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61

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Re: Custom motion plugin: Home()/Purge() never called + Motor Tuning graph broken on

« Last post by mtl on July 20, 2026, 12:21:15 PM »

Mach3. Sorry, this seems to have landed in the Mach4 board by mistake - I meant to post it under "Mach SDK plugin questions and answers." Could a moderator move it there if possible? Thanks for the reply.

62

MachPro General Discussion / Re: BUG? Axis A not homed... but I have no A axis

« Last post by Sunkistist on July 20, 2026, 12:19:21 PM »

Sorry to hear you're in a similar boat. Yes, I've got an ESS with an MB3. My guess is there's something going on where the import profile doesn't get it quite right.

I found a work around I'm not proud of but my machine is working. I gave up hunting settings and just enabled Motor3 and assigned it to the a axis, made sure it was set to "home in place" and then assigned some unused output ports on the ESS to the motor. Learning from a different issue I believe there's some setting buried in the config --> settings that is associated with the a axis, but not labelled as such, that would make the program think it needs an a axis.



Cheers,

63

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Re: Custom motion plugin: Home()/Purge() never called + Motor Tuning graph broken on

« Last post by Bill_O on July 20, 2026, 09:23:23 AM »

I know nothing about what you are doing but I do have one question.
Are you using Mach3 or Mach4?

64

MachPro General Discussion / Re: BUG? Axis A not homed... but I have no A axis

« Last post by phil@highside.co.nz on July 20, 2026, 05:32:28 AM »

I'm having the same issue with my upgrade from Mach4 Hobby to MachPro.
My install is running an ESS motion controller.
What is yours?
Wondering if there is something amiss in that department.
Cheers
Phil

65

Mach SDK plugin questions and answers. / Custom motion plugin: Home()/Purge() never called + Motor Tuning graph broken on

« Last post by mtl on July 18, 2026, 03:30:39 PM »

Hi all,

I've written a custom external motion device plugin (USB/serial connected, our own hardware) based on the official BlankMovement SDK template. The following is confirmed working:

- JogOn/JogOff are called correctly, and we drive real motion via Engine->Axis[a].Jogging
- Notify() receives real events (EX_SPINON, EX_MOTORTUNED, etc.)
- Our device is continuously, actively connected and communicating (verified via constant serial traffic)

Two things are NOT working:

1. Home() and Purge() are NEVER called - not via a real click on "Ref All Home", not via programmatically simulating DoButton(22-25), and not by setting Engine->Homing / Engine->AutoHome to true ourselves.

2. The Motor Tuning screen draws a normalized (0-1) graph and won't accept entered values, but ONLY for axes that are Enabled on the Motor Outputs screen. For a disabled axis, the screen behaves completely normally.

Question: Is there an undocumented step/flag/sequence in InitControl/PostInitControl/Update that we're missing, which is required for Mach3 to treat a plugin as a "fully authorized" real motion device for Home and Motor Tuning purposes? The SmoothStepper FAQ mentions this is related to "continuous communication with the board," but we already have that - and these two features still don't work.

Additional question: Beyond this specific issue - the official BlankMovement SDK template is just a skeleton and doesn't include a full working example where Home/Jog/Motor Tuning genuinely work end to end. Does anyone know of a publicly available, fully working open-source example plugin? A reference like that would have prevented this kind of "undocumented requirement" issue from the start.

Thanks in advance for any pointers.

66

MachPro General Discussion / Re: ESS Spindle Setup

« Last post by lmarti13 on July 18, 2026, 09:44:25 AM »

I did, but the spindle didn't work.  Maybe it was because I was on an old version of the plugin, before the spindle change in v278.  Anyway, once I remapped the spindle PWM to the proper output name, it is working.

Most likely I did something wrong... ;o)

67

MachPro General Discussion / Re: ESS Spindle Setup

« Last post by cd_edwards on July 18, 2026, 09:28:09 AM »

you didn't use the MachPro import Mach3/Mach4 setting when installing MachPro?

68

MachPro General Discussion / Re: ESS Spindle Setup

« Last post by lmarti13 on July 18, 2026, 09:14:19 AM »

Thanks for the suggestions.

I finally had the time to go back and compare notes from the Warp9 v275 plug-in configuration that was the last working one before I upgraded.  I made a mistake in mapping the spindle PWM signal in the new plug-in that supports Mach Pro.  Once I fixed that, my spindle is working as expected.

Lynn

69

MachPro General Discussion / Re: ESS Spindle Setup

« Last post by Sunkistist on July 17, 2026, 02:44:44 PM »

Yes, sorry I assumed the MB3 which is the only BOB I'm familiar with. But either way I think all the BOBs have the 10v analog out for spindle control so that remains a viable test strategy right? Also, the plugin portion for the ESS in Machpro would be the same regardless of the BOB right? Genuine question, not a push back, I'm here to learn too. I guess we need to confirm if OP has set it up digitally in MachPro the way it was working in Mach4.

70

MachPro General Discussion / Re: ESS Spindle Setup

« Last post by cd_edwards on July 17, 2026, 12:27:45 PM »

I'd be hesitant to share my ini since I'm wrestling with other problems but I'd recommend looking at your spindle tab in the ESS plugin settings. One thing I noticed right after I migrated was that the spindle settings hadn't been merged into the new MachPro profile. Mach had the default 60hz in the PWM version for spindle control and my VFD/ESS likes 260 Hz, at least for my TECO L510. Next thing I'd look for is what is the spindle speed output signal mapped to in the ESS plugin, I used the standard 0-10v analog dedicated for spindle control and it seems to work fine. After that I would check the spindle speeds in the Mach config settings... after I migrated I had to tweak the table similar to what these instructions say.

One quick sanity check would be to do an M3 S500 or something and then measure the voltage on the ESS analog pins (assuming thats how you're controlling the VFD), then change the speed to say... double what you first chose and see what the new voltage is. If the voltage doesn't follow the M3 commands then it would suggest the VFD doesn't have anything to do with the problem and it's either the ESS or Mach.

It won't be the ESS with analog pins. It's the bob attached to the ESS. I use C25XP from cnc4pc which has a analog 10v output for the spindle control. along with 2 relays for forward/reverse and a PWM signal.