Messages

1

General Mach Discussion / Re: A couple of design formulas wanted

« on: August 20, 2013, 04:01:55 AM »

Thanks Rich,
I shall have a look at the Gecko site for the info. I appreciate its probably not as simple as a basic calculation to get a realistic figure.

Stuart

2

General Mach Discussion / Re: CNC DEAD connected but doesn't communicate

« on: August 16, 2013, 08:39:12 AM »

John,
It's difficult to know whether this is going to be a Mach config problem or a problem with the printer port on your computer. The first place I would be looking now is in the device manager to see if the printer port is behaving itself and check it does not have a yellow exclamation mark next to it indicating a problem. If you are not familiar with this, Artsoft  gives a brief description of how to do this in their video training at http://www.machsupport.com/videos/

Have a look at the first video called "installation and basic configuration". It's about 10 minutes into the video.

If all looks good after the checking of the port, maybe following the config video with the other settings will give you a clue.

Have you tried another printer cable by chance??

Stuart

3

General Mach Discussion / Re: CNC DEAD connected but doesn't communicate

« on: August 15, 2013, 06:46:39 AM »

John,
With your new computer have you assigned the motor step and direction pin outputs to the connections from your breakout board and also enabled the motors.

Stuart

4

General Mach Discussion / A couple of design formulas wanted

« on: August 15, 2013, 06:36:08 AM »

Good evening guys,
Some time ago I was given a formula to work out what holding torque requirements i needed of a stepper motor to run the rack and pinion drive system of my router. It considered the weight of the axis to be moved and the speed of travel. Unfortunately I have misplaced it. Also another formula to work out the power supply voltage to a Stepper to get the best performance.

If somebody has this info, I would very much appreciate it.

Stuart

5

General Mach Discussion / Re: Setup Of New Breakout Board

« on: October 20, 2012, 02:19:17 AM »

I have the same package but have not put it into service other than some benchtop testing.

The "HY" cd that comes with this kit has a pdf document on it which tells you how to setup the port pins. It from memory was not as straight forward as numbering from 1 to 8. Have a look for it and this may fix your "Y" axis problem.

The stalling of motors could well be associated with the DIP switch settings on the board adjacent to the heatsink. The above document also has info on where to set these, but you will probably find the best results will come from trial and error

Hope this helps.

Stuart

6

General Mach Discussion / Re: Help with electrical interference

« on: May 24, 2012, 04:10:05 PM »

Hi Guys,
Some further success last night. Cutting the shield wires at the micro switches made little difference, but when I also cut the shields at the stepper motor ends I think may have fixed my problem. I only have the one piece of code to run the machine on at the moment, which runs for about 15 minutes. Today I plan to slow the feed rate right down and see if I can run it for over half an hour or so to see how it performs.

Good advice hood, thank you to both of you for your help.

Stuart

7

General Mach Discussion / Re: Help with electrical interference

« on: May 21, 2012, 07:01:49 PM »

Shall disconnect them when I get back home in a couple of days. Thanks again for your help.

8

General Mach Discussion / Re: Help with electrical interference

« on: May 21, 2012, 08:41:08 AM »

Hi Tweakie,
Just to give you a heads up on where I am at. I tried the two 0.1mf caps and it made a substantial difference. Good advice.... Thanks. The machine will run for about 10 minutes or more before the system detects a limit switch activation. I have been onto the BOB manufacturers today and they have suggested to move the position of the VFD and give it a try as they feel it is a little close. At the moment the VFD is about 300mm from the BOB and stepper drivers.

I am overseas at the moment with work so wont get to try it before the end of the week, but shall let you know the outcome.

Cheers,

Stuart

9

General Mach Discussion / Re: Cuts uneven when it's cutting arcs

« on: May 20, 2012, 05:09:11 PM »

I had a very similar problem with my router. I fixed it by going into the Config/General config page and changing the "IJ" mode from ABS to INC. You will find it in the second column from the left about half way down in the box for "Start up Modals"

Hope this helps.

Stuart

10

General Mach Discussion / Re: Help with electrical interference

« on: May 20, 2012, 05:14:15 AM »

The cable from the VFD to the spindle is shielded and connected to earth at the VFD end and not connected at the Spindle end. The supply cable to the VFD is not shielded but is only about 300mm long. Also the machine runs without a problem with the VFD powered. It is only when the spindle is running that I get the problem so I suspect more to do with the output wiring or some sort of harmonic being generated within the VFD when in the run mode.

Stuart