Hi,

Ive recently completed a build and having problems getting the Z touch plate to work correctly.
The machine has DMM servos and drivers installed and the usb controller from CNC4PC. The machine and all limits work fine, the input is solid for the probe too.

The problem is after the first detection the Z goes very high and stops, looking at the DRO's they continue to count, Im not sure if this is the encoder doing its stuff or what.
Ive tried Gerrys 2010 screen and big-tex, both do the same thing? All home switches work fine, changing the debounce makes no difference either.

Ive posted a video here www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn4gAOuBIZI sorry for the poor quality but youtube flipped the video over and degraded the resolution.

ANy help would be much appreciated.

HI
I have seem a similar thing but I did not have it hooked to my table.  I don't know if you were using lazycam to set up the routine but I do know that it Will assign a value of 60 for the "Z" axis I would stop it after a short time so I cannot say if it would got to 12. on the DRO.  Look in the g-code to see what value the command for the "Z" return is.
have fun
Tom

Hi,

Ive recently completed a build and having problems getting the Z touch plate to work correctly.
The machine has DMM servos and drivers installed and the usb controller from CNC4PC. The machine and all limits work fine, the input is solid for the probe too.

The problem is after the first detection the Z goes very high and stops, looking at the DRO's they continue to count, Im not sure if this is the encoder doing its stuff or what.
Ive tried Gerrys 2010 screen and big-tex, both do the same thing? All home switches work fine, changing the debounce makes no difference either.

Ive posted a video here www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn4gAOuBIZI sorry for the poor quality but youtube flipped the video over and degraded the resolution.

ANy help would be much appreciated.

Sorry, I didn't see this until now.

When it goes up and stops, is there a message displayed in the status bar? If it says "Probing Complete", then it's most likely that noise triggered the probe twice, and the probing routine finished.

As for the DRO's still counting after movement stops. That should never happen. It almost sounds like the drives have faulted and Mach3 is unaware of it? But if that's the case, then the macro might be still running?

Gerry

OK, I watched the video and have a better understanding. The DRO's counting is Mach3 doing the second probe, but for some reason you're drives aren't moving?

Also, between probes, the Z should only lift about 1/8". I have no idea why your's is lifting so high??? Is it hitting a limit switch when it goes up that high?
Do you have a Z home switch, and did you home the machine before the auto zero?

Hi Gerry,

While the DRO's are counting the motors are still moving ever so slightly.
I belive the fault to be with the USB controller as switching back to the parallel port makes everything work as it should.

I dont belive there is any noise on the system, I have disconnected the VFD and with the USB controller attached it faults. The popup is your way of saying the Z is going higer than the home switch to stop it runninginto it.

I have emailed the manufacturer and waiting for them to get back to me, they were very quick to reply and are looking into it. The fault is the same on both your screen and big-tex and only present when the USB contoller is plugged in. Parallel port works fine.

I will update the post with progress as the manufacturers get back to me. For now its back to the good old parallel port!

Thanks for the replies guys, much appreciated.

They should be moving very slowly for the second probe, so that is correct.

The macro does a G31 probe move, followed by a G0 rapid move that should only go up 1/8".
Apparently, your controller is doing something wrong after the G31.

Yes I agree, they are looking into this and I will report back the findings to help others.

Update: uc100 firmware has even updated to fix this problem, it was an error n the g31 code and as nw been fixed. Probe is working fine now. The manufacturer was very helpful and arranged to fix the bug very quickly.

I'd be lost without the use of the touch plate, invaluable!!

Cheers everyone.