Messages

1271

Mach3 under Vista / Re: Mach 3 bluescreen

« on: January 13, 2021, 02:14:28 AM »

Hi,
the UC100 is USB connected and is prone to 'Run out of Data' errors. Keep the USB cable as short as possible, preferably with two or even
three ferrite ring chokes on it.

Ethernet connected devices are much more reliable.

I use an Ethernet Smooth Stepper and Mach4 and have done for six years. I've never had a bluescreen event, although I can and
still do crash Mach4 occasionally. I've had two 'Run out of Data' events, both in the same afternoon, when I was pushing my spindle
to 110%. I suspect conducted electrical noise, but I've never had the issue since using the exact same set-up but rather less aggressive cutting.

Craig

1272

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Fanuc 6 Axis Robot Arm Help with Concept

« on: January 11, 2021, 01:17:38 PM »

Hi,
rather more serious suggestion (than a cheap political shot) is to sell it. I would have thought there would be
businesses which could use such a robot and to such a business would be worth many thousands of dollars,
if you ca find tat business.

Craig

1273

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Fanuc 6 Axis Robot Arm Help with Concept

« on: January 11, 2021, 12:32:57 AM »

Hi,
$350 sounds like a steal......you didn't have to tromp on any old ladies or anything?

If I had the chance to get some hardware like that I'd be in too, perversely I think I'd use it as a tool changer for my mill.

Craig

1274

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Fanuc 6 Axis Robot Arm Help with Concept

« on: January 10, 2021, 11:24:12 PM »

Hi,
boy are you in for a treat:

http://www.openrave.org/docs/0.8.0/tutorials/openravepy_examples/

I revise my earlier post, that's seriously geeky AND way way nerdy!!!

Craig

1275

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Fanuc 6 Axis Robot Arm Help with Concept

« on: January 10, 2021, 11:12:01 PM »

Hi,
if you are interested in 'rolling your own' you might check out OpenRAVE, open source software for robotics, in particular IKFast, an analytic
Inverse Kinematics solver may be what you require.

I suspect you'll need to be very seriously geeky and quite possibly a bit nerdy as well....

Craig

1276

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Fanuc 6 Axis Robot Arm Help with Concept

« on: January 10, 2021, 10:55:47 PM »

Hi,
in a regular three axis CNC machine with orthogonal axes if you require a move from 0,0,0 to 0,0,5 say then pulses have to be
issued to just the X axis motor. Thus a g1 Gcode block need only specify the amount to be moved in that one direction, the other
motors remain idle but the move will complete.

With a robot arm it may be just to execute a simple move in one direction requires three, four or more of your robot arms motors will
have to move. That kind of coordinated multi motor action to produce a simple g1 Gcode is called kinematics, and is right up there in terms
of complexity. I suspect you will be required to use the Fanuc controller to get the kinematics right.

Let me guess....you got the robot arm for free.....but the controller costs millions?

A controller from a different manufacturer will give different results.......because, say, the centremost arm is longer than the Fanuc robot and
consequently the controlled point, the end of the arm, is more sensitive to movement of the centremost arm.

Craig

1277

General Mach Discussion / Re: installing mach3 under new windows

« on: January 10, 2021, 10:39:38 PM »

Hi,
Machs parallel port will ONLY work with a 32 bit OS, Windows 7 or earlier.

If you install a new copy of Windows 7 make sure it is a 32 bit version. If you want to install either 64bit Windows 7 or any Windows 10
variant then you will need an external motion controller like an Ethernet SmoothStepper or a UC300.

Craig

1278

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Lua Script and reading register's Help

« on: January 07, 2021, 04:24:22 PM »

Hi,
one of the things I like about Lua is that it is largely type free.....one of the things I hate about Lua is that its largely type free, and you can
never be sure what its going to do next!

Craig

1279

General Mach Discussion / Re: Lost steps after reset or e-stop

« on: January 06, 2021, 01:17:46 PM »

Hi,
an EStop aborts the remaining moves in he motion buffer and will almost certainly cause loss of position reference,
FeedHold on the other hand allows those buffered move to execute and then the machine stops, usually 0.1-0.3 seconds
worth of movement.

Craig

1280

General Mach Discussion / Re: Z Axis Drift With Servos...I Don't Understand It

« on: January 06, 2021, 12:55:59 AM »

Hi,
my knowledge is limited to the B2 series being a bit later than the AB series, however I think you'll find you can use either
differential OR single ended, the difference is largely how the IO plug is wired, you'd use terminals p & q say for differential whereas you'd use
terminal r for single ended (open collector) input and  the COM terminal which would be common to all inputs.

Can you take the shells off the IO connector and identify which terminals have been used?. The manual would then tell you whether the IO
plug has been wired for single ended or differential.

Single ended input of Delta servos is 24V, like most industrial servo drive designs. Differential is 5V, application of more than 5V between the diferential inputs
risk blowing the photodiode.

I'm not sure the wiring diagram you've posted is relevant, there are several different ways to wire the pulse inputs, and the diagram likely shows
just some generic or common method of wiring, not necessarily how yours is wired.

According to the PMDX manual the outputs are 5V TTL. You would need a level translating transistor or MOSFET to use single ended signaling
to your drives. It may be that is your fault right there, you have a BoB with 5V outputs driving 24V inputs.

Craig