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Author Topic: LUV-N the ESS!!!  (Read 7941 times)

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Offline poppabear

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LUV-N the ESS!!!
« on: April 09, 2012, 07:46:26 PM »
Man, I am totally LUV-N the ESS, rock solid, NO NOISE DROPS even in an industrial environment!!

You ROCK GREG!!!!
Thank for for Finally getting this puppy out!!
I won't EVER go back to anything USB (at least for motion).........

Scott
fun times
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #1 on: April 25, 2012, 10:12:19 PM »
I just received an ESS from Homann Designs in Australia and swapped out the USB SS I had on a router. Everything seems to work as expected. I added a $10 ethernet card to the PC and setup is pretty simple.

Couple of things to watch out for.

I have a relay board on port 2 so had to set "port 2 pins 2-9" to "output" in the config screen since it defaults to "input"

For some reason it decided to home my X-axis the wrong way - easy fix in the limits/home settings though.

When trying to open some g-code I got an ESS timeout while the file browser was refreshing, PC was quite busy after rebooting and applying some updates so that could be why it was slow to refresh the file list. I extended the timeout to 3 seconds. Luckily the ESS seems to wake up afterwards.


Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #2 on: April 30, 2012, 06:47:31 PM »
Hey Scott,
Tell me/us about how and why this ESS is better than the SS.
I don't have either but I'm about to take the step. I'm converting a 4,000 lb machine that's using a VFD. I think I might have a noise problem because I'm sometimes gaining steps.
Anyway, looking at seller descriptions of the two, I don't see much to differentiate them, other than 2 versus 3 PP's.

Long time, eh?
Ozzie
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #3 on: May 03, 2012, 03:52:06 PM »
I could not get the USB Smooth Stepper to work reliably on my machine, an axis motor fault would lock-up Smooth Stepper and freeze Mach 3.  This was without even turning the spindle on, just the DC Servo motors controlled by Gecko 320X's and a PMDX 126 breakout board.  I tried every version of Mach and Smooth Stepper driver and plugin.  I rewired and re-grounded my system two times, the 2nd time with pain staking detail and all components mounted to a steel plate and the PC sharing a common ground.  The system was not reliable enough for me to even tune the motors, and I would get a run-away table from time to time.

After fighting that for a while I finally just moved to the ESS and installed it at the beginning of the week.  No more crash or lock-ups of Mach 3.  I finally have a working control system.  I know others have used the USB SS with success , but mine was absolutely non-usable.  I'm very happy that the ESS exists and solved my problems, allowing nice motion control with Mach 3 and fantastic integration with the PMDX 126 board.

Offline poppabear

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Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #4 on: May 07, 2012, 09:30:51 PM »
Ozzie,  what jid2 said, in spades.........
fun times
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #5 on: May 12, 2012, 03:01:43 PM »
I find I am having an issue, just received the ESS to replace the temperamental USB unit and find nothing on the board that mentions Bootp jumper location and nothing in any documentation I have read. I looked at the jumper close to the power in and the Ethernet Cable, that seems to be a 3.3/5.0 volt jumper the other three jumpers look to be connection settings for the three I/O ports.

Any insight would be a big help. Thanks


Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #6 on: May 12, 2012, 03:40:13 PM »
Its the one by power in.
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #7 on: May 12, 2012, 04:10:37 PM »
I have tried moving the jumper to connect both pins, but got the same result as the photo
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #8 on: May 12, 2012, 10:31:12 PM »
Norton is causing my problem.
Re: LUV-N the ESS!!!
« Reply #9 on: May 14, 2012, 07:22:04 AM »
On a different computer all worked fine. F#@%ing Norton

Just for general information:
Set up the network "alternative" computer IP address as 10.9.9.1 so when I dont plug in the network cable to the local hub/switch it defaults to the chosen IP address. That way I still have easy access to my network/internet when I need it (Just not at the same time). Using the BootP setup for the ESS, I set it to 10.9.9.9. Did noticed that after I remove the jumper a complete shut down of ESS and Computer was needed to address the board with Mach3. Also tried an IP addresses that my network is on, but had no luck setting the ESS. (would still like the ability to monitor the machine status remotely, but no luck other than i guess using an IP camera and viewing the machine movement or camera fixed on the screen) Using the network hub lets me use Pokeys 56E, it needed to be set to 10.9.9.2 using Pokeys setup software. I purchased the keyboard PoNET kbd48CNC that Boris/Pokeys sells and I have to say that is a beautiful piece of work and fine addition to a new build. Have some minor issues to work out but it is a learning curve. Hope that helps a few, now back to cutting chips.