Hello Smurph,
                     I asked a question in the general section of the forum and someone suggested I ask you, so here goes.
I think Galil boards are very expensive and I know of a PCI motion control board made by a company called Mesa
Electronics   www.mesanet.com   The board is a 5i20    I have no idea how Mach3 communicates with the Galil
board, so please go easy on the technical details at first. This board can be used with a bit of software you may
or may not have heard of called EMC2, which runs under Real Time Linux.
Any and all help, advice and info. gratefully received.

Thanks in advance

Dave.

Yes, I have thought about writing a PlugIn for the AnythingIO boards.  But I had all a few Galil Controllers laying around and decided to use them instead.

While some Galil controllers are PCI based, there would be no other similarities to the Mesa cards.  Galil provides an API library to access the controllers.  Mesa does too, but the APIs are totally different.

EMC2 uses the HOSTMOT configuration.  This is the configuration where the host closes the loop and it requires a real time operating system.  For Mach, the SOFTDMC configuration would be the choice.  It could be done, I'm sure.

Keep in mind that in order to run analogue amps with the Mesa boards, you will need their PWM to analogue converters as well.

What would it take for a Mesa Plugin to appear?  Well...  form the looks of the current PlugIns available, they come to life in one of four ways.

1) A programmer that likes to play CNC has a device that he/she wants to use and then they make it so. They may choose to "give" this PlugIn to the Mach community.
2) A manufacturer has a device that they want to run with Mach.  (Vital Systems)  They hire (or have) a programmer to write the PlugIn to insert themselves into the Mach market to sell the hardware device.  A commercial venture, so to speak.
3) A programmer writes a PlugIn for a device, that he/she thinks will be desirable in the Mach market, to sell the PlugIn.  Another commercial venture.
4) Art or Brian just gets froggy and decides to write the PlugIn for reasons of their own.  (Galil, G100)

I would probably write a Mesa PlugIn if I had the Mesa hardware.  But since I don't have the hardware and I already have Galil hardware, I can't justify buying the Mesa stuff.  If I bought the hardware just to write a PlugIn, the resulting PlugIn would most likely not be free as I would want to recover my investment in the hardware.  It's a lot of work.  You need a computer with Mach, VS2003 compiler, and the hardware device in it, all sitting very close to a test machine with motors on it.  And hours upon hours of time to spend on it.  I can't even begin to count the hours I have spent on the Galil PlugIn.  There are 4 people that have contributed to the Galil Plugin that I know of.  Brian, Jeff Birt, Kenny Crouch, and myself.  I would imagine that the total man hours spent on it's development is probably quite staggering. 

So for now, if you want to run a closed loop servo system, your choices are the Vital Systems DSPMC/IP and the Galil.    Or, if you wanted to write a plugin, both the Galil and G100 PlugIn source are in the Mach SDK.  You can look at them and learn about what information Mach can send to the PlugIn.  But the actual implementation for the Mesa is bound to be as different as the difference between the Galil and the G100.

Steve

Aren't you forgetting one option for servos, Mesa AnythingIO board and EMC2?  :-)  I know that Linux freaks people out though.:-)
Thank for your help and advice Steve.

Dave.

Hello all,
I just wanted to put up a great big thank you to Steve and Kenny for all that they have done.. This is everything that I could have hoped for! I love to see the code public and people working together to make it work!

So again THANK YOU BOTH!

Thanks
Brian

Is the Galil DMC 2040 (USB) supported by this plugin?

All of the needed stuff is in the 2040 controller, but USB has never been tested.  It would really depend on the speed of the USB connection.  Some vendors choose to emulate a serial port with their USB interfaces and they are subject to the speed limitations of the serial port.  I have no idea if this is the case with the USB Galil controllers.

They only way to know is to try it.  I've been trying to find a USB controller to test with, but no joy at this point.

If you have a USB controller, try it out.  If you don't have the controller, consider getting a PCI or Ethernet controller instead.  I much prefer the Ethernet controllers as it allows for the controller to be placed in the machine control cabinet.

Steve

Thanks, that's encouraging.  I'm somewhat early in the build process but I will try it out with my controller and let you know how it works out.  I think that the USB controller can still be placed inside of the control cabinet, I'll just need an extension cable with a bulkhead connector for the USB.  Let me know if you foresee any other issues.
Thanks again.

Version 4.0 of the Galil PlugIn has been released.  You can download it from the PlugIns download section.

Direct MPG support - The smoothest MPG jogging you will ever see!!!  (Kenny is the man!)
Axis mapping - Allows sinusoidal commutation axes to work plus greater freedom while commissioning the machine.
Smoother user interface (DROs and toolpath).
Probing support - G31 probes are now supported.  (However, the 3d probing plugin is not supported.)
Choice of two motion modes - Linear interpolation and contour mode.  You can choose which one works best for you!
Each different Mach profile can use a different Galil controller, if required.
Accelera (the latest and greatest from Galil) are supported.

Along with the PlugIn, there is a PDF user manual.  Be sure and read it as there are differences in the way input and output signals are handled (Ports and Pins) as compared to the V3 Plugin.

The Probing requires a special setup and it is not in the documentation as yet.  I will try and get that documented as soon as possible.

Thanks to all who tested this Plugin!

Steve

Version 4.1 of the Galil Plugin has been released.

It corrects issues when running high encoder counts.  This one is capable of running 700 IPM with an encoder count as high as 32768.  It may go faster, but my motors are maxed out.

We will be working on threading and tapping now.  It will all be theoretical, as I don't have a machine that will do either.  But that is the next item on the list.

Steve

How to use the analog inputs available with Galil pci 18xx cards. The Galil plugin document does not say anything about configuring analog inputs .
I would like to use these available Analog inputs for Feed and Spindle override control .
Sivaraj