Messages

1031

General Mach Discussion / Re: Bridgeport Discovery 308 retrofit

« on: December 31, 2007, 12:41:31 PM »

The spindle drive can bet set to accept 0-10V signals as well. In the original machine while milling the spindle drive runs in RS422 mode, basically just getting the speed command. The drive uses separate encoders for velocity feedback (this encoder goes to the drive) and position (this encoder goes to a little circuit board beside the spindle drive). When doing tool changing, the spindle drive is set to 0-10V mode and another circuit board takes over to control. It supplies the analog reference and reads the secondary spindle encoder signals to properly position the spindle for tool changes. I have retained this original setup, but I think it would work just as well, perhaps, to run the spindle drive the whole time in analog mode. But, by retaining the original setup I have a spare 4th axis to use for a indexer etc.

1032

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Re: Galil plugin for ISA bus card ie. DMC 1040

« on: December 12, 2007, 12:19:55 AM »

In Mach Ports&Pins:

Port 1-Input 1 is the Galil Input 1 and Port 1 - Input 2 is Galil Input 2, (etc) same for outputs

So in Mach Inputs tab, you would set Input 1 to Port 1, Pin 1 etc, the outputs are set the same, which seem strange if you try to compare it to a parallel port but its not really as Galil lables the built in I/O as Input 1/Output 1. In other words on the Mach Output tab Set Output 1 to Port 1, Pin 1.

make sure you also enable them or they wont work (enable the limits too while your at it). The Galil plug-in takes care of getting the all the limits and homes mapped to the correct place in Mach you just have to enable them in Ports & Pins.

1033

Galil / Re: Mach3 and Galil, What am I doing wrong?

« on: November 26, 2007, 03:37:12 PM »

Uninstalling/reinstalling the card will not correct registry problems. Read over page 10 in the manual. The software must be installed prior to the card being installed. Remove the card, uninstall the software. Use regedit to find and remove any registration entries for Galil (be careful editing the registry). Reboot. Reinstall the Galil drivers and SmartTerm. Then and only then reinstall the card. Start up Smart Term and it sees you card using the 'Registration' tool.

Hope that helps...

1034

Galil / Re: Mach3 and Galil, What am I doing wrong?

« on: November 26, 2007, 09:36:59 AM »

It still sounds like the card is not properly registered (set up in windows registry), it must be before it will work properly. In SmartTerm under Tools there is a Controller Registration option. You might want to first clean out any old registry entries for Galil and then use the 'Controller Registration' option to make sure that it is properly registered.

1035

General Mach Discussion / Re: could I use more than 500 lines ?

« on: November 25, 2007, 11:47:54 AM »

Yes, an easy solution. Buy a license! Really, it's money well invested. It keeps Art and the gang in the business of providing us with a great LOW COST CNC controller software solution.

1036

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Re: Mach3 Plugin Tutorial Document and Prototype File Set

« on: November 25, 2007, 11:42:51 AM »

Thanks for the explanation James. I also noticed that the SDK was missing a lot of things in MachIncludes (I did get hold of the latest though). I did like how you integrated the SysInternals debugging window. The ability to use VS2005 would be great as it's what I use for everything else. Your tutorial came at a good time as I was wanting to create a plug-in for Measurement Computing (MCC) I/O cards as I have several of them at work. The other advantage is that their 'Universal Library' should allow one plug-in to work with all the boards they make.

1037

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Re: Mach3 Plugin Tutorial Document and Prototype File Set

« on: November 25, 2007, 12:31:04 AM »

Wow! This is great James and very much appreciated. I just started working on the Galil plugin to get the extended I/O working. Your tutorial has anwered many questions I have had (the biggest being the configuration GUI in the resources file).

I do have one question, on page 8 you say:

To make a plug in of your own you must either use ‘BlankPlugin’ as a starting point or you can use the prototype file set and instructions that I am providing.  This document will only discuss the second method.

What advantage/disadvantage is there to these two choices? While I appreciate knowing how to set up a project 'from scratch' I was wondering what differences there may be for the developer for these two paths.

Thanks,

Jeff

1038

Galil / Re: Mach3 and Galil, What am I doing wrong?

« on: November 23, 2007, 06:37:24 PM »

The Galil plug-in does not make use of the port address. It only looks to see if there are any I/O's under
'Ports and Pins' that are set to Port 1 and active. The card must be registered properly in the Windows registry before the Mach Galil plug-in will work.

1039

Galil / Re: Mach3 and Galil, What am I doing wrong?

« on: November 20, 2007, 02:23:47 PM »

Double check that that card is registerd properly in the Windows registry, if SmartTerm automatically connects if should be properly registerd but you can always reregister it to be safe, and make sure you REMOVE any registry entried for you old ISA card. mach will try to connect to the first card it sees in the registry and is probably finding the entry for the old ISA card.

Then reinstall the latest mach, and reinstall the latest Galil plug-in, in that order.

I think that should get you going. BTW, the Inputs and Outputs on the Galil are mapped to Port 1 in Mach. You have to go into Pports&Pins and enable then and set them to Port 1 (have to enable the Homes and Limits too).

1040

General Mach Discussion / Re: Breakout Boards

« on: November 18, 2007, 10:17:21 AM »

I guess I'll have to voice the lone pro 'opto-isolation' opinion here. Opto-isolation is useful for far more than protection from getting things hooked up wrong the first time. When properly designed it will electrically isolate the computer from the machine. The primary advantages of this isolation are noise reduction, electrical protection of the host computer and interfacing dissimilar voltages. In some cases this isolation is essential, and in some cases not.

I built an opto-isolated breakout board for a Dyna-2400/Mach III conversion I did. It used all the original drives on the machine. The opto-isolation insured that no noise from the steppers/drivers got fed back to the computer. When I was looking at commercially available boards I was surprised to see some that seemed to have a single onboard transformer to provide power to both sides of the opto-isolation circuitry. That kind of blows the whole point of opto-isolation.

I'm finishing up a Mach III conversion of a Bridgeport Discovery 308 VMC now. It uses a Galil motion control board and ICM-2900 'break out' moudule. The encoders, limits, homes and operator interface buttons are not opto-isolated. They are powered by the ICM-2900/Galil and in shileded cables. The 'extended I/O' which controls both 24VDC and 110VAC. This was done through 'Opto-22' racks, which hold individually opto-isolated SSR's. This completely iso-lates all the higher voltage and 'noisy' signals from the control.