Messages

4251

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Following Error

« on: June 22, 2018, 06:08:48 PM »

Hi,

10.2 Have a red alarm after running a small angle
 In the parameter of the driver, phase motor phase
sequence is properly connected. Refer incorrectly identifies
the drive motor phase sequence corresponding
connection.

(section 10.1 page 34)

Is it possible that you have hooked up the phases in reverse. Easy enough to swap (just one winding) and try again.

Craig

4252

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Following Error

« on: June 22, 2018, 05:59:30 PM »

Hi,
I started reading up on the 7766 board, thinking it was the expansion board that made the HiCon
capable of closed loop control.....sorry. The 7766 IS the HiCon. The HiCon is not closed loop capable
without  software activation, an optional extra.

The HiCon unit passes commands to the drier in the form of Step/Direction pulses and the  driver/stepper take it
from there. The HiCon is not involed in closing the loop and has no control or even awareness that the
stepper cant keep up. If the stepper cant keep up, as measured by the difference between its actual encoder
position and its commanded position, the 2HSS86H  faults.

I guess that is the problem you are having....the Z axis driver signals a fault?

I noted in the manual  that there are a number of conditions that cause the fault. I suspect you will
have to experiment with them until you find which feature is causing you grief. It could be Position Error
but it could also be Over Current or Over Voltage.

I will do a little more reading and maybe we can come up with a plan to diagnose whats going on.

Craig

4253

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Following Error

« on: June 22, 2018, 05:34:39 PM »

Hi,
if your drivers are closed loop that means the loop is closed by the Driver and the Stepper,
the HiCon has nothing to do with it. The HiCon provides pulses to the driver at the behest of
Mach and then the driver/stepper moves to the correct position. If the stepper fails to arrive
at the correct location the driver will add or subtract steps to the stepper to bring it closer.
If it fails to do so because of overload or it gets just too far behind the it faults and produces an
alarm. (Section 3.1 page 7).

I am sorry to have to tell you that closed loop steppers are really very little better than ordinary open loop steppers.
They are still a stepper motor and their torque falls off very rapidly with speed. Most steppers will have 20%
or less of their rated torque at 1000 rpm. Closed loop steppers are exactly the same. If some manufacturer
tries to tell you otherwise they are lying....to get you to part with your money.

Another,if not a lie, a half truth is that the closed loop stepper will catch up lost steps. If your stepper is operating
at speed and it loses a step because its torque is no longer enough to keep up then a closed loop stepper driver
will insert another step in the pulse stream but because the stepper is overloaded it WONT catch up! If this is repeated
the driver will recognise that the stepper is lagging the commanded position by a too great a margin and 'fault'.
The truth is that a well designed, driven and specified open loop stepper will NOT lose steps, and if its overloaded
(speed/acceleration) to the extent it does start to lose steps a closed loop stepper will also lose steps....and for exactly
the same reason.

The manufacturers of closed loop steppers play the marketing card very well, they capitalise on your fear of losing steps.
One claim that they can make and is justified is that their devices can give you much higher resolution (4000 steps per rev
verses 200 step per rev openloop).

I personally am of the opinion that the premium paid for closed loop steppers bring too few advantages to justify the extra cost.
Just a little more and you can have genuine AC servos and they will KICK STEPPER ANUS ALL DAY LONG!!!

If you use proper AC servos then you don't need the 7766 extension board. All AC servos and their matching drive
close the loop, the HiCon controller is not required to do so. Typically the servo manufacturer, having control of the
design of the servo drive, have a closed loop performance better than you or I could achieve by programming
the HiCon.

Craig

4254

HiCON Motion Controller / Re: Following Error

« on: June 22, 2018, 03:18:16 PM »

Hi,
I assume that you have encoders on the steppers?

If your stepper lags behind the commanded position the stepper driver will have to 'add some additional steps in the pulse stream' to have it catch
up. That would require an intelligent driver. What drivers are you using?

Note the HiCon can 'close the loop' and exert PID dynamics on servos but cannot insert steps into a pulse stream.

Craig

4255

General Mach Discussion / Re: Mach3 looks weird and torch won't fire

« on: June 22, 2018, 06:02:51 AM »

Hi,
recent Microsoft updates have caused issues with Mach3. To date there has been a patch in Mach3 to accommodate one problem and you have to wind back the updates to address a second
problem with the parallel port.

It may well be that Mach3 is now 'out of the woods' and work to spec for some time to come but its also possible that Mach3 may face more issues of similar description the months to come.
All development of Mach3 ceased five years ago and NFS has declared no interest in resuming development nor even maintainence. I think it wise to consider at the least an external controller
as Bryanna has suggested to give yourself options should a similar outage occur in the future.

Craig

4256

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Are #100 thru #199 #vars safe for user functions?

« on: June 22, 2018, 05:50:02 AM »

Hi,
Allan is right, the problem with ANY of the pound variables is that NFS has NEVER guaranteed that they are not used for some internal purpose or that they maybe
in the future. Even those pound variables that we do know what they are may change at some future date and any code we have which depends on the variables
and/or their interpretation will fail, and it will be our fault!

Despite the seeming  inconvenience registers are still preferred from the point of view of reliability.

Craig

4257

General Mach Discussion / Re: Endstops and Torch Touch Off - 1 Input

« on: June 21, 2018, 06:37:59 AM »

Hi,
it would seem more likely that it would work that way, at least the input has one consistent mode of behavior. Why don't you try it?
I think you are well down the  'loss of discrimination' track.

Craig

4258

General Mach Discussion / Re: Endstops and Torch Touch Off - 1 Input

« on: June 21, 2018, 06:24:44 AM »

Hi,

Will 3 home inputs and a probe input all work on 1 if they would never be active at the same time?

It might be possible but it would require that the one input be treated differently at different times during a session. When homing for instance
the input has to be treated as a home switch. While having all three axes on one input is likely to confuse you or Mach it could be done.
THEN you want that input to be treated as a probe input, ie different behavior. Unless you can reprogram your ports and pins on the fly
then its not compatible with homing as well.

I would recommend you consider the UC300 or UC400 instead.

Craig

4259

General Mach Discussion / Re: Endstops and Torch Touch Off - 1 Input

« on: June 21, 2018, 12:53:58 AM »

Hi,
yes you can combine all of those and have one input, it would stop Mach.
The only down side is that any of the conditions would always result in Mach stopping,
you couldn't have one input do one thing and another input, say TorchOff, do something
different.

In Control Engineering terms its called 'loss of discrimination'. Its not the end of the world and when
so many users only had one parallel port with only five inputs it was necessary to combine inputs.
In more recent years with external motion controllers falling in price its doubtful we really need to do it
anymore.

For instance the USB connected USS of Warp9's has the equivelant of three ports. If you arrange them suitably
you haven port 1 doing all the normal motor and spindle outputs but the other two ports can be  arranged as
26 inputs and 10 outputs.
The UC300 and UC400 of CNCdrives also have multiple ports which would offer you alot of flexibility.

If you were going for an external controller I would advise Ethernet connection, its more stable and resistant
to electrical noise.

External controllers such as those I've mentioned have a much faster pulse rate and very much more accurately
timed pulses which often results in smoother motion. One last advantage is that you are no longer required to
stick to Windows 7 32bit and earlier....you can use just about any PC and Windows OS you like and often without
interference if some other program is running at the same time as Mach.

Craig

4260

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Are #100 thru #199 #vars safe for user functions?

« on: June 20, 2018, 03:08:25 PM »

Hi,
yes they are good:

Common vars (cleared on startup)
NAME: #Var Num
CMN1 START 100
CMN1 END 199

And:

Common vars (retained across startups)
NAME: #Var Num
CMN2 START 500
CMN2 END 599

This comes from poppabear, and there are some other important gems here as well:

http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,30323.0.html

Craig