Hello,

I recently got a Chinese 6090B variant machine from CNC-Warehouse, they call it the CM-6090B. It has a ~24" x ~36" x ~6" working area and a 2.2kW spindle with a Fuling 2.2kW inverter.
It has a parallel port BOB that can be seen here (http://www.automationtechnologiesinc.com/products-page/breakout-boards/kl-db25rs).

The Stepper controllers are Leadshine M860's. It is a three axis machine, although I have a rotary that I will eventually set up as the X axis when using it.
I have spent a couple of days getting familiar with the machine & Mach3. So far I have the X,Y,Z axes moving; the home switches (proximity) trigger properly.
I have a few issues that I cannot seem to work out before I can go any further.

1) When I try to ref all home, the Z axis references first. It stops just past the home switch after it activates it, but does not back off until the switch turns off as I thought it was supposed to.
    Then, the Y axis tries to home. It does not move- but the DRO coordinates for the axis show that Mach3 thinks it is moving. I can ref home the all axes individually. However
    if the X or Z home switch is active the Y axis will not move. I have to back off the X & Y axes to turn off the home switches before Y will move. I haven't figured out why.

2) I have not been successful in getting the spindle to operate. Probably misconfigured (I hope), but I am sure it is wired correctly.
    BOB has four wires to spindle; GND, SPEN, GND, 0-10V connected to DCM, S1, ACM, V1 on the Fuling VFD in that order. The Mach3 setup is confusing me.

3) I cannot determine the Stepper models, the labels are unreadable except I can just make out "450A". The M860 driver is factory set at 5.83A peak, 4.16A RMS.
    The steppers seem to be working OK, but I don't have enough experience to tell for sure. Like, how
    long should it take for the axes to travel the full table, what they should sound like, etc. Do I need to know the model #s for anything?

4) In motor tuning, I set the "Steps Per"...
    X- 3/4" ballscrew @ 10mm pitch (.3937") @ 2.54 rev/inch x 200 step/rev  x 8 microstep = 4064.008
    Y- 3/4" ballscrew @ 10mm pitch (.3937") @ 2.54 rev/inch x 200 step/rev x 8 microstep = 4064.008
    Z- 1/2"  ballscrew @ 5mm pitch (.19685") @ 5.08 rev/inch x 200  x 8 microstep = 8128
    Velocity
    X- 196
    Y- 196
    Z- 98.425
Do these numbers look right?

The machine was supposed to come with a USB controller. Should I switch the parallel out to a USB?

I have attached my XML if you have time to look at it.
I would appreciate help, this is unfamiliar to me, especially the many settings in Mach3. I did not think I
would be jumping into the guts of this stuff just to get it to work but that's how it is going.
Thanks!

Welcome to Mach.

How are your switches wired? Series with NC connections?

2 limits on each axis and a home switch?

Do all share the same pin?

Is each axis set up this exact way?

Does each axis have its own pin or all 3 share 1 pin?

It sounds like you must be sharing 1 pin. During the ref process the Z moves first (this is correct and helps keep from breaking tools etc) though I think your home switch is being mistaken for a limit switch. Mach backs off of a limit switch, not sure of the home switch as I dont run them. The odd thing is you state the DRO is still moving for the next axis but you see no stepper movement. That is not right but Mach is pretty complicated at times. Most likely a setting.

In your ports and pins "inputs" are both the home and limit switches enabled?

Regarding the spindle, again there are quite a few settings that can be easily misunderstood. Not only that but if you are new, what method might you be trying to activate the spindle? You probably havent set up hotkeys or the relays yet either in "outputs" Have you programmed the VFD to get its operational signals from an exterior source?

There are also a few settings under spindle , again in ports and pins. There are 2 that have a bearing, "disable spindle relays" and "motor control". How these are checked or not will be dependent on the signals needed. Dont worry this confuses most us. Solve the other issues first.

The steppers, it would be nice to know the model. If not at least how many wires are coming out of it. Pictures at this point would also be very helpful. The more the better IMO. Use your cell phone. The speed it takes to travel lock to lock is dependent on many things velocity, accel, voltage of your power supply, ballscrew pitch, microstepping, direct drive on the screws or geared. With the velocity numbers you stated 196, if you are in inches and new to this, 196ipm should seem very fast. It is. More on this later. Your math looks correct to me.

If the machine was supposed to come with the USB controller, why dont you have it? Personally I would go Ethernet before USB. It appears to be a much more stable format. Same price if you have to buy it or close enough. A smoothstepper will allow many more inputs and outputs. Potentially 6 axis IIRC and 3 ports if Ethernet, 2 if USB. Plenty of room for any kind of expansion. More to read and understand though too.

I didnt see your xml but the forum wont allow you to attach it as an xml. Rename the extension to .txt or similar and you can post it.
Hope this is of some help. Sorry this was incorrect, Mach does allow xml's but yours wasnt attached.

Hello, thanks for the help.
At this point I just have proximity switches for each axis home. I have them setup in input as pins 11, 12, 13 on port 1. None of the other inputs or any outputs are active except EStop. I have it set to Pin 0 until I can wire a relay on the current machine estop. It is wired as a looped 220v circuit that connects to the coil on the 240v magnetic switch and shuts the entire machine down. I think I need to wire a 240v relay into this circuit so I can switch a signal to the Estop on the BOB. Or maybe a current loop would work.
I measured the voltage on each of the home sensor pins; they show 5v when off and drop to 0v when on. They seem to be operating correctly.
Anway I have turned off everything else so I can rule out I/O conflicts. Y axis basically freezes when either the X or Z home switch is active.

I'm not sure what is the best way to run the spindle. Right now there are four wires and none of them connect to the relays. Just don't know yet.

I'm trying to get the part numbers for the steppers. They are 4 wire. I will post a pic of one of them along with my xml file.

Thanks again for the help!









 

Whoops, my mistake. The motor outputs for the axis steppers are also active. They move in the right direction and the velocity/ acceleration seems ok for now.

How are you supplying the 0-10v for the VFD? In my experience you take the 10v from the VFD, feed it to your controller as a 10v source. Mach and your controller regulate that voltage back to your VFD dependent on what RPM you request (half of max speed=5v).

I think my BOB outputs 0-10vdc by PWM control. It has an adjustment pot. I attached the diagram.

Thanks!

Regarding the Y axis ref home issue, I noticed that on the diagnostics screen that when any of the home switches are triggered the M1Home M2Home M3Home diagnostic screen lights flash intermittently, they do not stay on. However, on the BOB board the Led's corresponding to the configured inputs for the home switches light and stay lit when the axes reach the home switch.

I don't know if this is normal behavior, but it seems to me that when the home switches are active that the diagnostic screen led's should remain on?

Thanks

I disconnected my BOB from the machine side Power Supply and left it hooked to the PC. The P17 output LED and the power LED lighted faintly. I measured the voltage on the logic pins at the parallel port header and read around 3.3v. Looks like my parallel port is 3.3v. Powered off and reconnected the power to the BOB and reset everything.

I triggered the inputs on the BOB by shorting the input pins to ground (the pins were at 5v high). All of the LED's for the pins lit up correctly as they were triggered. Interesting thing, when I triggered the X+,X-, Y+,Y-, and Z+,Z- the corresponding LED's lit and also the  P11-P13 inputs lit- X+,X- triggered input 13, Y+,Y- triggered input 12 & Z+,Z- triggered input 11. I have those pins setup in Ports/pins > inputs as X home on pin 11, Y home on pin 12, and Z home on pin 13. Does that sound normal?

   Sorry I had not looked at your BOB. Most work about the same. The differences are pretty minor in regards to operation. Isolation circuits and additional features like relays are the norm.

   You got it from John @ Keling a.k.a. Automation technologies. The documentation was weak at best that I saw. From what I could read, it does lead you to believe it supplies the 0-10v. I would test it with a voltmeter.

 On the differences of the LED's of the BOB and the diagnostics screen. I would think they should match. I will have to verify in a while on my mill.

  The 3.3v could be a concern. I know that was 1 of the big issues with using laptops and parallel ports. Generally they output 3.3v and controllers had a problem recognizing the differences between 0 & 3.3v. My understanding is that a logic signal is 0 or 5v. I could and have been wrong before this is vague to me.

OK I know I am replying to myself here but I will post as I make progress in the hope it may help someone else sometime.

The home switches (proximity sensors) are currently tied to pins 11, 12, 13 inputs. I noticed that the diagnostics screen lights would only flicker intermittently when the switches were on.

I determined that my PC parallel port was at 3.3v on the logic pins.

With the X proximity switch off I measured the voltage at input 11; it was 5.2v.
With the proximity switch on I measured the voltage at input 11; it was 0v.

Then I measured the voltage at the parallel port header.
With the proximity switch off I measured 4.52v on header pin 11
With the proximity switch on I measured 1.46v on header pin 11

Then I disconnected the input wires from the BOB.
At the parallel port header I shorted pin 11 to gnd. The Mach3 diagnostic light for Motor1 Home lit up.

It seems the parallel port is not getting the signal it expects.