(sorry for double posting. I posted this in FAQ before realizing this was a general area)
Hello all.
Noob here.
I'm using the popular Chinese interface board and building up a system. I have the Toshiba drivers and all that. (If anyone needs the actual hardware items specified then it's no problem to get them for you)
It's taken a few weeks to iron things out to this point. First I had a faulty power supply. It was supposed to be a 12V supply but only putting out 2.6v. Now I'm using a 24v 20A power supply It's overkill but I already had it so that's where I'm at.
I'm using NEMA23 motors that are 8 wire but have isolated the 4 wire configuration.
My PC is Windows 7 32-bit fresh install.
Mach3 software is a fresh install, but a demo version (don't know if demo acts different than official version)
Parallel cable is new.
5v power to interface board is supplied via USB cable that I isolated the positive and ground (just occurred to me that I didn't test the voltage on the USB power wire)
Through trial and error I found out that I had the wiring set up as common cathode and changed everything to common anode (+)
Last night I was not getting any results, per usual, and then after adding the common anode the X axis worked. Y, Z, and A were still holding, no matter what test I ran.
This morning I thought I'd start swapping things around to rule out different things being problems. I disconnected the steppers and then tested them one at a time and verified that all the steppers were good.
I disconnected all the driver blocks and tested them one at a time. They all work with the X-axis test but none work with any other axis test.
I replaced ALL the wires from the interface board to the driver blocks.
I had a second interface board so I disconnected the old one and installed the new one and get the exact same results.
X-axis will work as configured but no other axis will.
I checked the address of the parallel port and it matches Mach3.
My motor outputs are
X - 3/2
Y - 5/3
Z - 7/6
A - 9/8
I have tried switching to 2/3, 4/5, etc and it won't work, even the X axis won't work at that point.
I can provide screen shots as needed.
Any help appreciated.