Messages

4731

One on one phone support. / Re: Need Help. Motors not responding.

« on: January 27, 2014, 02:59:40 AM »

As the steppers are not 'locked' when power is applied, in my opinion, this indicates that you are missing an 'enable' signal on one, or more, pins.

Because of the poor documentation supplied with you machine you will have to find the pin by 'trial and error'.
In Ports & Pins : Output Signals - enable Enable#1 and set it to Port#1 then try each of the pin numbers 1,8,9,14,16,17 in turn both Active Hi and Active Low until you find the right one (lets hope it is pin 1).

Tweakie.

4732

One on one phone support. / Re: Need Help. Motors not responding.

« on: January 26, 2014, 04:14:59 AM »

Try changing your step signals state to Dir Low Active checked (in Motor Outputs) and see if that makes any difference.

As you are aware Max NC mode allocates and drives the pins in a different way to your controller requirements so stay clear of that.

Try selecting Sherline 1/2 Pulse Mode and see if that makes any difference.

It could be that your allocation of pin# is totally incorrect in motor tuning but I would still expect some response with the setting you currently have.
Whilst the machine is connected and has no response are the motors locked (unable to easily rotate by hand) ??

Tweakie.

4733

Show"N"Tell ( Your Machines) / Re: The Laser Project.

« on: January 26, 2014, 02:14:32 AM »

Excellent work my friend, I look forward to seeing some pictures of more of the things you make.

Tweakie.

4734

FAQs / Re: Older MAXNC-10, no jog only steps

« on: January 25, 2014, 12:21:13 PM »

Not any help for the main problem but...

The roadrunner code is in Inch units so if your machine is set up for Metric units then you need to add the G20 command at the start of the code to get correct dimensional movements.

Tweakie.

4735

Mach3 under Vista / Re: Use of Embeeded Widows OS - Good, Bad, or Ugly?

« on: January 25, 2014, 08:51:14 AM »

Hi Guys,

Whilst the information presented in this thread is not of practical use to me (at this moment in time) I have learned a lot from it which otherwise I would not have known so thank you.

Tweakie.

4736

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z Axis loosing steps in the up direction only.

« on: January 25, 2014, 05:16:52 AM »

I then ran the stepper without it being connected to the ball screw and found that jogging in the down direction the motor runs perfectly, but jogging in the up direction the motor jerks and moans and looses steps. Sometimes it even runs the wrong direction.

Assuming all electrical wiring is indeed correctly connected...
Try selecting Sherline 1/2 Pulse Mode, apply, then do a Mach3 restart and just see if that cures this issue.
If it does not then it could either be the Z axis direction pin is faulty on your LPT parallel port (or BoB) or the Z axis motor driver is faulty. You may be able to swap pin numbers for Z axis direction signal and rule out one possibility.

Tweakie.

4737

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

« on: January 22, 2014, 10:18:36 AM »

Hi Kenneth,

An impossible question to answer but I suspect the forum support will last both your and my lifetimes. 

Tweakie.

4738

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z output faulty on 3040 - groan....

« on: January 22, 2014, 03:13:03 AM »

Joe,

The Gecko G540 would be hard to better http://www.geckodrive.com/geckodrive-step-motor-drives/g540.html plus their site contains all the necessary data / information to get it up and running etc.

Tweakie.

4739

Share Your GCode / Re: Cutting circle

« on: January 21, 2014, 05:58:05 AM »

Jim,

Most of the CAD / CAM software that I use has the option for an Arc Tangent Curve (straight lines) or Arcs (true circle) post processors so I think you are on the right track and should look at your PP.

Tweakie.

4740

General Mach Discussion / Re: OEM codes for buttons, DRO's and LED's

« on: January 21, 2014, 05:39:19 AM »

I have one problem, I have noticed that a power point or light swiitch when turned of or on is sending a pulse to the cnc and throwing the safety /stop button. All micro homing switch leads are earthed. any ideas to stop this please.

I would be inclined to fit a mains filter in series with the power input to your CNC (of sufficient current rating).

Tweakie.