Ok i've never got this CNC plasma running correctly. I built it from scratch 3 or so years ago. And it runs, but not consistently. Most of the time the torch moves to the start position, turns on, start the arc and then does nothing and gives me the error MACRO ALARM: 3 MERROR_TIMED_OUT. I usually have to restart mach or the computer or both to get it to cut.
I'm using a brand new Hypertherm 85 Plasma Cutter, Pokeys57CNC (which I'm very good at using, I have this motion controller on 3 of my machines with no problems.), Pokeys Plasma Sens THC Module (thought it might be that as I started with the Proma THC 150, but that didn't change anything).
The main problem I've always had is the THC doesn't follow the contours of the metal. I've tried everything and all the equipment works, but it never seems to move the torch head. I've never had good luck with laptops and cnc, but the plasma is outside in a pop up sealed tent thing so I used it for that. I just changed to a desktop to see if that made a difference, but it was an old PC I pulled from work as it was running slow. I reinstalled windows 10, re-setup the entire system. When I cut the torched finally moved, but I couldn't always get it to actually run as after it started the arc I'd get this error MACRO ALARM: 3 MERROR_TIMED_OUT. So I bought a new old computer from amazon, re-setup everything and tried again. Now it won't run even after restarting mach or anything. Arc starts and then I get this error. I'm at my wits end.
Any help would be appreciated.