old Z board and the new board I just got and it looked like several of the legs on some chips were not soldered to the board. There was solder on the underside and I would think the board would have Thru hole copper trace. Anyways, I went ahead and soldered where there didn't appear to have solder and by Golly It worked. I checked all the boards and every one is missing the solder on the top surface of these pins. I took all boards out and re soldered them all. If these boards have thru hole copper trace it is not working very good. How the other kept going is beyond me. I have another subject I need some help on but will post it later. Homing and jogging. Thanks for listening and the help.

4

General Mach Discussion / Re: optical interupter switchs

« on: April 20, 2014, 07:53:28 AM »

Thanks for the replies. I checked the output voltages from the computer and they run around 3 to 3.5 V. Wall Warts will be the best. I finally got my home made router table up and running last night. Had a problem with the Z axis not working, called my supplier and he gave me some suggestions but none worked. These are low end stepper motors and driver boards plus the BOB is very basic. Just the parallel input to screw termainals on the output side but they work. Everyone asks me what I am going to do with the router and all I can say is make wood dust. Oh, yeah, I found bad solder connections on the Z controller board and re soldered them and it worked. P.S. the phone wll warts are like $1.99 at Goodwill and there are tons of them hanging on pegs

5

General Mach Discussion / optical interupter switchs

« on: April 14, 2014, 09:23:25 AM »

i am presently revamping my "BuildyourownCNC machine". Plans from a book sold on the net. I want to use optical interupter switchs and need to know, how do you get the 5V to operate the IR transmitter and reciever. It works fine on a test board. when operating on the board I feed 5V in and get 5V out. When it is flagged the Votlage drops to 0V. Will I be using the 5V signal from the paralle port or do I have to set up a sperate 5V supply? My BOB is really basic BOB and my controllers are run with 12V. No actual power to the BOB other than the 5V (or nearly 5V) from the computer parallel port.

6

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: New people welcome !! Come in here and introduce your self!

« on: April 14, 2014, 08:55:59 AM »

Hi, I am pretty new at CNC and have built a home made (mostly plywood) router table. Gantry type. I got the plans online Through Ebay. bought the book. Decided to down size the original plans and did OK. Just OK! I am 74 years young and am enjoying myself immensly (forgive my spelling). I have very limited room in my garage being it is a one car garage. I think the plans were   Buildyourowncnc.com It has a very basic drive unit/s. But it works. Hope to spend more time on the Forum to see how other folks solve their problems.

7

General Mach Discussion / Re: Laptop with parallel Port

« on: October 15, 2012, 11:11:57 AM »

I did some research on that solid state relay and am glad I did. It is a Crydom D1225 (Brand name) relay and I did as you said, applied 5V dc and it shows about 2.4 m amps draw. I though, OK cool. I then decided to research further and if you put say just a light bulb in Series on the output it will work fine, but if you are going to put a inductive load in series like a motor or another coil type relay you need to put a "Freewheeling" diode across the motor windings or coil to stop the CEMF field collapsing and shorting out the SCR in the solid state relay. Now I got to find a "Freewheeling" diode. The research never ends. I learn something new every day and happy that I can.
Anyways I did get the IBM laptop up and running and it does run the CNC software and the CNC machine just fine. I know Artsoft says the minimum is 1 Ghz and 512 ram. It is working fine with a 900 Mhz processor. I had to McGiver the parallel cable as the BOB and the laptop both have female connectors and most parallel cables have a male connector on one end and female on the other end. Another trip to Goodwill should do it for that part. The Goodwill's here in Phoenix have tons of cables and power supplies and electronics in general. No computers tho. They will not sell them due to the hard drive may have data on them.

8

General Mach Discussion / Re: Laptop with parallel Port

« on: October 14, 2012, 09:29:22 AM »

Thanks Tweakie, I will copy this info and test it out on my table top power supply.
It is supposed to get into the 90's this next week. Loved the cool weather while it lasted!

9

General Mach Discussion / Re: Laptop with parallel Port

« on: October 13, 2012, 09:50:03 AM »

OK, now I remember seeing the E Stop input and it comes checked but if you don't incorporate it it does nothing, Right?
Now for another question. For now I am using a real cheap Harbor Freight trim router and a 1/8" bit and plan on doing real lightcuts. To control the router can I use a CRYDON (brand) solid state relay? It has a input of 3-32 V DC and a 120 V 25 amp output. Don't know where I got the relay but have had it for years. I think it should work, hopefully. Is there a input, output for such a setup?
Hey, it is in the upper 50's here in Phoenix this morning, lot better than the 110 degree weather we have been having.

10

General Mach Discussion / Re: Laptop with parallel Port

« on: October 12, 2012, 11:21:51 AM »

Thanks, I went to the web site and downloaded the software. Will have to copy onto a thumb drive and put it in the XP computer. Want to print out the manual also. Will probably do that on my laser printer in the "shop"/junk room. Picked up a Brother laser printer 8480DN at Goodwill for $14 (half price sale on a Saturday about 8 months ago and overrode the change toner cartridge and have been printing ever since. Found it had a aftermarket toner cartridge full of toner media.
Any ways I have another question, Tweakie said something about a E stop being incorporated into the system. Just how is the E stop wired in? Is it thru a relay or thru the breakout board? I just used the override button to back off the limit switch and or hit the stop button in the program to stop it. I am still learning but enjoying as I do.