...good. So how?

Ivan

I just wired 5VDC from my PC power supply and a ground. i wired the A to the A terminal on the G100 A Axis, and the B to the B terminal on the G100 A axis. I then went into Config plug-ins, set it up there, flashed to the G100. I then wento to ports and pins, MPG's and encoders. It likes multi step best on mine at about 10%. I have attached some pics to help explain.

Brett

Thank you, Brett, now I see what is going on. I shall rewire my MPG.

Time to go to bed...

Regards, Ivan

 

LOL, have a good one and let us know how it works out for you. Pay close attention to all of the settings in the plug-in config screen shoot. Also, make sure when you set the type of encoder, ( current axis setting) you are on the same axis you are wiring it too.

Brett

Hi Brett, got the MPG going in two minutes no problem. Didn't even need to rewire it, as it was connected to B axis, so I simply selected B axis in the setup and it worked straight away! Thanks again. You probably saved me a few hours of frustration... Interestingly, I am not able to find the MPG Mode screen (the one with MPG dial on it). I remember seeing it once, long time ago somewhere, but I cannot find it now. How do you get to it? Is it only in a certain screen set? No luck with homing. I have reinstalled everything and checked all settings, but it still does not work. So I will just wait and see what Art will come up with.

Regards, Ivan

Hey Ivan,
     Glad to hear you got the MPG straight. To pulll up or close the MPG screen just hit your Tab key.

Brett

Guys, I am experiencing exactly same problems! However, my setup was working for long time just fine with one of the older versions of Mach3, Grex plug in and Grex software (I think I installed this earlier this year or late last year). As I had a problem (as did others) with the CNC program stopping for no reason in the middle of a job, I recently decided to update the software. I updated to the latest version of everything which I downloaded two days ago. And this is when these problems started... I am also using a common switch for axis limit and home for each axis. There is no problem with Z axis homing, just like on Monty's machine. And I see all the problems Monty has. As he did, I tried everything, but nothing works. My switches are magnetic with schotky (very clean) output and everything is well screened (and as I said, it was working with older version of software perfectly). There is another common thing in Monty's and my setup - we are both using NC (Normally Closed) limit switches (which Brett isn't). I really cannot think of anything else but that the problem is in the software and we need Art to look at it. Perhaps Brian can ask him? What version of Mach3 and Grex software are you running, Brett? By the way, even if changing switches to normally open would possibly work, I do not want to do this for safety reasons. If any wire to a swich or a switch itself breaks, with Normally Closed switches the machine will simply stop immediatly. But with Normally Open switches it will not stop even when it reaches the limit position!!! Not a good prospect as you can imagine.

Regards, Ivan

Ivan,

Thanks for responding, for a while there I thought I was going crazy. I spoke with Brian on the phone and he wanted me to try homing on the diagnostics page with each axis independently rather than using the reff all home button. You might try the same thing. If we get the same problem (or not) it will help Art and Brian track down the cause. The way I uderstood what Brian said was that each piece of hardware handles things differently and they have to write the plugin/interface for that specific hardware. Some hardware gives them more freedom to handle the limit switch event. Others (like Grex) handle the routine in the firmware. (Brian correct me if I have this all wrong)

The regular debounce settings have no effect on the Grex.

One thing I have learned the hard way is that if this problem occurs, your best bet is to exit and restart Mach. Once it happens the limit switches become unreliable and you might crash the machine. Be safe and overide the limit, drive off, and restart Mach if one axis fails to home properly.

The bottom line is the people experiencing this problem can help isolate the cause by homing each axis individually and seeing if they have the same problem. So far I have not. I will do some more testing today.

Monty

Thanks Brett.
Hi Monty, Brian, I have just run tests homing individual axis as suggested. First of all I have to say that, on my machine, when I click 'Home ALL Axis', it will often get stuck on the first try or very soon after it - like 2nd try. That said, I have now homed each axis INDIVIDUALLY 50 times in a row without a single hitch. BUT - as soon as you start clicking the same home button before the axis is finished moving, it will get stuck when it hits the switch and will just sit there. You then have to reset and back off. In other words, if you click the axis home button few times in a quick sequence, it will get stuck. Hope this will help Art in locating the problem.

Regards,

Ivan

Thanks Ivan,
    We will call this the standard for now until we get the root problem hammered out. Thanks for testing it for us.

Brett

Doing some additional testing I found that when homing an axis individually it is much more stable. It did fail to home all the way a few times, but it did at least back off the limit. Hitting home again would fix the problem.

I also noticed that when you hit the goto Zero button the X and Y move before the Z so don't hit goto Zero if your Z is down in a workpiece.

Monty