Messages

5811

Mach3 under Vista / Re: 32 Bit Win 7 Unresponsive

« on: November 27, 2017, 06:28:55 PM »

Hi,
have a look at:

4.1.5 Enable pin.

in the manual.

In the paragraph it says:

If this
function is not required, an jumper can be placed between +5vdc and the EN
terminal.

Craig

5812

Mach3 under Vista / Re: 32 Bit Win 7 Unresponsive

« on: November 27, 2017, 06:25:14 PM »

Hi,
from your desrciption the BoB is not enabled therefore any signals which may be getting to the BoB are not passing
through it to the drivers. Need to work out what is required to enable your board.

Craig

5813

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 newbie here. I need some help

« on: November 27, 2017, 05:38:30 PM »

Hi Azalin,
I'll try it tonite after work . The code for the speed estimation and synchronisation is built into Mach, beyond what
we can see or manipulate. If nothing obvious ocurrs to us then you may be best placed opening a support ticket at
NFS. The only couple of times I have done so worked out well, took a few days but it did happen.

Craig

5814

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 newbie here. I need some help

« on: November 27, 2017, 04:28:47 PM »

Hi Azalin,
sounds my like general advice rather than to you specifically.

Are you using the lathe screen set or the mill set?. I was going to suggest setting up a profile in Mill to see if the
index/DRO True Speed function works.

Craig

5815

Mach3 under Vista / Re: 32 Bit Win 7 Unresponsive

« on: November 27, 2017, 12:38:45 PM »

Hi,
does the breakout board have LEDs on the outputs?. If it does do the Dr LEDs change as you MDI or jog back and forth?

Craig

5816

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 newbie here. I need some help

« on: November 27, 2017, 05:48:49 AM »

Hi Azalin,
AFAIK that all looks good and I don't know why its not working.


Tweakie

Mach requires one pulse per rev, an index, to calculate and synchronise a thread. Mach assumes that the speed is constant even when the tool engages the
material and starts cutting. We all know that is never actually the case, the spindle always slows a little. Even with closed loop control a feedback of one pulse
per rev is not enough for a controller to maintain spindle speed accurately enough for threading.

Sorry Craig but this is not quite true - there are many lathe users threading this way.

My understanding is:
Mach assumes constant speed. If the speed slowed over one revolution as a result of the cutting forces then Mach would attempt to cut the thread but do so
inaccurately. With spindle speed averaging it will take Mach several revolutions before a more accurate estimate of speed is available. If the spindle has significant
inertia and/or power then the speed change will be slight and the thread cut fine. A lightweight or underpowered spindle and the speed change could be significant
and the thread inaccurate.

For situations where the spindle is marginally powered, which is the same as saying taking heavy cuts relative to its power, then a higher bandwidth control
loop makes the most of the power available.

To my knowledge no-one has repealed Nyquist's sampling theorem and the control bandwidth is inextricably linked to the number of pulses per rev.

Several months ago I bought a 1.8kW Allen Bradley servo and drive for a spindle motor. Its encoder is 2000 line or 8000 count per rev with a loop update rate
of 20kHz. It beats any other spindle motor for speed/position accuracy that I've ever come across. Had I not bought one and tried it for myself I would not have
believed how much superior a servo could be over an index pulsed motor.

Craig

5817

General Mach Discussion / Re: moving mach3

« on: November 27, 2017, 12:57:31 AM »

Hi,
2) No. Machs parallel port is very much more than just the DB25 socket, it is also the software that generates the required pulse streams for the motors.
A 64 bit OS cannot do this, it requires a 32 bit OS Windows7 or earlier. Note that Mach will run fine on just about any Windows PC from XP onwards but
NOT the parallel port.

There are many external motion controllers that will do the job, some connected to the PC by USB and others by Ethernet with Ethernet being quicker and lower
latency preferred. Not a lot in it, both USB and Ethernet work fine.

As far as shifting Mach3, I wouldn't bother. Download and install a fresh copy. The only stuff you need from the old files are your .xml profiles and your
lic.dat file. Any macros and brains should also be transferred. If you are using a 64bit  PC don't try to install the printer port...it will fail.

Craig

5818

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with this

« on: November 26, 2017, 09:06:38 PM »

Hi,
the smooth stepper ran out of data. Your best bet is to go to the Warp9 site, there are a number of specific recommendations
dealing with this exact issue. A search on the Warp9 forum or a question on the forum will yeild plenty of results.

Craig

5819

General Mach Discussion / Re: how to configure mach3 closed loop spindle control

« on: November 26, 2017, 06:51:21 PM »

Hi,
Mach3 is not a closed loop controller.

"use spindle feedback in sync mode"

refers to Mach reading the index pulse used particularly for lathe threading.

closed loop spindle control"

if relying on the index pulse (once per revolution) even if Mach could close the loop its going to be that slow
to respond that it would still be unusable for lathe threading.

An external motion controller with feedback capability (rare and expensive) or alternately an AC servo and matching
driver (which are closed loop by design) is indicated.

Craig

5820

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Button OFFLINE

« on: November 26, 2017, 04:36:45 PM »

Hi,
I think you may be confused by the difference between disabling a drive and disabling an axis in Mach4.

If you disable the drive but otherwise leave Mach alone Mach will carry on as normal, the DROs will move, you can
jog, MDI and so on but the servo won't move, ie offline. When you go to re-instate the servos you will need to code
so that the actual machine co-ordinates are reflected in Mach and would be included in the <Offline> button.

If you disable an axis in Mach the servo stops but so does the DRO, you can't jog, MDI etc. Not much use.

The behaviour is really determined by the servo drive which is why I recomend a few simple experiments. If your servos
respond the same as mine then this whole thing will be easy.

Craig