Thousands of people are using Huanyang VFD's with modbus plugins, so I don't believe that modbus support in the VFD has been an issue for many years

Gerry, I hope that is correct. But as far as I know Mach 3 only works with HuanYang VFDs using an unsupported, closed source driver.
I have not found any instructions for setting up Mach 4 with a HuanYang VFD.

The Mach 4 documentation does not cover modbus -- the "Mach 4 Scripting Manual" ends with a heading reading "Modbus" with no content following it.

I'm not trying to be snarky, and I would love to have answers to any of the three questions I asked in my original post.

I'm an experienced software developer and I have the documentation for HuanYang VFDs -- if there is any documentation about writing modbus drivers for Mach4 I would be interested in having a crack at it.

Tgdavies;

I believe many are using HY VFD's with MACH4, but just not using MODBUS.  The are using other speed/ direction control methods supported by HY's. 

I would like to use MODBUS to get feedback from the VFD.
I don't have the manual with me but they are solutions such as/ similar to:

- zero to ten volt analog
- continuous digital pulse (similar to step/ direction)

There are many posts to show how these methods are accomplished.

Typing this on a phone so apologies for typos.

As far as I know, there is currently no way to control a Huanyang VFD via modbus in Mach4. It would require someone writing a new custom plugin, as the Huanyang does not use standard Modbus.

So, the answer to your questions are:

1) No
2) Use an analog 0-10V speed control board. You can get either step/dir or PWM versions. Many breakout boards have these built in.
3) No

For YaNvrNo,

Couldn't find the diagram or the chip but I was able to find the posts on the subject:

+  Machsupport Forum
|-+  Mach Discussion
| |-+  Mach SDK plugin questions and answers.
| | |-+  Finished Plugins for Download
| | | |-+  Huanyang VFD controller plugin

page 24, response 230


Which has a pic of the board as it should be and I took a pic of my VFD today which shows the missing u4 chip.

HTH

RT

Folks

In case it's any use to anyone developing a Mach 4 plugin, here's a link to a Windows application I wrote a few years ago to control the HuanYang VFD I had at the time.

I haven't done any further development on it (I had to Google it myself to see where I'd uploaded it to!) as I got rid of the HuanYang kit and invested in a FRENIC Mini.

Code written in C# with Visual Studio

https://github.com/GilchristT/SpindleTalker2/releases

Tommy

Excellent info TommyG - thanks for posting.

Tweakie.

TommyG;

That is exactly were I landed - swap out the VFD: I felt I would always be trying to make the HuanYang VFD work whenever software changed, so I decided to just update the VFD if/ when I upgrade to M4.

Thanks tommyg for the posting of the link. I was able to get my HY VFD running using the spindle talker over RS485. I also have also tried to use the  voltage output from my Gecko G540 wired up to use M4 controls, but having some configuration issues in Mach. I do like the current output feature of the spindle talker app....

this is something i am trying to do, i was able to make my huangyang work with spindle talker 2 and with 0-10v but it would be nice to have modbus working. i dont even know where to start with writing a plugin or how the modbus is supposed to work