Printable View
I have a RF45 clone and a 13x40 lathe with DMM servos, drives and BOB. I just got Mach4 and added an ethernet Smoothstepper for the lathe. I configured the ESS and it works fine in Mach3 but I cannot for the life of me get the motors to move in Mach4. I verified the ESS is working and followed the setup tutorials online for Mach4 -even got the estop to work in Mach4 but the motors don't move. Any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated.
There is no difference if you are still using step/dir,which you would be, with the use of the ESS, did you use the Dmm software or change anything in the Drives,Check the Drives are set drives in Pulse/Dir mode, if the Drives are the set in RS232, they won't do anything with your ESS conectionQuote:
Originally Posted by gt40
The servos work fine in mach3 and I used the same settings for pins 2 dir and 3 step for x and then mapped in mach4 after setting up in the ess config in mach4.Quote:
Originally Posted by mactec54
The way you configure Mach4 with ESS is very different than Mach3. Look on Mach forum and you will find instructions on the process.
Russ
Quote:
Originally Posted by CNCMAN172
I followed the instructions from this video to setup the ess to communicate with it. It shows the correct led with a solid and fast flashing one also.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czHUpPRKwb0
I used the other warp9 video to configure the motors and estop:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEuxOf2kuR8
The estop works on the screen but I don't hear the click when I reset on the dmm board like I do in Mach3. Mach4 thinks the motors are moving but they don't. I did each step exactly as it was on the videos. Really not sure what to do...
What you are describing sounds to me like the enable on the DMM driver has not been enabled. I would recommend you start in Kmotion not KmotionCNC, and check that IO is working correctly. Find out what bit is controlling the enable of the servo driver. You can change those bits manually while in Kmotion and you will probably find the bit that is not getting turned on to enable the drivers. My guess is MACH is sending the commands to ESS and it is sending the step pulses to the servo drive but since it is not enabled the motor is not turned. Do a few tests in this area and I am pretty sure you will discover the issue.
Russ
Something to try, disconnect the Estop, and use a jumper across the Estop on the Breakout Board, and see if you get the Relay reset, (click on the Board) this must reset or nothing will work, how do you have the Ports and pins set for the Estop, So play with the Estop settings until you get it to Reset on the Breakout Board, once you get this reset working, on the Board, then reconnect the Estop wiring, if the Estop wiring is then correct,you will hear the Reset on the Breakout Board, this must happen before anything will work, this is part of the safety circuitQuote:
Originally Posted by gt40
Thanks for the suggestion but unfortunately, I can confirm that jumping the estop did not work. I have previously done that trouble shooting mach3. Considering that I can reset the estop running mach3 but not mach4, it pretty much eliminates a hardware/wiring issue. If I am in mach4 though and hit estop, it shows triggered on the computer but I don't hear the click. I tried making it neg on both the ess config and in the mach config setting like they did as an example of what not to do in the 2nd warp9 video above and it was the same also.Quote:
Originally Posted by mactec54
gt40
If you have not done this, you may have to map the pins as Mach4 may have a different output to match the Dmm Breakout Board, if it is all working in your control and output from the ESS must have the wrong pin configuration or wrong output signal
The Estop is Pin 15 for the Dmm Board, you also may need to reverse the Pin state in the ESS to make it work
Update:
I got Mach4 working with the dmm tech bob and smoothstepper :)
It appears to be a hardware issue with my old XP windows machine I was using for mach3. I took a cheap windows 8 box and formated it and installed windows 10 and went through the same setup process I did on the old computer and everything works.
Mach 4 runs stable and was able to use the same steps I had calculated in mach 3 for each axis. I still have a dro with glass scales on the lathe and it was dead on so the steps settings are equivalent - save those numbers if you are upgrading from Mach 3 to Mach4.
FYI, I found the video below very helpful- just substitute the pinout DMM Tech specifies for their BOB for Mach3 for the ones in the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEuxOf2kuR8
In the ESS configuration, you assign step and direction that match each pin for the DMM BOB, using the same ones DMM specifies for mach 3.
For the x axis, pin 2 is direction, pin 3 is step and so on.
I basically tried to find the equivalent pins dmm specified in the drop down options in the ESS configuration for Mach4. The rest was following the steps in the video.
I really have no idea why my old xp box wouldn't run with mach 4 but in any case it works.
Next step is figuring out the spindle vfd in Mach 4...
Update:
I have the DMM servos and drives working with Mach4 and the Smoothstepper. I was able to cut a 1/2-20 thread and made the gcode with fusion360 and everything cuts fine. Homing though isn't working right: X axis homing works but z does not. I have the same setting in Mach4 for both axis except for the pins and name: Pin 10 for x homing/limit and 12 for z homing/limit. In diagnostics, you can see the lights work when you trigger the limit switch but when you try to home, Z homing does not work. It tries to home and then stops and does not back up, like x axis does. One other thing is that Z axis(Lathe profile) jogging is backwards when I push the jog buttons on the display with the mouse. x axis is proper direction. I don't know if these things are related and really am frustrated at this point.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
you need to weight for about two weeks a new plugin is almost finished being tested now a hell of a lot easier to use and set up and homing should work.
for changing the Z axis direction just change the state of the dir pin ever a green tick or a red X
Quote:
Originally Posted by daniellyall
Thank you for the suggestion-
I was able to correct the z direction by changing the direction pin to neg. The z axis limit issue still is the same with the switch going on and then Mach stops till I reset even though it is triggering the homing/limit switch. FYI, I also tried increasing the backoff speed in the smoothstepper config homing settings but that didn't work either.
Looking forward to the update- any other suggestions appreciated.