Messages

151

General Mach Discussion / Re: Spindle encoder disk diameter?

« on: June 10, 2008, 09:28:36 PM »

Hood,

Probably a good point but there is probably a way to stretch the pulse time if there is indeed two discrete outputs from such a critter, one being a once per revolution pulse and the other being 50 or 100 or per, It was just a thought to save labor retrofiting something that could be modified, and lord knows I am all for doing nothing if I can help it!

Kristin

152

General Mach Discussion / Re: Spindle encoder disk diameter?

« on: June 10, 2008, 01:22:08 PM »

looks like about 5 1/2" is about as small as I can make it , the spindle is 5" diam where it exits the bearings and increases to 10" at the big air cyl that closes the chuck . There is a 6" diam cog that drives the qaud encoder sandwiched between the bearing housing and air cyl , I was thinking of pulling it off and replacing with slotted disk

Just wondering if you already have an encoder if you couldn't pull your signal off of one of it's outputs? As pointed out above if it has a single index and another output of multiple slots?

Kristin

153

General Mach Discussion / Re: Having trouble using and understanding Mach3

« on: June 10, 2008, 12:27:15 PM »

Jim,

That reply should be a sticky at the top of the page! I wish someone had made it that clear when I was begining to figure out the G-code a month or two ago.

Kristin

154

General Mach Discussion / Re: Sanyo Denki steppers

« on: June 08, 2008, 12:59:44 PM »

Thanks,

I tried looking up the motor spec online, however this monster of a printer is probably 28 years old so I found nothing useful aside from mounting dimensons, Had to figure out the leads with the ohmmeter.

There is a encoder disk with two concentric rings of slots, the opto switch (dual) and a plastic enclosure that may become a spindle speed sensor. I still have to gut the rest of it there is a huge powersupply with 3 big can capacitors and the transformer, so I guess I need to plug it in and see what voltages it puts out. Lot's more goodies in there too, I know I saw at least 3 or 4 microswitches.

Kristin

155

General Mach Discussion / Sanyo Denki steppers

« on: June 07, 2008, 11:11:20 AM »

I just got two Sanyo Denki steppers from an old IBM wide format line printer, Type 103-820-28 4.5V 1.4A 2 deg/step.

So how do I set these up, 2 deg/step so 180 per rev?

Kristin

156

General Mach Discussion / Re: Little known use of mach3 (Video)

« on: June 05, 2008, 11:17:27 PM »

Benny,

Now that is something, shame the videos only had music and no commentary. Looks like I am going to be looking at doing up one of my Singer Machines with a spindle counter and x/y table for some custom patch making.

Kristin

157

General Mach Discussion / Re: Should I scrap Vista for XP?

« on: June 01, 2008, 01:34:01 AM »

Rich,

Good advise, most likley there is not a full install disk incuded in the system, just a restore disk so doing a fdisk would be fatal. Even then HP would probably want the HDD back and ship a new disk with the OS installed. One good reason I keep behind the pack and always have a installable OS disk.

I might add sometimes it's better to remove, reboot, reboot and then shut down before re-installing a hardware item, don't know why but there seems to be some latency built in that will restore the old settings on one shutdown and not allow for a clean install. I had the same problem with Mach3, tried to just re-install, same problems, uninstall reboot and install, same problem but after uninstall and two reboots it worked fine in XP. These dang OS's take over and are hard to repair. On that note, if there is still a "restore point" in vista, he could try to just back up to the original software settings and start fresh.

ALT-CTL-DEL

Kristin

158

General Mach Discussion / Re: Should I scrap Vista for XP?

« on: May 29, 2008, 06:43:16 PM »

Colin,

When your reply, look for the additional Options button, it will let you add a file.

Kristin

159

General Mach Discussion / Re: Should I scrap Vista for XP?

« on: May 29, 2008, 01:28:48 PM »

Well now that the Vista/XP/Linux thing has been beat to death, I would seem we are back to a hardware issue if there is no voltage on the cable pins. So I Propose the following again.

1- I can't recall (since this thread is split in two) if the cable its self was ever checked for continuity pin for pin to make sure it is wired straight through.
2- Seems there was a mention that the driver installed was a download from the net because "I could not figure out the CD" according to the OP
3- Time to remove the hardware, reboot and start clean, perhaps even try a different slot if avalable and install it with the driver provided on the included CD.
4- Has this card been tested with the most obvious thing, a printer?
5- Since the OP does not own a copy of XP that does not seem to be much of an option, adding a HDD & buying XP would probably be more than just buying a PC already loaded with XP, there are plenty of off lease machines cheap.

Kristin


PS- Thanks Hood for bringing this back around to the topic.

160

General Mach Discussion / Re: Should I scrap Vista for XP?

« on: May 28, 2008, 10:14:16 PM »

Colin,

If you can scrap vista I would, seems most people work well with XP, question is do you have the XP OS on CD to do that. Next Q, since it a new system, I would recomend swapping out the HDD and using another to install XP on so as not to mess with the "factory installed" OS should you need warrenty service. Since it's a PCI card it should work, the address you gave here or on the other thread seemed strange to me is there any way you can assign 0X378 to that port? It seems like the # you gave may be a virtual port address and that may make a big difference if the PC has to jump through hoops to send a signal to it. Just a thought as I just recently upgraded to XP from 98 but each OS has it's "funny quirks" and I used to be much happier when I could set a hard address by jumpers rather than plug and play software, a whole lot less problems and trouble.

Kristin