Messages

1251

General Mach Discussion / Re: limit switches

« on: January 23, 2021, 12:13:52 AM »

Hi,
your post belongs on the Mach3 General Discussion board, this board is for Mach4.

The Bitsensor  controller board, also called the RnR controller board, is famous for giving people grief trying to get them to work, they
are in short Chinese crap, you've got what you paid for.

They do not work with Mach4 at all.

Craig

1252

General Mach Discussion / Re: Mach3, Delta ASDA-B2, ESS. 12 straight hours working on this. could use assist..

« on: January 22, 2021, 09:05:48 PM »

Hi,
I think you'll need a few more wires that that.

I'm wiring up my servos at the moment and in order to get the pulse rate I want I need to use differential signalling for
step and direction, ie a pair of wires for each.

I want one (for the moment, may have more monitors in the future) alarm per servo. Each drive needs an Enable signal and each drive needs
an AlarmReset signal and each drive needs a COM- that can be tied to the 0V of the BoB/controller.

Step = 2 wires
Direction= 2 wires
Alarm = 1 wire
Enable = 1 wire
Reset = 1 wire
Com- =1 wire
Total= 8 wires

On page 3-32 of the Delta manual I'm using circuit diagram C9. So the internal (to the drive) 24V supply (pin 17 CN1) is connected to COM+ (pin11 CN1)
with a short piece of wire within the plug. The digital inputs to the drive called SON (servo on) and ARST (alarm reset) are pins 9 and 33 CN1 per the default pinout
of CN1 page 3-22.

Note that the voltage on those lines is capable of 24V so cannot in any circumstance be connected to a 5V output on your BoB/controller. I got around this
by using a small NPN transistor as a level translator for each line, per the attached circuit diagram. The 5V output of my BoB turns on the transistor and the transistor
shorts to COM- the 24V via the optocoupler photodiode in the drive thereby forming an active low signal to the drive.

The default alarm output (DO) of the drive are pins 28 and 27 per page 3-21. I am using a variant of circuit diagram C5 on page 3-31.
DO5- (pin27 CN1) is connected with a short piece of wire within the plug to COM- (pin14 CN1). The Alarm output is pin 28 CN1 and it will short to COM-
any voltage on that line. Note DO NOT DIRECT CONNECT that line to any power supply or you will overcurrent and blow the transistor in the drive. The voltage
on the line MUST be supplied via a current limiting resistance. I would suggest 4k7 Ohm for 5V and 27k Ohm for 24V.

Craig
 

1253

Mach4 Plugins / Re: Mach 4 wont recognise UC100 controller

« on: January 22, 2021, 02:41:49 PM »

Hi,
if you are considering another controller for your lathe then get one with enough IO to suit your machine NOW but also
in a few years.

I don't believe any of the UCnnn series devices support lathe threading whereas the PMDX-424 does as do PoKeys, ESS and others.

Craig

1254

Mach4 Plugins / Re: Mach 4 wont recognise UC100 controller

« on: January 20, 2021, 11:42:17 PM »

Hi,
there are a number of Mach4 users whom have a UC100 so it definitely does work. The UC100 is a single port equivalent, that
is 17 inputs and outputs, which is very restrictive.

A UC400 and PMDX-424 both have 34 IOs' an Ethernet SmoothStepper has 51 IOs, a 57CNC has 57 IOs, a UC300 has 85 IOs.
Not sure exactly how many a CSMIO and a Hicon have, but plenty.

As you noted all the UCnnn series are made by CNCDrive, the owners and manufacturers of UCCNC. They have a good Mach3 plugin for
all their motion controllers but the Mach4 plugin is weak on realtime supports. Given the competitive nature of the two companies I
don't see CNCDrive expending a lot of effort to improve their Mach4 plugins, when really they'd rather have customers buy UCCNC.

The other manufacturers have expended much more effort on their plugins to ensure maximum facility with Mach4, and include
Warp9TD, PMDX, PoKeys, Vital Systems. CSLabs deserve a mention but their Mach4 plugin lacks polish when not actually buggy. CSLabs
are trying to push their own software and the Mach4 plugin has suffered as a result.

Craig

1255

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue

« on: January 20, 2021, 11:28:04 PM »

Hi,
Darwin is very much an after thought, Mach4 was always designed to be supported by an external motion controller
like an Ethernet SmoothStepper or a Hicon Integra.

Art Fennerty, the chap who wrote the now famous Mach3 parallel port driver agreed to write another and very last parallel port
driver for Mach4. It is supposed to be its last evolution....hence the name Darwin. Note also that the intellectual property is
Art's, and the license fee is paid to him not New Fangled Solutions, the owners of Mach4.

I think the intention was that Darwin would allow someone to experiment with  machine capable Mach4 solution without going to the expense of
a motion controller. As such Darwin works but it misses a number of realtime supports, things like backlash comp, hardware THC, lathe threading.
My understanding is that those supports will never be implemented in Darwin.

If you want all of the features that Mach4 offers then get an external motion controller.

Craig

1256

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Setting up Soft Limits Help

« on: January 20, 2021, 11:17:17 PM »

Hi,
SoftLimits ONLY make sense if your machine is Homed (Referenced).

The first thing you do when you turn the machine on is Home the machine. The numbers you populate the SoftLimit table are the machine
boundaries FROM the home position. If your machine is not Homed to an exactly repeatable location every time then the numbers
(being units of travel) to the machine boundaries change every time.

Once the machine is Homed and the SoftLimit table is populated with data THEN <Enable SoftLImits> on the FileOps tab.

Craig

1257

Third party software and hardware support forums. / Re: NCStudio machine conversion to Mach4?

« on: January 19, 2021, 10:07:11 PM »

Hi,
saw this post.....

To use Mach4 you need obviously a PC, it doesn't need to be a flash or powerful unit, just stable. If you use an external
motion controller then any OS including 64bit OS's like Windows10 are fine and laptops work also. If you really must use a parallel port,
and Mach4 does have one called Darwin ($25.00 license fee applies), then you MUST use 32bit Windows7 or earlier, and a desktop rather
than a laptop.

Mach4 was designed for, and really requires an external motion controller, I would recommend an Ethernet SmoothStepper (by Warp9TD, $180USD),
and that needs to be matched to a breakout board(s). A fully developed and good quality unit is the MB3 (by CNCRoom, $180USD), although there are less
sophisticated units which are cheaper.

With Mach4 installed on the PC, the Ethernet Smoothstpper hooked up with its own 5V supply, the MB3 hooked to the SmoothStepper with its own 24V supply
you can hook up your existing stepper drives, homes and limits etc.

Craig

1258

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Current tool ==

« on: January 16, 2021, 10:14:13 PM »

Hi,
the warning relates to this line:

Code: [Select]

N15M06 T2
So Mach has determined that tool T2 is already in the spindle and therefore there is nothing for it to do. Try commenting out that line and see
if the warning goes away.

Craig

1259

Mach3 under Vista / Re: New setup for USB board by BSMCEO4U-PP Bitsensor

« on: January 16, 2021, 08:01:49 PM »

Hi,
the only thing to recommend RnR/BitSenor motion control boards is their price.

They do work despite the dearth of published information and confusing pin numbering system but they have never
supported G31 probing, single point threading or hardware THC.

If you want or need any of those realtime supports then you need a different controller period.

If you want a more capable and better supported external motion board then you should chose an Ethernet connected device
being much more noise immune and lower latency. An Ethernet SmoothStepper or a 57CNC has all the realtime supports
listed above.

Craig

1260

General Mach Discussion / Re: Adavanced CNC programmer but new to Mac3 ---Questions

« on: January 16, 2021, 05:18:02 PM »

Hi,

-The MAC3 i down loaded is their basic setup is close to the Fanuc O controls but i dont see Macro Variable screen of parameter screen to make custom G and M codes

Mach3 is broadly similar to Fanuc but you don't get the same parameters that you are familiar with. Pound variable numbers in Mach3 are very confused
because Mach3 evolved over a number of years, indeed it was that confusion that prompted me to migrate to Mach4 six years ago.

Mach4 is very nearly identical to Fanuc 21i. Mach4Hobby does not have parametric programming whereas Mach4Indutrial does.

As Brian Barker says:

Mach3 grew organically , Mach4 was designed.

smurph, one of the leading contributors to Mach4, stated very clearly that one of the design goals was to make Mach4 as close to identical to Fanuc 21 as possible.
If you are not familiar with the differences between Mach3 and Mach4 then I would recommend:

https://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php?topic=42891.0

Craig