Messages

1

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 08:47:17 PM »

Ok. Your reversing the polarity worked. Now my following error is never greater than 20!!!

The Hicon Integra is by far one of the best systems I have used to date (and I am comparing to Thermwood, Biesse and GE Fanuc based systems). It is lightyears beyond any hobby product on the market! If anyone has any doubt about the Integra all I can say is get it a go. You will not be disappointed. As far as price, compared to hobby controllers, it is comparable. Most hobby controllers require addition BOBs and IO boards totaling nearly 700.00USD. The base Integra is less. For 1500 or so one can have a closed loop controller!

We use DMM and Yaskawa drives and either HSD or Colombo spindles with Delta VFDs. I bring this up because I am using my notes to write a guide for the Encoder board, expansion board and Integra that more clearly defines setup parameters. Your documentation is GREAT but a step by step may be helpful for many.

Thank you for your help and advice; I am now a customer for life!

2

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 07:35:43 PM »

Thank you for all the help. I actually just figured it out. M0 is Index 3, M1 is index 4 and so on (since we are using the encoder board). The manual is not very specific here so I was setting the index to match the motor number.

The homing is now fixed as well. Still no joy on the e-stop on the encoder board and a new issue has surfaced.

If I can figure out why we are generating a higher pulse train than movement I will be golden.

We have a very low backlash system with ADS Helical Module 3 rack on the x, a C2 25mm screw on the y and a c2 18mm screw on the Z. The Following Error accumulates under movement. Having to set it to 2 million to move 4' without error. Ugh. More debugging. The odd thing is that the following error is consistent on x, y and z.

Is this a buffer issue maybe?

3

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 05:42:58 PM »

Will do. Our power supply is a custom 24/12/5 common ground system. Works well with GE controllers but I will follow your advice just to be sure.

I was also mistaken about the plugin reading the encoder... It appears there are 3 radio buttons: Load Enc, Motor Enc and Commanded. I had the Load Enc selected. With Motor Enc I see no updates but get movement. Oddly if I move slow it will not error out (which it should since there encoder is not being read it appears)

I checked the driver with an oscilloscope and determined the driver is indeed putting out information so I am not sure where the issue is. We have a custom cable (verified pinout) using cat 6 shielded ethernet cable from the encoder board to the driver. A, B and Z are all connected.

We followed standard ethernet pinout on the encoder board so assuming the order is ow, o, gw, b, bw, g, bw, b then it is connected properly. We also checked that J8 is the expansion being used (as also verified by the estop earlier).

We also updated Mach to the latest, updated the firmware on the Integra and the Mach 4 plugins.

Do you have any ideas?

4

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 04:30:41 PM »

Earth ground is connected. I had to jumper the estop to 24V on the encoder board and use an input directly on the Integra for the mushroom estop buttons.. Not sure why. I will debug this later.

Now the issue is that with the encoders enabled in the plugin settings I can get motion but the Mach DROs do not update. For now I have set the encoder feedback to "undefined" so I am not able to run fully closed loop. Any suggestions?

I see the encoders are indeed reading when I test motion from the plugin control but Mach will not reflect motion. If I move too quickly I get an error related to the encoders that states something about max following error and get an estop.

I probably have something in the plugin config page set wrong but when testing the motor from the plugin I see the max following error never exceeds 10k. Not sure what the gain and motion threshold count does.

Just to be sure I am right... In the plugin I have Command Input Source set to MachXX, Type = stepper and in the Feedback the source was Encoder, Gain 1, Max Follow 10k, count 4. Basically the default.

I have tried this with both a Yaskawa servo/driver and a DMM DYN 4.

Last issue is that Mach 4 no longer honors the home prox sensors. They are being read but the Ref All Home causes each axis to pass the prox trip point. I can probably figure this out - the encoder feedback is my major issue at the moment.

Thank you again.

5

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 12:22:48 PM »

Sorry - I meant to clarify - Yes. It errors on arming within 15 seconds. Never get a chance to apply motion.

6

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 12:21:33 PM »

Thank you for the prompt reply. Yes it does usually. Sometimes it takes about 15 seconds. Disabling the estop input in Mach allows me to enable the machine though which is odd.

It may be important to note that if the machine is disabled the estop does trigger (verified by the diagnostic LED in my custom diagnostic screen for inputs). It is 24v normally closed and there is no noise issue. The estop LED does not "flicker". I have checked for noise with an RF analyzer we have here and there is negligible noise. The estop button is in good working condition. I am perplexed.

Also the estop LED on the 7737 will light when we push the estop and remains unlit when the hardware estop button is reset; It also does not flicker.

There is a slight flicker on the first of the four LEDs furthest from the estop led on the 7737 but looks to be some sort of heartbeat - I can not find documentation on the LEDs for that board so I am not sure. Here is all I know for sure.


LED.      LED.       LED.       LED
 |            |             |            |
Estop.     ?             ?            ? <- this one flickers

7

HiCON Motion Controller / Error: Disarmed Drives Unexpectedly

« on: November 06, 2017, 11:14:32 AM »

Using an Integra  with an encoder board. Everything is connected and we get communication with Mach 4 - Tested e-stop button, limits, probe and some outputs while the system is in disable state - all working.

The issue is when we arm the system we get:

Error: Disarmed Drivers Unexpectedly. Please do not run any other software on this computer while Mach is controlling the machine.

Nothing else is running (except the standard windows services)


Any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

8

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z plunging deeper after each retraction. Not mechanical

« on: July 23, 2016, 07:49:03 PM »

Gary,

You are probably right. I may not mess with the 1.8Kw - overkill and probably won't make a difference. It is just odd that a C2 accuracy screw is not running in the tolerance it should.

Thank you again my friend.


Gio

9

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z plunging deeper after each retraction. Not mechanical

« on: July 23, 2016, 10:17:33 AM »

Z is still a little erratic. Either too high or too low but now within +/- .001 and not accumulating. Overall not great but at least it doesn't appear to be dropping continuously.

Thinking about putting an extra 1.8Kw servo on the Z (overkill) to see if this will get rid of the final bit of fluctuation. It is the only other motor I have that will work on the drivers I have.

Again though this could just be my old friend (and sometimes enemy) Gravity. A servo will indeed hunt a little. A larger servo would be less inclined to care about gravity.

Overkill or worth a try?

10

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z plunging deeper after each retraction. Not mechanical

« on: July 22, 2016, 06:39:42 PM »

Update:

Replaced the ESS, reinstalled Mach3 and rebuilt my profile from scratch. So far I am 1/4 through my program without a single variance. Odd that only the Z channel was affected. More likely a connection may have developed some oxidation or something. It is VERY humid in South Texas and even stainless will rust - indoors. You breathe a glass of water a day here.

So I am not sure the ESS was bad per se but with removing components and placing them back in I may have knocked some oxidation off a connector or something. TTL is a fickle *****.

I will post back if the issue is fully resolved. This job will take a few hours to run but things are looking up.

Gary. Your insight always puts me on the tight path. I owe you a cold one should you ever be in my neck of the woods (I also go to Virginia a lot due to my defense work so my neck of the woods is rather large - lol).

I will post an update soon.

Kind regards,

Gio