Messages

6361

General Mach Discussion / Re: Stepper Motor problem

« on: July 17, 2011, 11:03:19 AM »

Steppers use a Step signal and a Direction signal. The Direction signal is either high (+5V) for one direction of rotation or low (0V) for the other direction. If the Direction signal is missing or shorted then the the motor will only run in one direction.
It is also possible to have a motor with one wire not connected behave in this manner. With everything switched off check all your electrical connections thoroughly.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.

6362

General Mach Discussion / Re: Stepper Motor problem

« on: July 17, 2011, 08:39:02 AM »

I have 5mm pitch ballscrews, 200 step motors @ 1/8 microstep and my steps per mm are set at 320. 
You are spot-on Rene.

Tweakie.

6363

General Mach Discussion / Re: pocket wizard

« on: July 17, 2011, 08:08:39 AM »

Hi Lotusman,

Welcome to the forum.

I can't help much with the pocket wizard but It would be great if you could post some pictures of your CNC table addition to your manual knee mill, please. 

Tweakie.

6364

Tangent Corner / Re: Ooops !

« on: July 17, 2011, 07:24:25 AM »

i could go on about this speaker wire thing thinking of taking a pic so you guys can start a topic about us newbies and the stupid stuff we do. i think we all might get a laugh out of it 

Hi Mikee,

I don't think anyone would laugh because we have all been there, once or twice. In reality, everything seems so incredibly easy after we understand it.
A list of beginners mistakes may be an extremely good idea as it could help newcomers quite a lot.
Your speaker wire and the diagnostics LED's are not, I think, related as I have not got the diagnostic LED's to work properly on my system for the last 6 Months or so (they used to work once but don't any more).

Tweakie.

nb. Have you thought about keeping Water Buffalo and planting Rice ?

6365

General Mach Discussion / Re: Breathing New Life Back Into a Shopbot PRT 48 X 96 CNC Router

« on: July 17, 2011, 04:26:59 AM »

Sound like a good job done John.

Tweakie.

6366

General Mach Discussion / Re: Stepper Motor problem

« on: July 17, 2011, 04:23:52 AM »

Hi Rene,

Welcome to the forum.

Thoroughly check the electrical connections for your Z Axis motor.
Check that you have the Step and Direction pins configured correctly in Config / Ports & Pins / Motor Outputs.

Under Config / Motor Tuning, select the Z Axis and set the Velocity to a low value. Using the up / down keyboard arrow keys you should be able to jog the Z Axis. Repeat this Increasing the Velocity bit at a time until the axis just stalls then reduce the Velocity figure by about 30% then save your settings.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.

6367

General Mach Discussion / Re: RUN Button LED Blinks

« on: July 17, 2011, 04:12:52 AM »

Please excuse the brain error - in the above post GB should read GHz. 

Tweakie.

6368

General Mach Discussion / Re: Filpping the direction of the x-axis all by itself

« on: July 17, 2011, 02:17:59 AM »

It is something that has crept in during the last or last but one revision and the X Axis Scale DRO flips from +1.000 to -1.0000 when it encounters a minor error in the GCode.
For the time being all you can do is check your GCode for a bad instruction, possibly an M Code that is not on the approved list.

Tweakie.

6369

General Mach Discussion / Re: RUN Button LED Blinks

« on: July 17, 2011, 02:06:28 AM »

I have been looking into this issue recently as I was getting it occurring towards the end of a program run. My conclusion is that it was caused by a bad operation (one that Mach does not approve of) called by a running plugin.
Correcting the code order within the plugin resolved the problem for me (I was changing the Mach mode of motion during an operation rather than after the current operation had ended). Another thing found is that this problem is speed related in so far as it appeared on a 3GB PC but not on a 1.8GB PC both running the same OS and V3.043.022.

Don't know if this helps.

Tweakie.

6370

General Mach Discussion / Re: 19 hrs and 4 minutes. DARN IT! - New Personal Record

« on: July 17, 2011, 01:41:44 AM »

Come on Bob you have to show us some pictures of the finished work 

Tweakie.