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Author Topic: CNC stops responding and Jog Z randomly quits working  (Read 669 times)

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CNC stops responding and Jog Z randomly quits working
« on: August 29, 2022, 10:04:57 PM »
I have a couple of issues with my MACH3 powered CNC Mill. It is a Bridgeport Boss 3 retrofit, completed by the previous owner. It uses a breakout board from the LPT port. I have owned it for a few years but I can't ever really trust it to be reliable and honestly regret buying it in the first place. I have decided I really want to get it sorted out so I can depend on it at least mostly.

The main issue is how the machine will function great for several minutes or several hours and then all of a sudden it will stop responding to inputs, like the commands are not getting to the motors. I have had this happen in a program or even when I am setting up a program.

A couple of years ago, I was milling valve reliefs in pistons with it and it performed flawlessly on the first 5 and then I load the 6th and It gets 3/4 done and just stops moving, with the spindle still running. No amounts of resets or anything would get it working again, I couldn't even turn the spindle off from within MACH3.

Tonight I was getting ready to surface a block of aluminum, the machine had been on for a couple of hours and had been working great, then I walk away to grab a drink and when I come back it was totally unresponsive, even the Estop buttons had no effect on MACH3. I power cycled the machine and everything worked as usual again.

The other issue is how the Jog Z+/- (pgup/pgdn) just stop responding. The X and Y always seem to respond on the keyboard but Z stops working regularly. When I check under Config, System HotKeys: everything is 999 again, even the X and Y +/- that were still working. I go ahead and reassign the keys and the Z jog works again for a while.

Does anyone have any suggestions?