Messages

21

Third party software and hardware support forums. / Re: DMM Dyn4 Servo Drive Tuning.

« on: March 18, 2021, 11:50:35 AM »

You should be able to play with the acceleration for the motor in Mach for the Z axis to reduce the 'shock' load that the servo sees on starts and stops.
At least you can in Mach4.

22

Mach4 General Discussion / NAMUR Sensors, how to wire?

« on: March 18, 2021, 08:20:43 AM »

I'm working on bringing a fairly large panel router back in line after a bad retrofit. All the limits on the machine and the spindle RPM sensor are NAMUR sensors, meaning they change amps rather than volts and I've got 2 sensors per axis, so 7 NAMUR sensors total.
So it's great I figured that out, but I'm a bit clueless on some basic electrical principals, but I can make analog circuits just fine.
How can I get the amplitude change to register in Mach4? If you have a basic circuit diagram you can point to, I'll puzzle the thing out, but I'm a bit at a loss right now.

Controller is ESS Smoothstepper via C11G and C25S breakout boards.

23

Third party software and hardware support forums. / Re: DMM Dyn4 Servo Drive Tuning.

« on: March 18, 2021, 08:12:47 AM »

I might be able to help a bit, I've been beating my head on the DMM servo settings in Mach4 and their auto-tune settings on a panel router.
What sort of performance issues are you seeing or not seeing? I'm asking this as there are a bunch of tricks for working around the auto-tune to wring the most out of your unit.

24

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Colombo Spindle help

« on: March 16, 2021, 07:34:55 AM »

So, for the folks curious and following along I read the manuals again and looked at what was on the machine.
The wiring and circuit for the RPM sensor and tool changer are all gone.

The inductive sensors are all PNP and should have resistors and a circuit to pulse the input to the board, so time for some math and circuit board design. I wanted to cut out all the bus bars in the thing and make it tidier anyway, so not a bad thing to need to do.

25

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Colombo Spindle help

« on: March 15, 2021, 11:07:33 AM »

Words

Hey, a starting point is better than nowhere. I'm just happy that is not caught fire since the guy doing the retrofit quit working on it.
I wish I was joking about that, it happened more than once.

26

Mach4 General Discussion / Colombo Spindle help

« on: March 12, 2021, 05:45:19 PM »

So I'm trying to figure out how to get an accurate RPM reading on our Colombo spindle. I'm walking into a job that was left 1/2 done and I admit I'm not an expert, I'm just the guy that it falls to make it work.
Firstly, the spindle is brand spankin new, old one burnt out as the guys that did the 'retrofit' didn't know that the air wasn't cooling the spindle, so at least I know that the spindle is good and the sensors are in working condition.
Now here's my problem, the sensor is listed as a NAMUR, which a quick google told me is an inductive pickup sensor.
The spindle should be sending 2 pulses per rotation, so I set it up to send 5v to the sensor and the return to lucky 13 on the input and told Mach 4 control and ESS that is the spindle RPM sensor pin.
Well, it's getting........something?
Speed reading is bouncing all over the place at rest and has no real relation to actual spindle speed (checked by running spindle directly from VFD at lowest speed and watching readout).
So what am I missing? Sensor power range is listed as 5-30vdc, but later notes in the manual state +24vcc for all the sensor power needs. Does this mean I'm going to have to puzzle out a step down or some other means for the system to read the sensor?

27

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Losing Z reference with G Code generated from Fusion360

« on: August 31, 2020, 07:27:40 AM »

This from the autodesk support folks:

"delete this in the NC code in all spots where it shows up and carefully take a trial in the machine.

G20
G28 G91 Z0.
G90"

Did so and the problem appears to have ceased, which makes me wonder why those codes ended up producing this issue.

28

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Losing Z reference with G Code generated from Fusion360

« on: August 27, 2020, 06:42:52 AM »

The Autodesk rep said it looks like a post problem and gave the issue to someone else.......

Disappointing.

29

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Losing Z reference with G Code generated from Fusion360

« on: August 26, 2020, 04:31:50 PM »

Nope didn't fix it, tried it with a different job, still losing Z with code generated by Fusion 360

30

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Losing Z reference with G Code generated from Fusion360

« on: August 26, 2020, 03:19:30 PM »

Doing so, just trying to find the time to do it.