Kflop controlling ultrasonic welder...

Hi Tom,

One of my customers has an automated ultrasonic welder. We built a control for it using a stepper, gecko drive and Turbocnc about 8 or 9 years ago. Turbocnc was obsolete then, and even more so now so we would like to update the system and run it with Kflop. Probably overkill but id rather stick to what Im used too.

So just wondering what hardware we should use? I dont know much about driving steppers with your boards. Do I need a kstep or snapamp or can I get by just with kflop and use the existing gecko drive? I need to drive one stepper, need at least 2 inputs, at least 2 outputs. Some extra I/O would be nice for future expansion. I have a 67VDC power supply, and the gecko can be reused or replaced. Let me know what you think.

Mark

Hi Mark,

Geckos are great Stepper Drives and can be driven from KFLOP with Step/Direction Outputs. I’d recommend you keep them.

You might add a Konnect for other IO.

Hi Tom,

Ok sounds good, I will use a Konnect for I/O, never know what we might add so good to have room for expansion.

So whats the best way to make a connection from Kflop to the Gecko? Can I just use a ribbon cable on JP7 and separate the wires im using and connect these directly to the gecko? Like this old picture: https://www.dynomotion.com/Help/Step...pDirLayout.jpg

Does this jp7 cable come with kflop?

Hi Mark,

An unshielded ribbon cable should work if not too long and not excessive noise. The opto couplers in the Gecko are not super fast and take some current so higher frequency noise is not normally an issue.

JP7 ribbon cable is not normally included. If you ask with your order and tell us the length we could include a connector/cable for you. Otherwise see our wiki here.

Hi Tom,

Finally getting around to this project. Have a few questions. Im trying to use Kflop to control a Stepper motor driven by a Gecko G203V drive, and I have a Konnect board for various other I/O.

I have the boards mounted, USB plugged in to laptop and tried running a ribbon cable to the gecko but not getting any movement. Kflop is connecting fine, no issues with drivers this time. Do I need the 5V power supply? I read that it may or may not be required. Im guessing that having the Konnect board plugged in may be an additional load and requires external power?

I measured the voltage at the pins on the gecko. The dir pin measures 0 volts with bit 9 turned on and 0.9v with it turned off. The step pin stays at 0.9V and does not change when i toggle bit 8 on and off. Does this sound like I have a problem with my connections? It is a custom made ribbon cable, with a re-used connector so might be questionable. You guys sent me a long section of ribbon cable, but no connectors so I tried removing one off a shorter cable but the pins may have been warped a little.

Are these connections and settings right? Thanks again.

Mark

Hi Mark,

Change KFLOP’s Output Channel0 to 8 to use TTL output more for these Drives that need current sourced rather than sinked. See also.

Thank you Tom, made that simple change and now it works perfect.

Im going to be using this to rotate a table, then turn on the welder and do its thing, then rotate to next position and repeat. Does so many cycles then waits for operator to load more parts and hit start button. Do you think I should program this with G codes, and use M codes to turn welder on and off, or should I just do the whole process in one C program?

Right now its a pretty simple process. Could easily be programmed either way. Down the road we may consider more automation for this machine, possible automated parts loading etc. Maybe G code would be easier here? Still might be just as easy in C? What do you think?

Mark

Hi Mark,

I can't think of a strong reason one way or another. However you should note that MCodes (other than ones that do Synchronous IO) are not deterministically real-time. So for example say you have GCode do motion of some path followed by an MCode that executes a C Program. There will be a delay between the end of the motion and the start of the C Program execution, Usually a short delay but occasionally, depending on what Windows is doing, might be up to several seconds.

I think for now I will set it up with G and M codes, can always change it out later if I run into problems with delays. Might be easier working with degrees rather then encoder counts.

I guess I made a little mistake here wiring it to axis 0. Is there a way I can set this up as Axis 3 (A axis) without re wiring? I've tried configuring axis 3 the same (channel 8 output) but it doesnt work. Output seems to be in the form of a servo. Stepper makes a high freq hissing sound as soon as i make a move or click enable. Goes away if i disable. Strange.

Could just leave it as X axis I guess even though its a rotary?

Got the last issue sorted out. Just needed to reboot kflop and its fine now working as axis 3.