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Author Topic: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue  (Read 1330 times)

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Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« on: May 19, 2020, 03:46:17 AM »
I've just set up Mach4 with the Darwin pluggin and I cannot get any movement on any axis when trying to reference home. I get a message saying all axis referenced but nothing moves

I can jog the axis and the dro's show correct movement, I can MDI and move an axis a set amount so mach4 has control of the motors correctly. All my limit/home switches light up correctly for each axis in diagnostics when manually triggered too.

I'm lost to what the cause of this is, it's as if it sees the axis homed without any movement. Also I've not set anything up in home/limits yet so the tick for reference in place is not active.

Offline Stuart

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Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #1 on: May 19, 2020, 06:19:28 AM »
I think you have answered your own question “no home/limits connected or set up”
How can it home if it does not know where home is . It’s homing in place because it’s lost
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #2 on: May 19, 2020, 06:23:23 AM »
I think you have answered your own question “no home/limits connected or set up”
How can it home if it does not know where home is . It’s homing in place because it’s lost

Hi Stuart

I worded that wrongly sorry, I have set up home and limits and they do trigger properly in inputs/ouputs diagnostics screen. I meant i haven't set home in place as active as i know the axis wouldn't move if that was the case. Also worth mentioning that the dro's do not zero in machine coord even though it says home is finished.

Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #3 on: May 19, 2020, 06:25:00 AM »
Ps, how do you edit a thread you've started on here I cannot see the option in "actions" :)
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #4 on: May 19, 2020, 09:03:12 AM »
Ps, how do you edit a thread you've started on here I cannot see the option in "actions" :)

Hi Mark.
You only have the option to edit your post for a few minutes, then it times out.
It helps to avoid confusion later on if edits come in after subsequent postings/responses.
Russ
 :)
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #5 on: January 20, 2021, 07:27:24 AM »
Same issue here,

Iam very new to the Mach-ecosystem. Iam coming from linuxCNC, machine works fine.
Then i tryed Mach3 first (demo version) and everything works fine (homing, jogging,...)
then i tryed Mach4 + Darwin:

Jogging over keyboard is possible, Inputs configured (homing and limits) but when i click on "Ref All", button gets grayed out and nothing happens.
also its not possible to switch on Mist or flooding. (outputs configured to correct pins. If i click "Toggle" in Darwin-config-outputs, the solenoid gets activated correctly)

3hours of testing and reconfiging yesterday, but couldnt sort it out.

anything else what i can try?
anything else of information i should provide?

thank you in advance.

Fr33man
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #6 on: January 20, 2021, 01:24:52 PM »
Found out.
  It's a licensing problem with Darwin.

  It would be great if you put some information on the Darwin plugins page that the demo version has this limitation.

  Very annoying and unnecessarily time-consuming!
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #7 on: January 20, 2021, 11:28:04 PM »
Hi,
Darwin is very much an after thought, Mach4 was always designed to be supported by an external motion controller
like an Ethernet SmoothStepper or a Hicon Integra.

Art Fennerty, the chap who wrote the now famous Mach3 parallel port driver agreed to write another and very last parallel port
driver for Mach4. It is supposed to be its last evolution....hence the name Darwin. Note also that the intellectual property is
Art's, and the license fee is paid to him not New Fangled Solutions, the owners of Mach4.

I think the intention was that Darwin would allow someone to experiment with  machine capable Mach4 solution without going to the expense of
a motion controller. As such Darwin works but it misses a number of realtime supports, things like backlash comp, hardware THC, lathe threading.
My understanding is that those supports will never be implemented in Darwin.

If you want all of the features that Mach4 offers then get an external motion controller.

Craig
'I enjoy sex at 73.....I live at 71 so its not too far to walk.'
Re: Mach4, Darwin and Ref all home issue
« Reply #8 on: January 21, 2021, 04:42:50 AM »
Thank you for the explenation of the History of Darwin.

But that doesnt solve the main "issue" that nobody knows about the limitations of the demo-version and maybe also struggle around with this problems.

i would recommend to add only a small hint on the plugin page: Demo only allows to test and configure the paralellport, it doesnt allow automatic movements through Mach4

thats all

but thanks anyway